Feedback - town and place names in romaji

[SnowJapan 178]

Hi there

 

I have a question and thought I would ask people on here - for our upcoming updates, we want to be consistent as possible with the way we write down things like place names in romaji (ie. abc).

 

What do you think is the best way to write these, making it easy to understand and easy to pronounce -- without using symbols above the letters?

 

大台 (おおだい)

 

Odai

Ohdai

Oh-dai

Oudai

Ou-dai

 

大穴

 

Ohana

Oh-ana

Ouana

Ou-ana

 

奥羽 (おうう)

 

Ou

Ouu

Oh

 

I'm not showing any preference for any of this as would like to see feedback and what people think on the subject.

 

Thank you.

[SKI 15]

I would like to know too!

 

[grungy-gonads 54]

Is there a "correct"?

 

Personally I would go with

 

Oh-dai and Oh-dai as that's how we would read it.

[Metabo Oyaji 71]

Tough ones. I guess I'd go with:

 

大台： Ohdai

大穴： Oh-ana

奥羽： Oh-u

[SKI 15]

Could you explain why MO?

[Metabo Oyaji 71]

1) "Oh" to suggest dragging out the "o" sound. (At least the "h" might make someone pause while pronouncing the word to wonder, "why is that h there?") (And using "Oo" and "Ou" seems likely to lead to wildly wrong pronunciations by people unfamiliar with Japanese.)

 

2) Hyphen after the "h" when it is followed by a vowel, to separate it.

For example, if I see "Ohu," I want to say "O who." But "Oh-u" tells me to put the "u" into a separate syllable.

 

And yes, one might complain that "おお" and "おう" are both collapsed into "oh" this way, which is a loss of information and hence not ideal. But it seems a reasonable short-cut that leads people unfamiliar with Japanese to a somewhat correct pronunciation, while still signalling to those who do know Japanese that this is more than just "お," all without resorting to extra markings.

 

Anyway, just my thoughts, not that I'm any kind of transliteration expert.

[rach 1]

I agree with what Metabo said

 

[Sciclone 2]

I'd do it like Õ (tilde on top) to show an enlongated sound. It's how I'd usually write it, or else Oo is my preference. Having said that I still write 五 as Goh sometimes.

[SnowJapan 178]

Thanks all.

 

I think we actually wish to avoid any symbols on the tops of letters.

[frannyo 2]

Having said that I still write 五 as Goh sometimes.

 

Why would you do that?

[Sciclone 2]

Old habits.. It was how I was taught at primary school. I think the teacher did it to make us enlongate the sound.

[frannyo 2]

But that kanji is not, on it's own, an elongated sound.

 

[Sciclone 2]

When you're learning numbers it is...

[frannyo 2]

No, it isn't.

 

Not if you are learning to pronounce things correctly anyway.

[muikabochi 208]

1) "Oh" to suggest dragging out the "o" sound. (At least the "h" might make someone pause while pronouncing the word to wonder, "why is that h there?") (And using "Oo" and "Ou" seems likely to lead to wildly wrong pronunciations by people unfamiliar with Japanese.)

 

2) Hyphen after the "h" when it is followed by a vowel, to separate it.

For example, if I see "Ohu," I want to say "O who." But "Oh-u" tells me to put the "u" into a separate syllable.

 

And yes, one might complain that "おお" and "おう" are both collapsed into "oh" this way, which is a loss of information and hence not ideal. But it seems a reasonable short-cut that leads people unfamiliar with Japanese to a somewhat correct pronunciation, while still signalling to those who do know Japanese that this is more than just "お," all without resorting to extra markings.

 

Anyway, just my thoughts, not that I'm any kind of transliteration expert.

 

Sounds very reasonable to me that.

 

Clever man, Metabo Oyaji.