Transliteration

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Transliteration is the attempt to represent the text of one language in the writing system of another. For instance, for the Greek term Template:Angbr, which is usually translated as Template:Gloss, the usual transliteration into the Latin script (romanization) is Template:Angbr;Template:Citation needed and the Russian term Template:Angbr, which is usually translated as Template:Gloss, can be transliterated either as Template:Angbr or alternatively as Template:Angbr.

Transliteration is the process of representing or intending to represent a word, phrase, or text in a different script or writing system. Transliterations are designed to convey the pronunciation of the original word in a different script, allowing readers or speakers of that script to approximate the sounds and pronunciation of the original word. Transliterations do not change the pronunciation of the word. Thus, in the Greek example above, Template:Angbr is transliterated as Template:Angbr, though it is pronounced exactly the same way as Template:Angbr, i.e. Template:IPAblink; likewise, Template:Angbr is transliterated as Template:Angbr, though pronounced as Template:IPAblink rather than Template:IPAblink, and Template:Angbr is transliterated Template:Angbr, though pronounced as Template:IPAblink (exactly like Template:Angbr) rather than Template:IPAblink or Template:IPAblink, and is not a long vowel.

Transcription, conversely, seeks to capture sound, but phonetically approximate it into the new script; Template:Angbr corresponds to Template:IPA in the International Phonetic Alphabet. Here, Template:Angbr palatalizes the preceding Template:Angbr, and thus is represented in IPA with Template:IPAblink, the palatal allophone of Template:IPAslink. Likewise, the tonos diacritic Template:Angbr to denote stress of a syllable is transcribed as Template:Angbr IPA in IPA.

Angle brackets Template:Mono may be used to set off transliteration, as opposed to slashes Template:Mono for phonemic transcription and square brackets Template:Mono for phonetic transcription. Angle brackets may also be used to set off characters in the original script. Conventions and author preferences vary.

Definitions

Template:Unreferenced section Systematic transliteration is a mapping from one system of writing into another, typically grapheme to grapheme. Most transliteration systems are one-to-one, so a reader who knows the system can reconstruct the original spelling.

Transliteration, which adapts written form Template:Em altering the pronunciation when spoken out, is opposed to letter transcription, which is a letter by letter conversion of one language into another writing system. Still, most systems of transliteration map the letters of the source script to letters pronounced similarly in the target script, for some specific pair of source and target language. Transliteration may be very close to letter-by-letter transcription if the relations between letters and sounds are similar in both languages.

For many script pairs, there are one or more standard transliteration systems. However, unsystematic transliteration is common, as for Burmese, for instance.

Difference from transcription

Template:Unreferenced section In Modern Greek, the letters ⟨η, ι, υ⟩ and the letter combinations ⟨ει, oι, υι⟩ are pronounced Template:IPA (except when pronounced as semivowels), and a modern transcription renders them as ⟨i⟩. However, a transliteration distinguishes them; for example, by transliterating them as ⟨ē, i, y⟩ and ⟨ei, oi, yi⟩. (As the ancient pronunciation of ⟨η⟩ was Template:IPA, it is often transliterated as ⟨ē⟩.) On the other hand, ⟨αυ, ευ, ηυ⟩ are pronounced Template:IPA, and are voiced to Template:IPA when followed by a voiced consonant – a shift from Ancient Greek Template:IPA. A transliteration would render them all as ⟨au, eu, iu⟩ no matter the environment these sounds are in, reflecting the traditional orthography of Ancient Greek, yet a transcription would distinguish them, based on their phonemic Template:Em allophonic pronunciations in Modern Greek. Furthermore, the initial letter ⟨h⟩ reflecting the historical rough breathing ⟨ ̔⟩ in words such as ⟨Template:Translit⟩ would intuitively be omitted in transcription for Modern Greek, as Modern Greek no longer has the Template:IPA sound.

Greek word	Transliteration	Transcription	English translation
Template:Lang	Template:Transliteration	Template:Transliteration	Template:Gloss
Template:Lang	Template:Transliteration	Template:Transliteration	Template:Gloss
Template:Lang	Template:Transliteration	Template:Transliteration	Template:Gloss
Template:Lang	Template:Transliteration	Template:Transliteration	Template:Gloss

Challenges

A simple example of difficulties in transliteration is the Arabic letter qāf. It is pronounced, in literary Arabic, approximately like English [k], except that the tongue makes contact not on the soft palate but on the uvula, but the pronunciation varies between different dialects of Arabic. The letter is sometimes transliterated into "g", sometimes into "q" or Template:"'" (for in Egypt it is silent) and rarely even into "k" in English.^[1] Another example is the Russian letter "Х" (kha). It is pronounced as the voiceless velar fricative Template:IPA, like the Scottish pronunciation of Template:Angbr in "loch". This sound is not present in most forms of English and is often transliterated as "kh" as in Nikita Khrushchev. Many languages have phonemic sounds, such as click consonants, which are quite unlike any phoneme in the language into which they are being transliterated.

Some languages and scripts present particular difficulties to transcribers. These are discussed on separate pages. Examples of languages and writing systems and methods of transliterating include:

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