Alien names, second try
Feb. 1st, 2012 04:17 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
beccaelizabethNobody thinks Darwin sounds like an alien. Fair enough.
Poll #9352 Name for an offworlder
Open to: Registered Users, detailed results viewable to: All, participants: 5
Do these names sound like an offworlder
Which do you like best for our biologist
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Date: 2012-02-02 04:16 am (UTC)~
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Date: 2012-02-02 05:12 am (UTC)(I looked it up)
Bible names In Space gets... complex.
Also I was looking for a boy name.
It probably looks more Kryptonian though.
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Date: 2012-02-02 05:33 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-02-02 05:44 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-02-02 05:46 am (UTC)...Although it's not that kind of -el ending. It's a different spelling and meaning, it's not one of the series of Daniel/Michael/Raphael ones. Whole other. *grin*
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Date: 2012-02-02 10:28 am (UTC)Thanks for making my point for me :) Of course Yael is an alien name, for anyone who isn't from one particular culture! It IS alien for non-Hebrew speakers, and hasn't been popular enough in English to be naturalised, unlike, say, Deborah, which I assume would feel less alien although it comes from the same bible chapter.
http://www.behindthename.com/
Anything from any culture that isn't one's own is likely to feel alien. But would that be sufficient for fictional naming? Depends on a whole lot of work-specific factors.
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Date: 2012-02-02 04:42 pm (UTC)I'm using Behind The Name for my name lists, it's fun.
Yorath and Yale are Welsh names, spelled the English way though, Yorath should be Iorwerth.
Since the character writing them down is English but then there's a Welsh character hearing them too I thought it was funny, they can have this exact argument in character.
Plus the stargate is in Wales, so why not a Welsh name? It opens up all sorts of arguments about when the last time their cultures connected was.
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Date: 2012-02-02 09:40 pm (UTC)I assume you've seen the name statistics on Behind the name, and the variations for each name as well as variations of popularity across cultures in the same period.
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Date: 2012-02-03 07:08 am (UTC)(that's the same type of "el", btw, but that's just random)
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Date: 2012-02-02 05:38 am (UTC)My point is, he may have been sshhhtthhshss*click*mmm*snort*kkkkkkreeeep on his own planet, but here they call him George. Solve problem?
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Date: 2012-02-02 10:09 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-02-02 04:38 pm (UTC)For this post I meant offworld humans, humans of another culture that branched thousands of years ago and possibly pre writing.
But it is important, with alien naming, to remember they wouldn't have the same invisible lines that readers are used to. And then balance that with something an actor or reader is going to have to deal with :-)
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Date: 2012-02-02 04:33 pm (UTC)I forgot to write in this post I mean offworld humans, like in Stargate. and they have Babelfish that rewire your brain to talk their language, if you want. Mostly they rewire themselves to talk English too though.
but their language could still be clicky and tonal and sounds that English doesn't use, and then their names would be, and then they could have nicknames. That would work.
and yes, lots of colonial renaming happened. or still happens, some.
I'd still need to invent a clicky name once, but he could be Darwin after that.
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Date: 2012-02-02 04:57 pm (UTC)Glad if I could help :)
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Date: 2012-02-02 09:51 pm (UTC)b. That Babelfish translates the content communicated or the language or whatever, but would it translate a name? Would it identify a name? [Sorry, that's the linguist in my wondering about the practicality of this. ]
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Date: 2012-02-02 10:31 pm (UTC)They plug in to one brain, learn the way that speaker knows a language, and then plug into another and give them the language they just learned. Details depend on what I want to do to be funny or create complications. Like, they learned English from a science fiction fan, now all the aliens know words like frell and grok and goa'uld, but not all the English speakers do. Once there has been time for all the offworlders to have a go with the fish then all the audience hears is English, plus funny sounds where something doesn't translate, like a word or a name or a title.
Since it's a cheat, I've not thought it through very hard.
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Date: 2012-02-03 10:48 am (UTC)However I did not know it was suck a creepy sounding cheat. *making abortive moves to scratch ear*
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Date: 2012-02-03 06:38 am (UTC)Like they turned Yishai to Jesse..
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Date: 2012-02-02 08:58 am (UTC)But I kind of like "Yash" because it sounds like a sort of intoxicated guy saying, "Yes."
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Date: 2012-02-02 04:36 pm (UTC)Now I can hear Yash that way. Now I don't think I'll use it.
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Date: 2012-02-29 10:21 pm (UTC)