#i know the phonetic alphabet and by god im going to use it

[thisoneweirddragon]

My brother is bullying me because I think delta-tango is the better way to communicate the letters d-t instead of dog truck

[glazeliights]

Danganronpa in toki pona part 1: names

toki!

since Im both a danganronpa fan and a conlang enjoyer, I had the idea a while ago to try and translate parts of it into toki pona (not whole games, god no. just snippets, maybe some ftes). while I assume this is mostly going to interest people who already know about conlangs, I still want it to be readable by people who have never heard of them in their life. so

what is toki pona?

toki pona is a conlang (short for constructed language, a language someone made up, think: esperanto or tolkiens languages. theres a lot I could talk about here but rn thats all you need to know) made by sonja lang. it was created to be as minimalistic as possible with a vocabulary of about 120 - 150 words depending on who you ask. it onls has 9 consonants and 5 vowels, which means theres some restrictions for how you can transliterate names into toki pona (called 'tokiponization').

lets get into how that works

tokiponization

since tokiponization is based on pronounciation rather than spelling, its important to know what sounds were working with. this is where I might lose some folks that dont know any linguistics stuff, but this section is optional. you only need to read it to find out how the names turned out the way they did, and how to say them out loud.

consonants

the nine consonants of toki pona are m, n, p, t, k, s, w, l, j. these are pronounced like their ipa (international phonetic alphabet) counterparts. its not necessary to know what that means, just know that [j] is pronounced like english <y> (as in yes, not as in synth). everything is else is p much how an english speaker would expect it.

the way consonants are tokiponized goes as follows:

voiced stops and fricatives are devoiced (z, d, g, b > s, t, k, p)

labial fricatives (f, ɸ) become p

coronal fricatives (and affricates) (θ, ʃ, ɕ, ts, tʃ, tɕ) become s

the japanese r [r] becomes l (the english r [ɻ] becomes w)

h is dropped word-initially and becomes w or j intervocalically

v can become p or w but Ill use w here

vowels

toki ponas vowels are a, e, i, o, u. this is almost the same as japanese, which has ɯ instead of u, but since its just the same sound with a rounding difference its tokiponized as u. japanese also has a length distinction, which toki pona doesnt, meaning long and short vowels will simply be the same length.

syllables

toki ponas syllable structure is CV(n) meaning that each syllable must have a consonant and a vowel (except word-initially where it can be just a vowel) and can optionally end in n. this is fairly similar to japanese syllable structure, but one thing is that japanese has palatalized consonants. this is pretty easy to solve by just inserting -ij- to mimic the sound. generally with tokiponization its preferable to preserve syllable count rather than add extra sounds but 1) if you say it quickly its barely noticable and 2) its my project and I can do what I want.

the other thing is that while in toki pona, vowels need to be seperated by at least one consonant, japanese allows you to theoretically chain together as many vowels as you want. I tried to find out whether vowel sequences are pronounced as diphthongs or disyllabically and turns out its a little complicated because those terms are defined in terms of syllables and japanese is mora-timed rather than syllable-timed. Ill admit I only have the faintest clue what a mora is but for the purposes of this project I will be treating vowel sequences as seperate syllables when possible. if it isnt, due to the syllables wu, wo, ji, and ti being forbidden in toki pona, Ill treat them like diphthongs in that the second vowel is just dropped entirely.

some smaller notes:

the only phoneme allowed in syllable codas is n, so for example gundham becomes kantan

stress always falls on the first syllable

and the final, rather important thing

the way names work in toki pona is that you have to describe what the thing is before saying the name (for example, canada is called ma Kanata, which literally means canada-place). therefore people are generally called jan [name], however, some tokiponists use a different term before their name (called a head noun) either for fun or to express something about themselves (such as many plural systems using kulupu ("group")).

theres quite a few options for varying what head nouns someone uses for themselves or others to add nuances. for example, I think gundham might refer to himself as a jan wawa ("powerful (in the sense of supernatural powers in this case) person"), or perhaps hiyoko might call mikan a jaki instead of a jan to insult her. theres a lot of fun to be had here.

the actual names

THH:

jan Makoto Najeki

jan Kijoko Kilikili (note: kili is the toki pona word for fruit so her name here literally says fruit-fruit)

jan Pijakuja Tokami

jan Toko Pukawa

jan (moli) So (note: jan moli here would mean killer to translate the spirit of her original title better, but since her talent would include it anyways Im not sure whether to use it?)

jan Sajaka Masono

jan Lejon Kuwata

jan Siwilo Pusisaki (note: yes this means their name is pronounced pussysaki. do with this info what you will)

jan ante/jasima (note: alter ego. lit: "different/reflection person", I feel like jasima fits more but Im also kinda unsura abt using nimi pu ala in the names and talents. I would definitely use at least nimi ku suli in the actual translations but for names and talents its like. hm :/)

jan Monto Owata

jan Kijotaka Isimalu

jan Ipumi Jamata

jan Selesija Lutenbeku/Tajeko Jasuwilo

jan Jasuwilo Akakule

jan Sakula Okami

jan Awi Asawina

jan Mukulo Ikusapa

jan Sunko Enosima

soweli Monokuma

SDR2

jan Asime Inata

jan Isulu Kamukula

jan Sijaki Nanami

jan Nakito Komajeta (note: I think he may also switch to a more self deprecating head noun when hes having a Moment)

jan Sakisi/Pijakuja Tukami (note: since tu means two, the togami/twogami thing works just as much in toki pona as it does in english)

jan Lijota Mitala

jan Telutelu Anamula

jan Mawilu Kowisumi

jan Peko Pekojama

jan Pujuwiko Kusuliju

jan Ipuki Mijota

jan Ijoko Sajonsi

jan Mikan Sumiki

jan Akane Owali

jan Nekomalu Nita

jan Kantan Tanaka (note: probably calls himself jan wawa or perhaps even usawi ("magic/supernatural") if I feel spicy enough to include nimi sin)

jan Sonja Newaman

jan Kasuwisi Sota

soweli Usami/Monomi

NDRV3

jan Kajete Akamasu

jan Suwisi Sajala

jan Kato Momota

jan Maki Alukawa

jan Kokisi Oma

jan Lantalo Amami

jan Lijoma Osi

jan Kilumi Toso

jan Imiko Jumeno

jan Ansi Jonaka

jan Tenko Sapasila

jan Kolekiju Sinkusi

jan Miju Iluma (note: I think she may also call herself jan sona or smth like that for "genius")

jan Konta Kokuwala

jan Kipo (note: possibly he gets called jan ilo (robot, lit: "tool/machine-person") to convey how the others set him apart from humans at times. kokichi probably calls him just ilo when he wants to get a rise out of him)

jan Sumuki Silokane

soweli Monotalo

soweli Monosuke

soweli Monopani

soweli Monotan

soweli Monokito

UDG. I guess

jan Komalu Najeki

jan Monaka Towa

jan Masalu Tamon

jan Satalo Kemuli

jan Kotoko Usuki

jan Nakisa Sinkesu

jan anpa (note: this is servant, anpa means "below, downward, lowly")

jan Asi Towa

jan Iloko Akakule

jan Tasi Pusisaki

jan Juta Asawina

soweli Silokuma

soweli Kulokuma

[sparkelingspectres]

ooh please do tell more about languages and their origins and about the manuscripts that sound cool

HHHHHHHHH okay so I mainly gravitate towards studying abrahamic Faith's and Germanic/Latin/arabic languages so yea. But full disclosure Im a meat brain who accidentally made this all about religion on accident but dw I'll do a part 2 sometime focussing more on languages. Also I dont even know where to begin because just *brain fizzes like a soda can* so i guess I'll just go down the same rabbit hole I did earlier but if you have any more questions or specific topics feel free to hmu!! Also I'm writing this in between customers so sorry if my responce is hella late and kinda uncoordinated (scroll down to bottom for footnotes)

So today i got to talking about different translations of the bible and one of the things we discussed was the partial removal of gods name in the king james translation* and the few scriptures where gods name, in this case translated as Jehovah, was kept in (mostly in the hebrew scriptures but a few in the Greek)

Then we started discussing what the meaning of the name jehovah is, which can be partially explained in exodus 3:14 where god himself speaks to moses and says the phrase אֶהְיֶה אֲשֶׁר אֶהְיֶה

Which is most commonly translated as "I am that I am"* but I also wanted to include translations of the original hebrew spelling as well which is יהוה‎ * which directly translates as "to be".However scholars have also translated yhwh to mean He Who Makes That Which Has Been Made” or “He Brings into Existence Whatever Exists” which led me to researching alternative titles used for god such as elohim/eloah/allah all of which directly translate to "god"

And just thinking about all the different translations of gods name sent me into a total rabbit hole of different understandings of scriptures bc overall christianity/Judaism/and Islam share core beliefs, a lot of the differences is just alternative understandings of the same texts as well as different primary focuses (first thought was how both muslims and Christian's believe in jesus but only muslims talk about Muhammad. as well as in Islam jesus is one of the prophets but in christianity hes gods son and also how Judaism uses the first 5 hebrew scriptures while some sects of christianity use both the hebrew and christian greek scriptures) and just hhhhhhh I could go on and on and on about comparisons, contrasts, understandings, and beliefs are unique to each core religion but I've already typed a bunch and have kinda dug myself into a conversational rut here lmao sorry I didnt mean this whole thing to be about abrahamic religions but I'm at work rn and ran out of spoons to write any more so I'll have to do a part 2 or something focusing on languages and alphabets!! Thank you for allowing me to pontificate a bit :D

*the reason for the name removal was most likely a misunderstanding of one of the 10 commandments "thou shalt not take the name of the lord thy god thy god in vain". Basically his understanding of that was that gods name it too holy to be spoken among humans however there are about 7 scriptures I think where he did keep the name Jehovah it the verses instead of removing it

*other translations of this verse include "I will become what I choose to become" and "I am the existing one"

* the direct letter translation of יהוה‎ is YHWH pronounced phonetically as yah-weh, which when translated into english is commonly spoken as Jehovah or Yehovah