United States Assessment of the Downing of Flight MH17 and its Aftermath

[happyslug]

47. Transliteration is a factor

Transliteration is the conversion of one alphabet to another. We in the West use the Latin Alphabet, which goes as far east as Poland. Most Slavic languages (Poland and Czech are the two biggest exceptions, but there are others) use the Cyrillic Alphabet. Thus not only to you have to translate words, but actual letters of the Alphabet (and that means translating sounds those letters represent).

On top of the problems with transliteration, is the Slavic Languages have what is called an "Iodation" and "Palatal approximat". These involve consonants and involved Y when it is a consonant, not a vowel (Thus in English the Y in you is a consonant, while the Y is Sky is a vowel, in the Cyrillic Alphabet Y means the vowel after it has a different sound then if it was alone)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iotated

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palatal_approximant

In simple terms Ye and Yi (Cyrillic иï, In Ukrainian and ие, in Russian) are the same sound. The better translation would be to just the letter i, thus Kiv should be the better transliteration (In older papers you will see Kief, when the v sound is a f sound in English so if that v is an f sound, it should be transliterated as Kif).

On the other hand tradition does kick in and Kiev is how the name was translated into English for Centuries. Since the break up of the Soviet Union, the Ukrainians have tried to make Kyiv the official English transliteration (NOT translation but transliteration, the actual name of the City did NOT change just how you write in down in English).

Please note, this is unlike Bombay and Peking, where a more precise translation of the actual name became preferred, Mumbai and Beijing replacing Bombay and Peking. The older names were English names for the same cities, but do to weaknesses of the English translators of the 1700s, a less then accurate translation occurred. In recent decades a more accurate translation of the actual name into English has occurred, and thus we use Mumbai and Beijing instead of they older English names.

On top of the Yi and Ye transliteration problems, you have the additional problem if I or Y for the Cyrillic letter "и". This is a minor problem compared to the above Ye and Yi transliteration but it is a factor. Thus the letter "и" appears in both the Ukrainian and Russian names for Kyiv/Kiev but is made a when Ukrainian is preferred or I in the case where Russian is preferred (Thus the Yi and Ie differences between the Russian and Ukrainian printed name for the same City).

The Cyrillic "и" (Which is a Vowel) can be viewed as a Latin "i" or a "y". Polish uses the Latin Alphabet, thus Polish Names ending in an "i" sound always end in an i, for that is how such names are written in Polish. Russian Ukrainian names are traditionally written in the Cyrillic Alphabet and thus when converted to the Latin by changing Cyrillic "и" to a Latin "Y", through it is the same sound. Thus Russian names ending in the Sound "i" are transliterated as ending in "y" instead of "i".

Thus the sound represented by the letter Cyrillic "и" can be either I or Y in English.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I_(Cyrillic)

It is called a "close front unrounded vowel":

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Close_front_unrounded_vowel

Cyrillic "ï" becomes

Cyrillic "ï" vs "е" represent different vowels.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yi_(Cyrillic)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yo_(Cyrillic)

Thus "ï" vs "е" by themselves represent different vowels, but remember Yi and YE are even more different sounds.