Gaddafi? Kadafi? Qaddafi? What's the correct spelling?

[somone]

http://www.csmonitor.com/World/2011/0222/Gaddafi-Kadafi-Qaddafi-What-s-the-correct-spelling

Gaddafi? Kadafi? Qaddafi? What's the correct spelling?
You say, Gaddafi, we say Qaddafi. Other variations on the leader of Libya include "Gathafi," "Kadafi," and "Gadafy," creating an unholy mess for newspaper editors.
By Eoin O'Carroll, CSMonitor.com / February 22, 2011

Each time Libya appears in the news, scores of newspaper editors go bananas. Once possessed of faculties that could detect a breaking story as readily as a dangling participle, these poor souls are now reduced to a jabbering stupor, as though they had gazed into the tentacled maw of Cthulhu himself. Blame it on the name of the country's head of state, Colonel Gaddafi. Wait, no, that's Kaddafi. Or maybe it's Qadhafi. Tell you what, we'll just call him by his first name, which is, er ... hoo boy.

Part of the problem here is that there's no universally accepted authority for transliterating Arabic names. Normally, news outlets will just go with whatever spelling the subject prefers, but this particular subject hasn't settled on a single Roman orthography for his name. Instead, Libya's Brother Leader lets a hundred flowers bloom. The banner at the top of his official website spells it, "AL Gathafi." But if you go deeper into the site, you'll see it variously rendered as "Al Qaddafi," "Algathafi," and "Al-Gathafi." Adding to the multitude of his spellings is the increasingly ironically named "Al-Gaddafi International Prize for Human Rights."

And that's just the surname. Variations on his given name include Muammar, Moammar, Mu'ammar, and Moamar, and many others. Once you've settled on how to spell his first and last names, you then have to decide whether you want to add the Arabic prefix "al-" before his last name. Which can also be spelled "el-." And then you have to decide whether the prefix should be capitalized. This is the point where most editors give up and run a story on Justin Bieber instead.

For those few brave editors who press on, the result is a multiplicity of spellings. The Associated Press, CNN, and MSNBC spell it "Moammar Gadhafi." The New York Times spells it "Muammar el-Qaddafi." At the Los Angeles Times, it's "Moammar Kadafi." Reuters, the Guardian, and the BBC go with "Muammar Gaddafi." The Irish Times goes with "Muammar Gadafy." ABC News – which spells it "Moammar Gaddafi" – has posted a list of 112 variations on the English spelling of the Libyan strongman's name...

[Make7]

1. I just spell it 'Asshole'. ( n/t )

[Syrinx]

2. .

معمر القذافي

[BOG PERSON]

3. this is the correct spelling:

معمر القذافي

[ProgressiveProfessor]

4. Would they settle for "The weird guy in charge in Libya?

Some names just don't Anglicize well

[cbayer]

5. here.

معمر القذافي

[Blue_In_AK]

6. Does it really matter?

We all know who they're talking about with each of these spellings.

[Ilsa]

7. That's a 25 year old question, at least. I remember it

In 1986 after the air strikes on Libya.

[socialist_n_TN]

8. I believe it's all of the above.........

As another poster said, Arabic sometimes doesn't translate into English very consistently.

[damntexdem]

9. Gawdawful?

Gonedaffy?

[hlthe2b]

10. C_L_O_W_N

Anyone dressing up like that can only spell it one way. :eyes:

[asjr]

11. I have seen it as Kadaffy Duck. About

20 years ago there was a newspaper cartoon calling him that.

[bbgrunt]

12. correct spelling: jim jones

[SoCalDem]

13. p-s-y-c-h-o

[DainBramaged]

14. Schmuck

[roamer65]

15. H-I-T-L-E-R.

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

16. What's Arabic for "goofy fucker?"

[DainBramaged]

17. And it sounds funny as shit too

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