Re: Hiatus within words

On Mon, Oct 30, 2000 at 08:38:12PM -0500, Roger Mills wrote:
> ---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
> Sender:       Constructed Languages List <CONLANG@...>
> Poster:       Roger Mills <romilly@...>
> Subject:      Re: Hiatus within words
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> I've never heard the native pronunciation of "Hawai'i" or "Maui"-- but
> theoretically, historically, they should be 4 and 3 syllables respectively.
> Hawai'i = other PN Sawa iki 'little Sawa' (the traditional homeland) --
> since PH /s/ can correspond to Malay/Javanese /j/ (dZ), it has often been
> proposed that Sawa = Java (but nooooo, or at least, not likely).  IIRC
> "Maui" corresponds to others ma'ui, and indeed to NZ maori, *ma+qudip
> 'alive; to live'.
From the spelling and etymology, it seems reasonable to me to assume <Hawai'i>
should be pronounced something like /ha.wa.i.?i/. In any case, it really
annoys me when people say /ha.wa.?i/, since I figure they should at least be
pronouncing the other /i/ in there, whether there's a glottal stop or hiatus
or what. Myself, I go with /h@wa.i/ or more probably /h@waji/.

BTW, is <Hawai'i> with a ' a "standard" spelling? I've only seen it within
the last few years.

--
Eric Christopherson / *Aiworegs Ghristobhorosyo