I'll probably seem really ignorant asking this but why do Indian names have a silent 'a' so commonly.

For example, buddha has an 'a' but I don't know any Indians who pronounce it, same with Buddha's name Gautama (which is always pronounced Gautam).

I've noticed this seems to occur often but have never actually known why. My sister in law who is from India first heard someone say 'Buddha' rather than 'Buddh' and got totally confused, so I presume these spellings aren't too well known in India (or at least these pronounciations).

If anyone can help I'd appreciate it.

funny thing that it's in practice

The Ramayana should be the Ramayan (Ruh-mayan).

Why is there an S in Island?

I think its in NZ they just had it as Iland.

lol, so no one knows?

I remember having an argument with @jagger on the same topic some time ago. @jagger was stressing on the last 'a' of the word and aspirated sounds. But I told him not to consider the roman alphabets at all because it is the main root of this confusion. The Roman Script is grossly inadequate in writing the Indic languages, in short the Roman Script sucks big time.

There are some schemes which are used to write Sanskrit in Roman Script like International Alphabet of Sanskrit Transliteration (IAST)

According to IAST -

Above are the vowels below one consonant is used with each vowel as an example. In the 1st column pa here 'a' is silent, 2nd column pa with a bar on 'a' here 'a' is pronounced with the word.

For anyone who couldn't read Devanagri script the first vowel means that the last 'a' is read as silent, and the second vowel means that the pronunciation of the word includes last 'a'. More than that they souldn't go in the details because there is no vowel in English which can simulate the similar sound to 1st and 2nd vowels of Devanagari Script.
http://www.lingvozone.com/languages/Langua...formation24.htm

So when we write Buddha in Devanagri Script it looks like this which is pronounced as Buddh.

Thanks Vaman, it makes a little more sense to me now

Welcome, I am trying to have the images of these alphabets as they always disintegrate to something gibbrish.

Same reason why some english letters are silent? ...like "known" where you don't even pronounce the k.

My favorite quirk is how the letter v is confused for w among some Desis....like "vat (what) is up"

Sorry but English sucks and English speakers are horrible when they speak other languages. It is amusing to hear most of the second generation guys/girls speak, they just make a mess out of Hindi.

Yeah that's true, but some can speak it good.

I'm an ABCD, but I can speak Punjabi better than most Punjab natives....lol

ABCD = ???

That is what I was pointing out before. Some Indians from India can speak better English than most Americans or British people. Indians can speak good english that is why so many call centres are cropping up and they have to change their accents to american english or they dabble between different british accents which is a very difficult thing to do. So it goes both ways. I have yet to meet a second genrationer who can speak better Hindi than me, but yes I have meet some second generationers with better Punjabi speaking skills, my Punjabi sucks anyway.


Then your Punjabi skills must be better than mine.


America Born Confused Desi

LOL.

the short a is not pronounced in hindi at the end of a word, except some words, but in Sanskrit it is pronounced shortly and like aspirated.
i don't know about the other languages, but In the South of India, those who speak Tamil keep the sound a, except that it becomes a longer a or an.
For example Shiva becomes Shivaa or Shivan.
Raama becomes Raamaa or Raaman.

Interesting, thanks

Wow, this thread is still alive!

I've been wondering that myself too cos I used to learn Indian words from my friends.And sometimes i'm having difficluty in pronouncing them. If its long "a" or short"a".

ohhhh so that's why this one indian dude in my karate class' name is Sidharth or something, when the buddha was actually sidhartha.. but he just goes by sid

Just read this article, it will clear the confusion.

http://www.maanojrakhit.com/supporting_data/visually_phonetic_spellings.pdf


You are right in the first part of your sentence that in Hindi the short 'a' is not pronounced. But your second part is incorrect. Because both in Hindi and Sanskrit the convention of pronouncing words is same.


For Tamil speakers the conventions are the same. Though Tamil itself has a very heavy accent of it's own. Please don't give incorrect information.


Shiva becomes Shiv.
It is Shivam and not Shivan.
Shiva and Shivam both have same meaning but they are different words and should be pronounced differently.

Rama becomes Raam.
Rama and Raman are two different words so don't be confused.


As long as you stick to English while learning Hindi, you will remain confused. Because many vowels in Hindi are not found in English. Or ask your friends to pronounce the words for you to get the correct pronunciation.


The correct spelling is Siddharth and Siddhartha.

I'm sorry but in Sanskrit the short "a" even at the end of a word is pronounced!!!
when it shouldn't be pronounced, we use a sign called virâma...

what conventions are you talking about for Tamil?
here's an example showing the conventions are different... :
Sanskrit word माया (mâyâ) becomes மாயை (mâyai) in Tamil
Sanskrit word राम (râma) becomes (இ)ராமன் ((i)raman) in Tamil

and for Shivam, it doesn't mean Shiva himself.
here it's not the same word as Shiva, but it's the meaning of what Shiva is...
and Shivan(or rather Sivan in Tamil pronounciation) exists... read the Thirumanthiram....
for Rama and Raman, i don't know if you're referring to Tamil, but it's the same thing, the only thing with Rama is that this is how you CALL someone named Raman. It's like when somebody calls his dad "Appa" when it is actually "appan"...
you can check how words like Ganesha, Krishna...from Sanskrit get transformed in Tamil and then tell me if i'm wrong...

another thing i'm not sticking to English to learn Hindi...
i know how to read Sanskrit, and i know the rules are (almost) the same.
i'm not learning Hindi... though i understand it...
it's because i have Indian blood.

another thing i'm a Tamil native speaker, my relatives are from Sri Lanka and Madurai, so i think i understand enough to talk about Tamil, cause Sri Lankan Tamil and Madurai Tamil are considered to be the purest especially Sri Lankan one where we use a lot of words and grammatical syntax from Sanga Tamil...
and i also read a lot of Tamil texts, classical and modern ones, so i know what i'm saying...

and it's not because i said things that you ignore that it means i'm giving false information...

Please you got wrong again. Virama in Devanagri Script and a bar in Roman Script are two different things. Please don't mix them up and create more confusion

While writing Sanskrit words in Roman Script we generally don't put viramas because people are not aware of the conventions. You please read my Post #6. You will understand what I mean. If you pronounce the short 'a' with the word it becomes long. So
'a' --> consonent is pronounced and 'a' becomes silent.
'a' with a bar over it --> consonent + 'a' is pronounced like an aspirated sound.

So this word virâma becomes viraam.

While writing in Roman script there is some difference in Hindi and Sanskrit (IAST) words, but we pronounce it as same to same in both the languages. So there is no difference.


I meant that conventions for Sanskrit are same for all. For Tamil speaks, for Hindi speakers conventions are the same.


So you were talking about conversion to Tamil words. Then it's fine with me. I thought you were refering to Hindi and Sanskrit.


You are right. I got wrong here. Thanks for the explaination.

Yes I know Rama and Raman have the same meaning. Okey I will check how Sanskrit words are spoken in Tamil. Please don't confuse already confused souls by bringing Tamil into it.


Nice post-meeting you. Your first sentence was wrong. But I have no doubt on your Tamil language skills.

yeah i was talking about Sanskrit to Tamil...
about Roman script, i don't read Hindi or Sanskrit using it, i read them in Devanagari...
i don't know what you're talking about the bar in Roman Script.

i agree with the fact that "a" at the end of a word is never pronounced in Hindi (but there are exceptions like the word "na"),
i agree that when in Roman Transliteration it is written Râma, then it is pronounced Râm.
but i maintain that in Sanskrit that short "a" at the end of the word is pronounced....
if you don't want to pronounce it, viraama symbol is used...
yeah, for the letter a when i said it is aspirated i was wrong, that was not what i had in mind.
thx for the correction.
but i still maintain about the virama, and the fact that in Sanskrit the short sound "a" is pronounced, but i'll still ask my grand-parent they know Sanskrit better than me.

There is a correction here. Rama and Raman are two different people. Raman is the name of a saint. So Sanskrit word râma is same in Tamil too.


If you don't even know what a bar means why you're even arguing with me. Here â has a bar over it. And please open this link and understand how Sanskrit in written using modified Roman script.

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


Ok point taken. But there is a catch here. The viraam symbol is used in Devanagri script, and not in Roman script. I thought we were arguing about Roman script in this thread.


You didn't ask your grandfather yet. Sorry I waited for so long I had to reply you.

hahahahaha yes it's a silent S



some indian names i know.. some of my asian friends have these sort of names.
1. mohammed
2. abesheik
3. harpreet

Mohammed is an Arabic name, but it could be considered an Indian name in the sense that it's a common name for Indian Muslims.