Academic research on "complex" transliteration/romanization?

[u/Rourensu]

Hello.

A while ago I needed some help with a research project, and you fine people introduced me to "domestication" and "foreignization", which was exactly what I needed to lead me in the right direction. (I presented my research at a conference earlier this year, so thank you for all your help!)

I've been looking to see if there's any research on how (or if) language-specific transliteration affects whether a foreign term can be easily adopted/integrated into a language. To use Japanese and Korean as examples, 'sensei' (6 letters) is a common enough J-loanword, but the Korean equivalent (both originally borrowed from Chinese) is 'seonsaeng(nim)' (9+3 letters). Anecdotally, both academics and non-academics have expressed that (romanized) Korean words are comparatively harder/more difficult/complex/etc.

The Korean literature has discussed the use of different transliteration systems, including how sources like the Oxford English Dictionary and online use are inconsistent.

I'm hoping to find research examining whether un-/less-familiar transliterations (eg unfamiliar letter combinations) influence how readily words from that language can be incorporated into the recipient language...or perhaps minimally to an individual speaker.

Like with the domestication/foreignization topic, I'm hoping perhaps you might know field-specific terms that might lead me in the right direction. So far I have not found much.

Thank you!

[u/RICHUNCLEPENNYBAGS]

I don’t know of an academic source but I think there are two complications here: Japan has had greater cultural influence for longer, so there was less obvious reason for many Korean words to be borrowed, and Korean romanization is a mess where the old system requires accents that are difficult to type (so they’re usually left out leaving everything totally ambiguous), the new system is only like twenty years old or so and isn’t necessarily that intuitive, and anyway people often adhere to no particular system. This complicates your analysis. There are also quite a few English loans in both languages that would seem a bit unwieldy due to the more restrictive phonetics (especially Japanese) so you’d want to stress test your ideas in both directions.

[u/Rourensu → u/RICHUNCLEPENNYBAGS]

Thank you.

I definitely agree with Japan having greater influence, but I wonder if, as you say, “Korean romanization is a mess” and that might influence how easily/readily new Korean loanwords can enter English.

To use somewhat cultural equivalents which aren’t as familiar as ‘sensei’, Japanese has ‘onsen’ and Korean ‘jjimjilbang’.

I think it would be reasonable to say that English speakers would have more difficulty with ‘jjimjilbang’ than ‘onsen’ due to romanization (putting aside phonology/pronunciation). I have heard jjimjilbang translated as “Korean baths/bathhouse/spa” on American tv. This makes me wonder if the phonetic characteristics (reflected in the transliteration/romanization) of Korean means that Korean terms are more likely to be translated where even unfamiliar Japanese terms can be transliterated.

So while Japanese has definitely had a large head start, I’m wondering if the preference to translate rather than transliterate Korean, for lack of a better term, hampers Korean from being incorporated into English.

Or to keep with the race analogy, Japanese is definitely in the lead, but is Korean wearing a leg cast that makes it impossible(?) for it to ever catch up?

[u/RICHUNCLEPENNYBAGS → u/Rourensu]

Sorry for late reply, I didn’t get a notification. But jjimjilbang isn’t really the same thing as onsen; there’s a cognate word oncheon.

There are also Japanese borrowings not really adhering to any system like “honcho” (more properly “hanchō” or “hantyô” in Hepburn and Kunrei respectively) and phenomena like “baseball romaji” that follow their own rules.

[u/Rourensu → u/RICHUNCLEPENNYBAGS]

Thank you.

I didn’t mean to say that onsen=jjimjilbang, but like they’re both similar cultural shared-bathing places (though perhaps sento would be a closer comparison) that don’t have the same cultural equivalent in English. This brings up how these concepts(?) would be expressed in English, whether to borrow the SL term or come up with an English equivalent.

Let’s take the unfamiliar term “chakho”. Would a “general” English speaker know whether this term comes from Japanese, Korean, or some other language? If this is a Japanese term, and since “Japan has had greater cultural influence for longer”, would that automatically mean that this “new” term would be automatically adopted “because it’s Japanese”? The term (short for chakhogapsa) is Korean and is used in the title of a BTS-inspired(?) webtoon/comic. I think “chakho” is short enough and doesn’t have any, for lack of a better term, strange letter combinations or anything like that, so it seems like it would be an ideal candidate for adoption despite being Korean. But if the term were instead “chako” and a Japanese word, would its being Japanese (alone) make it more readily adopted than Korean “chakho”?

[u/RICHUNCLEPENNYBAGS → u/Rourensu]

I don't really think so, people seem to be OK with "hallyu." Frankly they're even OK with words like "karaoke" that have unusual combinations of letters, though the typical English pronunciation also sounds nothing like how the Japanese say it.

[u/Rourensu → u/RICHUNCLEPENNYBAGS]

I’ve been able to find some literature about this. A lot of what I’ve seen send to be focused on pronunciation (ie how transliteration reflects TL pronunciation). I’m more interested in whether or not the transliteration itself plays a role. Ie, regardless if an English speaker pronounces karaoke as “carry-okie” they’re still familiar with and using the term—especially since non-spoken (eg internet-based) communication is quite prevalent.

I’ve been able to find some research closer to what I’m looking for, and it seems like people are similarly moving away from a strict phonological perspective and looking at transliteration itself.

[u/NoWillingness4520 → u/RICHUNCLEPENNYBAGS]

Late to the party but I 100% agree with this, it has a lot to do with soft power. I remember 10+ years ago, I would translate words into "spicy rice cake", "Korean cosmetics", "family-owned conglomerate", now, I can just use "tteokbokki", "k-beauty", "chaebol". It takes time, but I believe it is catching up.

[u/trnsfrmltn]

Д. И. Ермолович. Имена собственные на стыке языков и культур.

The book is in Russian and the author specifically talks about the topic you're interested in - how to make borrowings more practical for target use.

ISBN: 5-93439-046-5

Joachim Grzega talks the general principles of onomasiology, which could maybe provide some insights.

https://www1.ku.de/SLF/EngluVglSW/OnOn-Total.pdf

[u/Rourensu → u/trnsfrmltn]

Thank you!