ATTN Kalamar Fans - How do you SAY this stuff?!

[Simon Magalis]

I love the setting, I really do, but does anyone have some hints on pronouncing the vast cornucopia of very long and difficult city and landmark names in this setting. Do you find this a problem? Do you work around it? So many questions, so little time! AHHHH

 

[hong]

I find that "the town over thataway" and "Fred" work wonders.

 

[shadow]

As a linguistics major, I find the naming conventions of KoK really fascinating. The fact is that no "official" pronounciation guide has really been given so I make up my own prounounciations. The pronounciations should be appropriate to the culture. For example, I see the Fhokki as losely derived from Scandinavian cultures, so I pronounce Fhokki very gutural and make many of the consonants fricatives. I generally try to come up with pronounciation guidelines and try to be consistent to them. For example the letters Kh could represent a "hard K" (K aspirated) or a velar fricative (like the ch in German). I decided the all the apostrophes in the Hobgoblin names reprensent a brief pause before the next sound. Making up your own pronounciations is half the fun, just try to be consistent!

 

[Harlock]

What the hell did Shadow say? Velar fricative? I think "Fred" is fine, like Hong said.

 

[Scarogoth]

Kalamaran pronounciation

I'd make it up according to how it looks -- there won't be a "correct" way to say it any more than there is in English. For years and years I'd lived in the South of England where we talked about having a 'barth' or mowing the 'grarse'. Went away to the "North" of England (well, Birmingham, about 110 miles away and suddenly everybody was talking about 'baths' (as in Maths) and 'grass' (as in a mule-type 'ass') -- nearly pissed myself laughing to start with. And naturally, I'm not even going to mention how you Americans abuse the language ;-)

I think the moral is, don't worry about it...

 

[AGGEMAM]

For example, I see the Fhokki as losely derived from Scandinavian cultures, so I pronounce Fhokki very gutural and make many of the consonants fricatives.

Actually, pronouncing Fhokki in any scandinavian language will sound like something that I am sure will be familiar, and dirty.

That is because the 'okk' is pronounced like you english speaking people pronuonce 'uck'.

 

[Kichwas]

I just say them like they're spelled.

Pretty easy to do; they all have very simple pronounciations.

 

[Numion]

Actually, pronouncing Fhokki in any scandinavian language will sound like something that I am sure will be familiar, and dirty.

That is because the 'okk' is pronounced like you english speaking people pronuonce 'uck'.

In finnish 'okk' is pronounced like in 'stock'. But I'm not sure if finnish is a scandinavian language, though finland is in scandinavia. (Depends if scandinavian means here geographical location or some language category.)

 

[Henrix]

Well, I can't even think about Kalamar without pronouncing it like calamares ("squids" in spanish, delectable)!

 

[AGGEMAM]

In finnish 'okk' is pronounced like in 'stock'. But I'm not sure if finnish is a scandinavian language, though finland is in scandinavia. (Depends if scandinavian means here geographical location or some language category.)

Actually, I was thinking excepting Finnish but you proved my point.

Whether it is 'uck' like in 'buck' or 'ock' like in 'stock', Fhokki would sound the same.