I came across some amusing articles when following up on a link from a
Wikipedia article on the letter W. The Hebrew letter "vav" (ו) was, of
course, *originally* pronounced with a "w" sound when used as a
consonant, far enough back, and still is in some dialects. However, in
most dialects and in Modern Israeli pronunciation, it's a "v" sound.
Hebrew transliterates the "w" usually with a vav, or more commonly two
vavs: in unpointed text, a consonantal vav in mid-word is generally
doubled, unless it's next to another vav already. That's what these
articles are about. I translated far more of them than is necessary to
understand what he's saying; I was enjoying reading the articles.
Anyway, to pick up our story, we begin at
http://www.notes.co.il/ben-hateva/12019.asp which I've started
translating at the second paragraph:


~mark


===================

http://www.notes.co.il/ben-hateva/12019.asp

....

These days, tennis players are competing in the Wimbledon games, and as
usual, I devote many hours of watching to the tournament(?). If in the
past we became accustomed to seeing movie stars like Brooke Shields by
the side of Andre Agassi, now it's obvious who the real stars are:
Serena Williams and Maria Sharapova. The first is a terrifying figure,
who, apart from her great strength and the killer instinct in her, is
without a doubt the smartest female athlete in the world, in regards to
both the management of her career and her style of play. Someone who
plays chess and understands something about tennis could anticipate some
of her journeys more than once, and it would seem that a match between
her and Gary Kasparov would surely end with a disastrous result for
him... on a tennis court, of course. On her side, Sharapova is a thin
girl who could, even now, change careers to the glamourous life of a
supermodel without anyone batting an eye. There is no doubt that finals
the same as last year's will once again be the best film in town, just
so long as it's possible to mute the television because of Maria's loud
grunts (otherwise whatever will the neighbors think...). I have decided
in advance to pass up on predicting the men's games, due to overwhelming
boredom (the robotic generation(?) of Pete Sampras and Roger Federer
could put even owls at night to sleep).


However, hearing an announcer say "Vimbledon" instead of "Wimbledon" is
a recurring problem(?) each year. To our great sorrow we have become
used to seeing "Hollywood" spelled more than once as "hollybood", [i.e.,
הוליבוד, using a Bet, presumably soft, instead of Vav, to avoid the
double-vav of w+u] and it seems that there is a serious problem here.
The English "G" is written as ג׳, and the English "J" as ז׳, but only
the English W have they left without a solution. The center for the
Hebrew Language, which customarily confuses us morning and night, which
still has not found an acceptable(?) replacement for the word Akademia
[it is properly called the "Hebrew Language Academy/Akademia", using an
obviously non-native word], has set forth in one of the most bizarre
decisions in the history of the Holy Language, that the letter ו is
enough to pronounce the W, because the short-sighted linguists did not
envision Hollywood and the like, which changed in one massacre to the
letter b. More than that, not just once there are Hebrew speakers whio
pronounce the German W like the English W, instead of pronouncing it
like the English V like they should. And still, despite the great
confusion thus created, it seems that the time has come to tell tennis
fans in Israel that the saving solution has been found.

I have been proposing already for some time ו׳ (with a geresh) as the
appropriate substitute for the English letter W, exactly as ג׳ provides
an excellent substitute for the English letter G. Thus "Wimbledon" will be
written {ו׳ימבלדון}, and thus "Veterinarian" will still be written
{וטרינר}. "Mrs. Flower" will be written as Mrs {פלאו׳ר} and not
{פלאוו׳ר}, because the rule regarding doubling the letter ו in the
middle of a word does not apply to ו׳. Edward [אדוארד] will stay as is,
since in this one case, the spelling
provides all the linguistic needs, but if one insists, [אדו׳רד] is a
possibility. The nitralists(?), one of the two main streams of
Evolutionary research, claim that there is no justification for
rejecting the principle of natural election for the differentiation of
species, only because there was no other theory. They are correct, but
their theory, too, isn't complete. Charles Robert Darwin and Alfred
Russel Wallace--who discovered the principle of natural selection, and
greatly influenced the notion that species develop from other
species--would of course be highly pleased to discover that the people
of the Promised Land pronounce their names correctly, in the endless
arguments between the Selectionists and the nitralists.

There is no doubt that the subject of Mozart is in many good ???? [I
can't work out the word, sorry]. Here, students of non-modernized
music, who want to pronounce the great composer's first name, find
themselves bewildered to the bottom of their souls. Are we dealing with
the pronunciation "Wolfgang" in English, or the pronunciation "Volfgang"
in English? [i.e. spelled by English spelling rules, I think]. Salieri
would inform us that the pronunciation is "Volfgang," of course, since
we're dealing with a German name. When the rule of ו׳ as the substitute
for the English "W" comes into force as it should, it will be clear if
it's {ו׳ולפגאנג} or {וולפגאנג}. In this case, we will of course
continue to write {וולפגאנג}, but at the end of the day, we will also
know to pronounce the name correctly with the letter "V". Even the
English don't have this possibility in their language, and what of the
Scots, would they know to pronounce it correctly?

Regarding the Scottish people, this discourse will not expound here, but
still I will pause a while, to focus on another nation that dwells
alongside the English, namely "The Welsh People", who are known to be
avid tennis fans. The custom of writing also {ווימבלדון}, as the
sports channel
does, is well known, but here we have a widespread linguistic error, since
the letter ו is to be doubled only in the middle of a word, like
{יוונית} [Greek] for example. When we write {וולשי} it won't be clear
if this is to be pronounced "Wolshi" or "Welshi" or maybe "Volshi".
When we write

{ולשי} it won't be clear if it's to be pronounced "Welshi" or "Velshi".
Only when we write {ו׳לשי} will it be very clear how to pronounce the
word. In any case, as someone who only last night saw a Welsh film, I
can say after
hearing it that they themselves have trouble pronouncing every known word.


==================

The saga continues on http://www.notes.co.il/ben-hateva/12037.asp ....



"Behind the curtains of linguistic innovations"

My public response to my dear Mr Mazar who wonders if I have already
contacted the "Academy" of the Hebrew Language, and also a
clarification to the members of three different forums who contacted me
with ardent support:

I proposed the linguistic innovation of using the letter ו׳ (with a
geresh) as a substitute for the English letter W at many opportunities
since September 2004, and all this is attested in the pages of the
Internet in the most reliable manner. In the last weeks I have found
that my linguistic invention has popped up in all sorts of forums with
examples similar to those which I gave. Of course, everyone claims to
have invented it from his own mind, but there's no need to complain
about that, since I'm not going to take out a patent on it or anything,
and I just want the method to spread quickly. So, in the past month
several articles in Hebrew were published using this innovation, and I
wish the authors great success in continuing. I note that all my
communications with the Hebrew Language center went unanswered, and not
a few of the people, strangers to me, to whom I told the wonderful idea
early on, laughed in my face or behind my back. Certain factors even
attacked(?) me with a despicable strength I can't recall ever
encountering before in my life, and the portion of wrath and the display
of loathing which I earned could crown a cruel tyrant's mausoleum.
However, in our day, when each Hilton wants to be a world-famous star
just because she still hasn't stripped in a Sheraton hotel, so too a man
discovers that the more he uses his brain, the stupider he appears to
everyone else. In Hilton's favor, let it be said that also a true star
of importance like Serena has already displayed her nudity before the
cameras. In my favor, let it be said that I have nothing against those
who detract from the innovation for various reasons, but who do so in a
civilized and polite way. Thus, I believe that this innovation will be
placed(??), even if the shortsighted continue to mock it until then.


When in October 2004 I said that I had heard from Mason himself that
Pink Floyd would get together in the summer of 2005, people scoffed with
laughter and said that this would never happen. To my satisfaction, I
was the first who published this piece of news to the world on the
Internet, weeks and months before everyone, and all this is attested
forever. So it is, when the star of a famous rock group greets you on
your holiday, or when a novelist of physiology sends you [e]mail in the
afternoon, and consults with you on some topic or another, there will
always be a thousand other people who will ask themselves, if you even
know how to read and write coherently (and how does an illiterate like
you dare to propose linguistic changes). And in the worst case you
instantly become a joke. I have never given in to this sort of beastly
behavior, and I never intend to, come what may. Certainly among the
deriders... were also individuals of quality who supported with no
compromises, and of course, the local friendly environment began to
support(?) the transliteration. I don't know if the blame lies in the
Israeli mentality, in the wild web surfers, or just because my eyes are
brown, but also in the future I will continue to bring every pressing
linguistic innovation before the audience of readers, even if every time
I go to the beach I find small planes carrying signs to disgrace me.