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I'm translating English to Hindi, what's it called when the translations are with English characters?

For example, "love" comes up as "Pyāra" and "प्यार". I need the "Pyāra" word in my dictionary.

Rand al'Thor
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Rob
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    Below are 2 equally valid answers, romanization and transliteration. I would select the latter, which basically means spelling the sounds of words from one language (Hindi) using the approximate phonetic equivalent in the alphabet of a different language (English). It should be noted that romanization is a subset of transliteration that applies only if the output uses the Latin alphabet. For example English words may be phonetically spelled using the Cyrillic alphabet for Russian readers and that would be transliteration but not romanization. – O.M.Y. Nov 14 '15 at 20:22
  • @ElliottFrisch, I would respectfully disagree. Transliteration is the process, Romanization and Cyrillization are two of many possible specific applications of that process. Transcribing is the process of converting spoken sounds to written form, and again Romanization is one of many possible applications of that process, as is Gregg Shorthand (stenography). – O.M.Y. Nov 14 '15 at 20:26
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    @O.M.Y. I don't disagree, that is I do agree, with your updated comment. Not really to OP's question, but another option is a phonetic dictionary; but then you get fəˈnedik ˈdik-shə-ˌner-ē, -ˌne-rē – Elliott Frisch Nov 14 '15 at 20:32
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    @O.M.Y. I would be careful, 'transliteration' is often not the business of supplying approximate phonetic equivalents. It can be, informally, of course; but generally transliteration is quite technical and scientific https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Indic_transliteration, may employ a host of diacritics, e.g. ḍ, may be very formal and standardised and - while it usually tries to use generally appropriate letters - need not give excessive heed to pronunciation, e.g. च (which has a sound like chat) is often transliterated "c" (which doesn't) – Au101 Nov 15 '15 at 04:57
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    In fact, most formal transliteration schemes try to reflect the original script and transliteration will be letter-for-letter, rather than sound for sound. Which is not to say that no heed at all is paid to pronunciation, far from it, indeed schwa deletion in Hindi is usually observed in transliteration – Au101 Nov 15 '15 at 05:02
  • @Au101 I am confused. The Wikipedia link you provided supports my understanding of what transliteration is. It states: "The formal transliteration may be used to accurately and unambiguously present the phonetic content* of the original script." [emphasis added]. How do you get this to mean transliteration is not* based on pronunciation? As for the CH vs C issue, obviously various dialects and even various linguists will produce different pronunciation and transliteration charts (compare English pronunciation by folks from New Jersey with that of folks from Louisiana for example). – O.M.Y. Nov 15 '15 at 07:16
  • That's phonetic Hindi I guess? :/ – Santosh Kumar Nov 15 '15 at 12:24
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    @O.M.Y. I was using the Wikipedia link to demonstrate the formality of the process. If you scroll down and have a look at the chart, especially the ISO standard, you'll see that there's very little approximation involved. Instead, it's mechanical. The standard provides a letter which you then use. For example, in formal transliteration of Tamil ṭ is always used for the letter ட், even though it may be pronounced like a t, or like a d, depending on context, but that isn't reflected in transliteration, because it isn't reflected in Tamil script. – Au101 Nov 15 '15 at 16:27
  • So, in my experience, learning a transliteration scheme can be almost like learning a whole new script. For example, the formal transliteration of the capital of Yemen is Ṣan`ā'. Now, most native speakers of English will, I think, have a hard time working out what that's supposed to mean. Approximating the pronunciation of this name would give us the informal transliteration Sana'a, or Sanaa, or Sana. But, of course, the letters chosen are supposed to be as logical as possible, I just wanted to expand a little on your comment, I wasn't trying to say you're wrong – Au101 Nov 15 '15 at 16:31
  • As a francophone I do understand about pronunciation in context. It is my belief that much of transliteration is often done on a word-by-word -- and the occasional inseverable phrase -- basis, disregarding context. Much as one would include stand-alone phonetic spellings when creating a dictionary. Thanks Au101. – O.M.Y. Nov 15 '15 at 20:33

2 Answers2

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Transliteration may be the word you're looking for: "Pyāra" is the transliteration of "प्यार" into the Latin alphabet.

From Wikipedia:

Transliteration is the conversion of a text from one script to another.

For instance, a Latin transliteration of the Greek phrase "Ελληνική Δημοκρατία", usually translated as 'Hellenic Republic', is "Ellēnikḗ Dēmokratía".

Community
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Rand al'Thor
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6

I believe you are looking for

Romanization

From the romanization wikipedia,

Romanization or Latinization (or romanisation, latinisation: see spelling differences), in linguistics, is the conversion of writing from a different writing system to the Roman (Latin) script, or a system for doing so. Methods of romanization include transliteration, for representing written text, and transcription, for representing the spoken word, and combinations of both.

Elliott Frisch
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