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Romanization or romanisation, in
linguistics Linguistics is the scientific study of human language. It is called a scientific study because it entails a comprehensive, systematic, objective, and precise analysis of all aspects of language, particularly its nature and structure. Ling ...
, is the conversion of text 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. Transcription methods can be subdivided into '' phonemic transcription'', which records the
phoneme In phonology and linguistics, a phoneme () is a unit of sound that can distinguish one word from another in a particular language. For example, in most dialects of English, with the notable exception of the West Midlands and the north-wes ...
s or units of semantic meaning in speech, and more strict '' phonetic transcription'', which records speech sounds with precision.


Methods

There are many consistent or standardized romanization systems. They can be classified by their characteristics. A particular system’s characteristics may make it better-suited for various, sometimes contradictory applications, including document retrieval, linguistic analysis, easy readability, faithful representation of pronunciation. * Source, or donor language – A system may be tailored to romanize text from a particular language, or a series of languages, or for any language in a particular writing system. A language-specific system typically preserves language features like pronunciation, while the general one may be better for cataloguing international texts. * Target, or receiver language – Most systems are intended for an audience that speaks or reads a particular language. (So-called ''international'' romanization systems for Cyrillic text are based on central-European alphabets like the Czech and Croatian alphabet.) * Simplicity – Since the basic
Latin alphabet The Latin alphabet or Roman alphabet is the collection of letters originally used by the ancient Romans to write the Latin language. Largely unaltered with the exception of extensions (such as diacritics), it used to write English and the ...
has a smaller number of letters than many other writing systems, digraphs, diacritics, or special characters must be used to represent them all in Latin script. This affects the ease of creation, digital storage and transmission, reproduction, and reading of the romanized text. * Reversibility – Whether or not the original can be restored from the converted text. Some reversible systems allow for an irreversible simplified version.


Transliteration

If the romanization attempts to transliterate the original script, the guiding principle is a one-to-one mapping of characters in the source language into the target script, with less emphasis on how the result sounds when pronounced according to the reader's language. For example, the Nihon-shiki romanization of Japanese allows the informed reader to reconstruct the original Japanese
kana The term may refer to a number of syllabaries used to write Japanese phonological units, morae. Such syllabaries include (1) the original kana, or , which were Chinese characters ( kanji) used phonetically to transcribe Japanese, the most ...
syllables with 100% accuracy, but requires additional knowledge for correct pronunciation.


Transcription


Phonemic

Most romanizations are intended to enable the casual reader who is unfamiliar with the original script to pronounce the source language reasonably accurately. Such romanizations follow the principle of
phonemic transcription In phonology and linguistics, a phoneme () is a unit of sound that can distinguish one word from another in a particular language. For example, in most dialects of English, with the notable exception of the West Midlands and the north-west ...
and attempt to render the significant sounds (
phoneme In phonology and linguistics, a phoneme () is a unit of sound that can distinguish one word from another in a particular language. For example, in most dialects of English, with the notable exception of the West Midlands and the north-wes ...
s) of the original as faithfully as possible in the target language. The popular Hepburn Romanization of Japanese is an example of a transcriptive romanization designed for English speakers.


Phonetic

A phonetic conversion goes one step further and attempts to depict all
phones A telephone is a telecommunications device that permits two or more users to conduct a conversation when they are too far apart to be easily heard directly. A telephone converts sound, typically and most efficiently the human voice, into ele ...
in the source language, sacrificing legibility if necessary by using characters or conventions not found in the target script. In practice such a representation almost never tries to represent ''every'' possible allophone—especially those that occur naturally due to coarticulation effects—and instead limits itself to the most significant allophonic distinctions. The
International Phonetic Alphabet The International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) is an alphabetic system of phonetic notation based primarily on the Latin script. It was devised by the International Phonetic Association in the late 19th century as a standardized representation ...
is the most common system of phonetic transcription.


Trade-offs

For most language pairs, building a usable romanization involves trade-offs between the two extremes. Pure transcriptions are generally not possible, as the source language usually contains sounds and distinctions not found in the target language, but which must be shown for the romanized form to be comprehensible. Furthermore, due to diachronic and
synchronic Synchronic may refer to: * ''Synchronic'' (film), a 2019 American science fiction film starring Jamie Dornan and Anthony Mackie * Synchronic analysis, the analysis of a language at a specific point of time * Synchronicity, the experience of two or ...
variance no written language represents any spoken language with perfect accuracy and the vocal interpretation of a
script Script may refer to: Writing systems * Script, a distinctive writing system, based on a repertoire of specific elements or symbols, or that repertoire * Script (styles of handwriting) ** Script typeface, a typeface with characteristics of ha ...
may vary by a great degree among languages. In modern times the chain of transcription is usually spoken foreign language, written foreign language, written native language, spoken (read) native language. Reducing the number of those processes, i.e. removing one or both steps of writing, usually leads to more accurate oral articulations. In general, outside a limited audience of scholars, romanizations tend to lean more towards transcription. As an example, consider the Japanese martial art 柔術: the Nihon-shiki romanization ''zyûzyutu'' may allow someone who knows Japanese to reconstruct the kana syllables , but most native English speakers, or rather readers, would find it easier to guess the pronunciation from the Hepburn version, ''
jūjutsu Jujutsu ( ; ja, link=no, 柔術 , ), also known as jiu-jitsu and ju-jitsu, is a family of Japanese martial arts and a system of close combat (unarmed or with a minor weapon) that can be used in a defensive or offensive manner to kill or subd ...
''.


Romanization of specific writing systems


Arabic

The Arabic alphabet is used to write
Arabic Arabic (, ' ; , ' or ) is a Semitic language spoken primarily across the Arab world.Semitic languages: an international handbook / edited by Stefan Weninger; in collaboration with Geoffrey Khan, Michael P. Streck, Janet C. E.Watson; Walter ...
, Persian,
Urdu Urdu (;"Urdu"
'' Pashto Pashto (,; , ) is an Eastern Iranian language in the Indo-European language family. It is known in historical Persian literature as Afghani (). Spoken as a native language mostly by ethnic Pashtuns, it is one of the two official langua ...
and
Sindhi Sindhi may refer to: *something from, or related to Sindh, a province of Pakistan * Sindhi people, an ethnic group from the Sindh region * Sindhi language, the Indo-Aryan language spoken by them People with the name * Sarkash Sindhi (1940–2012 ...
as well as numerous other languages in the Muslim world, particularly African and Asian languages without alphabets of their own. Romanization standards include the following: * Deutsche Morgenländische Gesellschaft (1936): Adopted by the International Convention of Orientalist Scholars in Rome. It is the basis for the very influential Hans Wehr dictionary (). *
BS 4280 BS, B.S., Bs or bs may refer to: Arts and entertainment *BS-, a prefix for all games broadcast for the Satellaview modem via the Japanese Broadcasting Satellite system * "B.S." (song), a song by Jhené Aiko from the album ''Chilombo'' * Team BS ...
(1968): Developed by the
British Standards Institution The British Standards Institution (BSI) is the national standards body of the United Kingdom. BSI produces technical standards on a wide range of products and services and also supplies certification and standards-related services to busines ...
* SATTS (1970s): A one-for-one substitution system, a legacy from the Morse code era *
UNGEGN The United Nations Group of Experts on Geographical Names (UNGEGN) is one of the nine expert groups of the United Nations Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) and deals with the national and international standardization of geographical names. E ...
(1972) *
DIN 31635 DIN 31635 is a Deutsches Institut für Normung (DIN) standard for the transliteration of the Arabic alphabet adopted in 1982. It is based on the rules of the Deutsche Morgenländische Gesellschaft (DMG) as modified by the International Orientalist ...
(1982): Developed by the
Deutsches Institut für Normung ' (DIN; in English, the German Institute for Standardisation Registered Association) is the German national organization for standardization and is the German ISO member body. DIN is a German Registered Association ('' e.V.'') headquartered ...
(German Institute for Standardization) * ISO 233 (1984). Transliteration. *
Qalam A qalam ( ar, قلم) is a type of pen made from a cut, dried reed, used for Islamic calligraphy. The pen is seen as an important symbol of wisdom in Islam, and references the emphasis on knowledge and education within the Islamic tradition. ...
(1985): A system that focuses upon preserving the spelling, rather than the pronunciation, and uses mixed case *
ISO 233-2 The international standard ISO 233 establishes a system for romanization of Arabic and Syriac. It was supplemented by ISO 233-2 in 1993. 1984 edition The table below shows the consonants for the Arabic language. ISO 233-2:1993 ISO 233 ...
(1993): Simplified transliteration. * Buckwalter transliteration (1990s): Developed at
Xerox Xerox Holdings Corporation (; also known simply as Xerox) is an American corporation that sells print and digital document products and services in more than 160 countries. Xerox is headquartered in Norwalk, Connecticut (having moved from St ...
by Tim Buckwalter; doesn't require unusual
diacritic A diacritic (also diacritical mark, diacritical point, diacritical sign, or accent) is a glyph added to a letter or to a basic glyph. The term derives from the Ancient Greek (, "distinguishing"), from (, "to distinguish"). The word ''diacrit ...
s * ALA-LC (1997) * Arabic chat alphabet


Persian


Armenian


Georgian


Greek

There are romanization systems for both
Modern Modern may refer to: History *Modern history ** Early Modern period ** Late Modern period *** 18th century *** 19th century *** 20th century ** Contemporary history * Moderns, a faction of Freemasonry that existed in the 18th century Philosophy ...
and
Ancient Greek Ancient Greek includes the forms of the Greek language used in ancient Greece and the ancient world from around 1500 BC to 300 BC. It is often roughly divided into the following periods: Mycenaean Greek (), Dark Ages (), the Archaic pe ...
. * ALA-LC * Beta Code *
Greeklish Greeklish, a portmanteau of the words Greek and English, also known as Grenglish, Latinoellinika/Λατινοελληνικά or ASCII Greek, is the Greek language written using the Latin alphabet. Unlike standardized systems of Romanization of G ...
* ISO 843 (1997)


Hebrew

The Hebrew alphabet is romanized using several standards: * ANSI Z39.25 (1975) *
UNGEGN The United Nations Group of Experts on Geographical Names (UNGEGN) is one of the nine expert groups of the United Nations Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) and deals with the national and international standardization of geographical names. E ...
(1977) * ISO 259 (1984): Transliteration. * ISO 259-2 (1994): Simplified transliteration. * ISO/DIS 259-3: Phonemic transcription. * ALA-LC


Indic (Brahmic) scripts

The Brahmic family of
abugida An abugida (, from Ge'ez: ), sometimes known as alphasyllabary, neosyllabary or pseudo-alphabet, is a segmental writing system in which consonant-vowel sequences are written as units; each unit is based on a consonant letter, and vowel no ...
s is used for languages of the Indian subcontinent and south-east Asia. There is a long tradition in the west to study
Sanskrit Sanskrit (; attributively , ; nominally , , ) is a classical language belonging to the Indo-Aryan languages, Indo-Aryan branch of the Indo-European languages. It arose in South Asia after its predecessor languages had Trans-cultural diffusion ...
and other Indic texts in Latin transliteration. Various transliteration conventions have been used for Indic scripts since the time of Sir William Jones. * ISO 15919 (2001): A standard transliteration convention was codified in the ISO 15919 standard. It uses
diacritic A diacritic (also diacritical mark, diacritical point, diacritical sign, or accent) is a glyph added to a letter or to a basic glyph. The term derives from the Ancient Greek (, "distinguishing"), from (, "to distinguish"). The word ''diacrit ...
s to map the much larger set of Brahmic
consonant In articulatory phonetics, a consonant is a speech sound that is articulated with complete or partial closure of the vocal tract. Examples are and pronounced with the lips; and pronounced with the front of the tongue; and pronounced w ...
s and
vowel A vowel is a syllabic speech sound pronounced without any stricture in the vocal tract. Vowels are one of the two principal classes of speech sounds, the other being the consonant. Vowels vary in quality, in loudness and also in quantity (len ...
s to the Latin script. The Devanagari-specific portion is very similar to the academic standard, IAST: "International Alphabet of Sanskrit Transliteration", and to the United States Library of Congress standard, ALA-LC, although there are a few differences * The National Library at Kolkata romanization, intended for the romanization of all
Indic scripts The Brahmic scripts, also known as Indic scripts, are a family of abugida writing systems. They are used throughout the Indian subcontinent, Southeast Asia and parts of East Asia. They are descended from the Brahmi script of ancient India ...
, is an extension of IAST * Harvard-Kyoto: Uses upper and lower case and doubling of letters, to avoid the use of diacritics, and to restrict the range to 7-bit ASCII. * ITRANS: a transliteration scheme into 7-bit ASCII created by
Avinash Chopde Avinash Yelandur (born 22 December 1959) is an Indian actor who stars predominantly in South Indian language films, notably in the Kannada and Tamil film industries. He has been in the industry for two decades and has acted in over 200 films. Kn ...
that used to be prevalent on
Usenet Usenet () is a worldwide distributed discussion system available on computers. It was developed from the general-purpose Unix-to-Unix Copy (UUCP) dial-up network architecture. Tom Truscott and Jim Ellis conceived the idea in 1979, and it wa ...
. * ISCII (1988)


Devanagari–nastaʿlīq (Hindustani)

Hindustani is an Indo-Aryan language with extreme digraphia and diglossia resulting from the
Hindi–Urdu controversy The Hindi–Urdu controversy arose in 19th century colonial India out of the debate over whether the Hindi or Urdu language should be chosen as a national language. Hindi and Urdu are mutually intelligible as spoken languages, to the extent ...
starting in the 1800s. Technically, Hindustani itself is recognized by neither the language community nor any governments. Two standardized registers, Standard Hindi and Standard Urdu, are recognized as
official language An official language is a language given supreme status in a particular country, state, or other jurisdiction. Typically the term "official language" does not refer to the language used by a people or country, but by its government (e.g. judiciary, ...
s in India and Pakistan. However, in practice the situation is, * In Pakistan: Standard (Saaf or Khaalis) Urdu is the "high" variety, whereas Hindustani is the "low" variety used by the masses (called Urdu, written in nastaʿlīq script). * In India, both Standard (Shuddh) Hindi and Standard (Saaf or Khaalis) Urdu are the "H" varieties (written in
devanagari Devanagari ( ; , , Sanskrit pronunciation: ), also called Nagari (),Kathleen Kuiper (2010), The Culture of India, New York: The Rosen Publishing Group, , page 83 is a left-to-right abugida (a type of segmental writing system), based on the ...
and nastaʿlīq respectively), whereas Hindustani is the "L" variety used by the masses and written in either devanagari or nastaʿlīq (and called 'Hindi' or 'Urdu' respectively). The digraphia renders any work in either script largely inaccessible to users of the other script, though otherwise Hindustani is a perfectly mutually intelligible language, essentially meaning that any kind of text-based open source collaboration is impossible among devanagari and nastaʿlīq readers. Initiated in 2011, the Hamari Boli Initiative is a full-scale open-source
language planning In sociolinguistics, language planning (also known as language engineering) is a deliberate effort to influence the function, structure or acquisition of languages or language varieties within a speech community.Kaplan B., Robert, and Richa ...
initiative aimed at Hindustani script, style, status & lexical reform and modernization. One of primary stated objectives of Hamari Boli is to relieve Hindustani of the crippling devanagari–nastaʿlīq digraphia by way of romanization.


Chinese

Romanization of the Sinitic languages, particularly Mandarin, has proved a very difficult problem, although the issue is further complicated by political considerations. Because of this, many romanization tables contain Chinese characters plus one or more romanizations or Zhuyin.


Mandarin

* ALA-LC: Used to be similar to Wade–Giles, but converted to Hanyu Pinyin in 2000 *
EFEO The French School of the Far East (french: École française d'Extrême-Orient, ), abbreviated EFEO, is an associated college of PSL University dedicated to the study of Asian societies. It was founded in 1900 with headquarters in Hanoi in wh ...
. Developed by École française d'Extrême-Orient in the 19th century, used mainly in France. * Latinxua Sin Wenz (1926): Omitted tone sounds. Used mainly in the
Soviet Union The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen nationa ...
and
Xinjiang Xinjiang, SASM/GNC: ''Xinjang''; zh, c=, p=Xīnjiāng; formerly romanized as Sinkiang (, ), officially the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region (XUAR), is an autonomous region of the People's Republic of China (PRC), located in the northwes ...
in the 1930s. Predecessor of Hanyu Pinyin. *
Lessing-Othmer Lessing-Othmer is a romanization of Mandarin Chinese that was once utilized by Germans written by F. Lessing and Dr. W. Othmer, who in 1912 printed their book „Lehrgang der nordchinesischen Umgangssprache“ (Course in the North Chinese Colloqu ...
: Used mainly in Germany. * Postal romanization (1906): Early standard for international addresses * Wade–Giles (1892): Transliteration. Very popular from the 19th century until recently and continues to be used by some Western academics. * Yale (1942): Created by the U.S. for battlefield communication and used in the influential Yale textbooks. * Legge romanization: Created by
James Legge James Legge (; 20 December 181529 November 1897) was a Scottish linguist, missionary, sinologist, and translator who was best known as an early translator of Classical Chinese texts into English. Legge served as a representative of the Londo ...
, a Scottish missionary.


=Mainland China

= * Hanyu Pinyin (1958): In
mainland China "Mainland China" is a geopolitical term defined as the territory governed by the China, People's Republic of China (including islands like Hainan or Chongming Island, Chongming), excluding dependent territories of the PRC, and other territorie ...
, Hanyu Pinyin has been used officially to romanize Mandarin for decades, primarily as a linguistic tool for teaching the standardized language. The system is also used in other Chinese-speaking areas such as
Singapore Singapore (), officially the Republic of Singapore, is a sovereign island country and city-state in maritime Southeast Asia. It lies about one degree of latitude () north of the equator, off the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula, bor ...
and parts of
Taiwan Taiwan, officially the Republic of China (ROC), is a country in East Asia, at the junction of the East and South China Seas in the northwestern Pacific Ocean, with the People's Republic of China (PRC) to the northwest, Japan to the no ...
, and has been adopted by much of the international community as a standard for writing Chinese words and names in the Latin script. The value of Hanyu Pinyin in education in China lies in the fact that China, like any other populated area with comparable area and population, has numerous distinct dialects, though there is just one common written language and one common standardized spoken form. (These comments apply to romanization in general) *
ISO 7098 ISO is the most common abbreviation for the International Organization for Standardization. ISO or Iso may also refer to: Business and finance * Iso (supermarket), a chain of Danish supermarkets incorporated into the SuperBest chain in 2007 * Is ...
(1991): Based on Hanyu Pinyin.


=Taiwan

= # Gwoyeu Romatzyh (GR, 1928–1986, in Taiwan 1945–1986; Taiwan used Japanese Romaji before 1945), # Mandarin Phonetic Symbols II (MPS II, 1986–2002), # Tongyong Pinyin (2002–2008), and # Hanyu Pinyin (since January 1, 2009).


=Singapore

=


Cantonese

* Barnett–Chao *
Guangdong Guangdong (, ), alternatively romanized as Canton or Kwangtung, is a coastal province in South China on the north shore of the South China Sea. The capital of the province is Guangzhou. With a population of 126.01 million (as of 2020 ...
(1960) * Hong Kong Government * Jyutping * Macau Government * Meyer–Wempe * Sidney Lau * Yale (1942) *
Cantonese Pinyin Cantonese Pinyin (, also known as ) is a romanization system for Cantonese developed by the Rev. Yu Ping Chiu (余秉昭) in 1971, and subsequently modified by the Education Department (merged into the Education and Manpower Bureau since 2003) ...


Min Nan or Hokkien

*
Pe̍h-ōe-jī (; ; ), also sometimes known as the Church Romanization, is an orthography used to write variants of Southern Min Chinese, particularly Taiwanese and Amoy Hokkien. Developed by Western missionaries working among the Chinese diaspora in Sout ...
(POJ), once the ''de facto'' official script of the
Presbyterian Church in Taiwan The Presbyterian Church in Taiwan (PCT; ; ) is the largest Protestant Christian denomination based in Taiwan. The PCT is a member of the World Council of Churches, and its flag features a "Burning Bush," which signifies the concept of burning y ...
(since the late 19th century). Technically this represented a largely phonemic transcription system, as Min Nan was not commonly written in Chinese. * Tâi-uân Lô-má-jī Phing-im Hong-àn


=Teochew

= *
Guangdong Guangdong (, ), alternatively romanized as Canton or Kwangtung, is a coastal province in South China on the north shore of the South China Sea. The capital of the province is Guangzhou. With a population of 126.01 million (as of 2020 ...
(1960), for the distinct Teochew variety.


Min Dong

* Foochow Romanized


Min Bei

*
Kienning Colloquial Romanized The Kienning Colloquial Romanized Alphabet (建寧府土腔羅馬字, ) is a romanization system adopted by Western missionaries to compile the Kienning dialect (modern day Jian'ou City) of the Northern Min language in the Fujian Province of C ...


Japanese

Romanization (or, more generally, Roman letters) is called " rōmaji" in Japanese. The most common systems are: * Hepburn (1867): phonetic transcription to Anglo-American practices, used in geographical names * Nihon-shiki (1885): transliteration. Also adopted as (
ISO 3602 Strict Nihon-shiki ( ja, 日本式ローマ字, "Japan-style," romanized as ''Nihonsiki'' in the system itself), is a romanization system for transliterating the Japanese language into the Latin alphabet. Among the major romanization systems for Japa ...
) in 1989. * Kunrei-shiki (1937): phonemic transcription. Also adopted as (
ISO 3602 ISO is the most common abbreviation for the International Organization for Standardization. ISO or Iso may also refer to: Business and finance * Iso (supermarket), a chain of Danish supermarkets incorporated into the SuperBest chain in 2007 * Is ...
). * JSL (1987): phonemic transcription. Named after the book ''Japanese: The Spoken Language'' by Eleanor Jorden. * ALA-LC: Similar to Modified Hepburn * Wāpuro: ("word processor romanization") transliteration. Not strictly a system, but a collection of common practices that enables input of Japanese text.


Korean

While romanization has taken various and at times seemingly unstructured forms, some sets of rules do exist: * McCune–Reischauer (MR; 1937?), the first transcription to gain some acceptance. A slightly changed version of MR was the official system for Korean in
South Korea South Korea, officially the Republic of Korea (ROK), is a country in East Asia, constituting the southern part of the Korea, Korean Peninsula and sharing a Korean Demilitarized Zone, land border with North Korea. Its western border is formed ...
from 1984 to 2000, and yet a different modification is still the official system in North Korea. Uses breves, apostrophes and diereses, the latter two indicating orthographic syllable boundaries in cases that would otherwise be ambiguous.
What is called MR may in many cases be any of a number of systems that differ from each other and from the original MR mostly in whether word endings are separated from the stem by a space, a hyphen or – according to McCune's and Reischauer's system – not at all; and if a hyphen or space is used, whether sound change is reflected in a stem's last and an ending's first consonant letter (e.g. ''pur-i'' vs. ''pul-i''). Although mostly irrelevant when transcribing uninflected words, these aberrations are so widespread that any mention of "McCune-Reischauer romanization" may not necessarily refer to the original system as published in the 1930s. ** There is, for example, the ALA-LC / U.S. Library of Congress system, based on MR but with some deviations. Word division is addressed in detail, with a generous use of spaces to separate word endings from stems that is not seen in MR. Syllables of given names are always separated with a hyphen, which is expressly never done by MR. Sound changes are ignored more often than in MR. Distinguishes between ‘ and ’. Several problems with MR led to the development of the newer systems: * Yale (1942): This system has become the established standard romanization for Korean among linguists. Vowel length in old or dialectal pronunciation is indicated by a macron. In cases that would otherwise be ambiguous, orthographic syllable boundaries are indicated with a period. This system also indicates consonants that have disappeared from a word's South Korean orthography and standard pronunciation. * Revised Romanization of Korean (RR; 2000): Includes rules both for transcription and for transliteration. South Korea now officially uses this system that was approved in 2000. Road signs and textbooks were required to follow these rules as soon as possible, at a cost estimated by the government to be at least US$20 million. All road signs, names of railway and subway stations on line maps and signs etc. have been changed. The change has been either ignored or grandfathered in some cases, notably the romanization of names and existing companies. RR is generally similar to MR, but uses no diacritics or apostrophes, and uses distinct letters for ㅌ/ㄷ (t/d), ㅋ/ㄱ (k/g), ㅊ/ㅈ (ch/j) and ㅍ/ㅂ (p/b). In cases of ambiguity, orthographic syllable boundaries were intended to be indicated with a hyphen, but this is inconsistently applied in practice. * ISO/TR 11941 (1996): This actually is two different standards under one name: one for North Korea (DPRK) and the other for South Korea (ROK). The initial submission to the ISO was based heavily on Yale and was a joint effort between both states, but they could not agree on the final draft. * Lukoff romanization, developed 1945–47 for his ''Spoken Korean'' coursebooks


Thai

Thai, spoken in
Thailand Thailand ( ), historically known as Siam () and officially the Kingdom of Thailand, is a country in Southeast Asia, located at the centre of the Indochinese Peninsula, spanning , with a population of almost 70 million. The country is b ...
and some areas of Laos, Burma and China, is written with its own script, probably descended from mixture of Tai–Laotian and Old Khmer, in the Brahmic family. * Royal Thai General System of Transcription * ISO 11940 1998 Transliteration *
ISO 11940-2 ISO 11940-2 is an ISO standard for a simplified transcription of the Thai language into Latin characters. The full standard includes pronunciation rules and conversion tables of Thai consonants and vowels. It is a sequel to , describing a way to ...
2007 Transcription * ALA-LC


Nuosu

The Nuosu language, spoken in southern China, is written with its own script, the Yi script. The only existing romanisation system is YYPY (Yi Yu Pin Yin), which represents tone with letters attached to the end of syllables, as Nuosu forbids codas. It does not use diacritics, and as such due to the large phonemic inventory of Nuosu, it requires frequent use of digraphs, including for monophthong vowels.


Cyrillic

In English language library catalogues, bibliographies, and most academic publications, the Library of Congress transliteration method is used worldwide. In linguistics,
scientific transliteration Scientific transliteration, variously called ''academic'', ''linguistic'', ''international'', or ''scholarly transliteration'', is an international system for transliteration of text from the Cyrillic script to the Latin script ( romanization). ...
is used for both Cyrillic and Glagolitic alphabets. This applies to Old Church Slavonic, as well as modern Slavic languages that use these alphabets.


Belarusian

*
BGN/PCGN romanization of Belarusian The BGN/PCGN romanization system for Belarusian is a method for romanization of Cyrillic Belarusian texts, that is, their transliteration into the Latin alphabet. There are a number of systems for romanization of Belarusian, but the BGN/PCGN sy ...
, 1979 ( United States Board on Geographic Names and
Permanent Committee on Geographical Names for British Official Use The Permanent Committee on Geographical Names (PCGN) is an independent inter-departmental body in the United Kingdom established in 1919. Its function is to establish standard names for places outside the UK, for the use of the British governm ...
) *
Scientific transliteration Scientific transliteration, variously called ''academic'', ''linguistic'', ''international'', or ''scholarly transliteration'', is an international system for transliteration of text from the Cyrillic script to the Latin script ( romanization). ...
, or the ''International Scholarly System'' for
linguistics Linguistics is the scientific study of human language. It is called a scientific study because it entails a comprehensive, systematic, objective, and precise analysis of all aspects of language, particularly its nature and structure. Ling ...
* ALA-LC romanization, 1997 (American Library Association and Library of Congress): *
ISO 9 ISO 9 is an international standard establishing a system for the transliteration into Latin characters of Cyrillic characters constituting the alphabets of many Slavic and non-Slavic languages. Published on February 23, 1995 by the Internatio ...
:1995 * ''
Instruction on transliteration of Belarusian geographical names with letters of Latin script Instruction on transliteration of Belarusian geographical names with letters of Latin script is an official standard of Romanization of Belarusian geographical names. Status The instruction was adopted by a decree of the Belarusian State Commi ...
'', 2000


Bulgarian

A system based on
scientific transliteration Scientific transliteration, variously called ''academic'', ''linguistic'', ''international'', or ''scholarly transliteration'', is an international system for transliteration of text from the Cyrillic script to the Latin script ( romanization). ...
and ISO/R 9:1968 was considered official in Bulgaria since the 1970s. Since the late 1990s, Bulgarian authorities have switched to the so-called Streamlined System avoiding the use of diacritics and optimized for compatibility with English. This system became mandatory for public use with a law passed in 2009. Where the old system uses <č,š,ž,št,c,j,ă>, the new system uses . The new Bulgarian system was endorsed for official use also by UN in 2012, and by BGN and PCGN in 2013.


Kyrgyz


Macedonian


Russian

There is no single universally accepted system of writing Russian using the Latin script—in fact there are a huge number of such systems: some are adjusted for a particular target language (e.g. German or French), some are designed as a librarian's transliteration, some are prescribed for Russian travellers' passports; the transcription of some names is purely traditional.   All this has resulted in great reduplication of names.   E.g. the name of the Russian composer Tchaikovsky may also be written as ''Tchaykovsky'', ''Tchajkovskij'', ''Tchaikowski'', ''Tschaikowski'', ''Czajkowski'', ''Čajkovskij'', ''Čajkovski'', ''Chajkovskij'', ''Çaykovski'', ''Chaykovsky'', ''Chaykovskiy'', ''Chaikovski'', ''Tshaikovski'', ''Tšaikovski'', ''Tsjajkovskij'' etc. Systems include: *
BGN/PCGN BGN/PCGN romanization are the systems for romanization and Roman-script spelling conventions adopted by the United States Board on Geographic Names (BGN) and the Permanent Committee on Geographical Names for British Official Use (PCGN). The syste ...
(1947): Transliteration system (United States Board on Geographic Names & Permanent Committee on Geographical Names for British Official Use). *
GOST 16876-71 GOST 16876-71 (russian: ГОСТ 16876-71) is a romanization system (for transliteration of Russian Cyrillic alphabet texts into the Latin alphabet) devised by the National Administration for Geodesy and Cartography of the Soviet Union. It is b ...
(1971): A now defunct Soviet transliteration standard. Replaced by GOST 7.79, which is an
ISO 9 ISO 9 is an international standard establishing a system for the transliteration into Latin characters of Cyrillic characters constituting the alphabets of many Slavic and non-Slavic languages. Published on February 23, 1995 by the Internatio ...
equivalent. *
United Nations The United Nations (UN) is an intergovernmental organization whose stated purposes are to maintain international peace and security, develop friendly relations among nations, achieve international cooperation, and be a centre for harmoni ...
romanization system for geographical names (1987): Based on
GOST 16876-71 GOST 16876-71 (russian: ГОСТ 16876-71) is a romanization system (for transliteration of Russian Cyrillic alphabet texts into the Latin alphabet) devised by the National Administration for Geodesy and Cartography of the Soviet Union. It is b ...
. *
ISO 9 ISO 9 is an international standard establishing a system for the transliteration into Latin characters of Cyrillic characters constituting the alphabets of many Slavic and non-Slavic languages. Published on February 23, 1995 by the Internatio ...
(1995): Transliteration. From the
International Organization for Standardization The International Organization for Standardization (ISO ) is an international standard development organization composed of representatives from the national standards organizations of member countries. Membership requirements are given in A ...
. * ALA-LC (1997) * "Volapuk" encoding (1990s): Slang term (it's not really Volapük) for a writing method that's not truly a transliteration, but used for similar goals (see article). * Conventional English transliteration is based to BGN/PCGN, but doesn't follow a particular standard. Described in detail at
Romanization of Russian The romanization of the Russian language (the transliteration of Russian text from the Cyrillic script into the Latin script), aside from its primary use for including Russian names and words in text written in a Latin alphabet, is also essenti ...
. * Streamlined System for the romanization of Russian. * Comparative transliteration of Russian in different languages (Western European, Arabic, Georgian, Braille, Morse)


Syriac

The Latin script for Syriac was developed in the 1930s, following the state policy for minority languages of the
Soviet Union The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen nationa ...
, with some material published.


Ukrainian

The 2010 Ukrainian National system has been adopted by the UNGEGN in 2012 and by the BGN/PCGN in 2020. It is also very close to the modified (simplified) ALA-LC system, which has remained unchanged since 1941. * ALA-LC *
ISO 9 ISO 9 is an international standard establishing a system for the transliteration into Latin characters of Cyrillic characters constituting the alphabets of many Slavic and non-Slavic languages. Published on February 23, 1995 by the Internatio ...
* Ukrainian National transliteration * Ukrainian National and BGN/PCGN systems, at the UN Working Group on Romanization Systems * Thomas T. Pedersen's comparison of five systems


Overview and summary

The chart below shows the most common phonemic transcription romanization used for several different alphabets. While it is sufficient for many casual users, there are multiple alternatives used for each alphabet, and many exceptions. For details, consult each of the language sections above. (Hangul characters are broken down into jamo components.)


See also

* Anglicisation *
Cyrillization Cyrillization or Cyrillisation is the process of rendering words of a language that normally uses a writing system other than Cyrillic script into (a version of) the Cyrillic alphabet. Although such a process has often been carried out in an ad ...
, expression of a language in Cyrillic letters * Francization * Gairaigo * Transcription into Chinese, though standards vary by polity. * Sinicization, specifically adoption of Chinese literary culture * Latinisation of names * Semitic romanization *
Spread of the Latin script This article discusses the geographic spread of the Latin script throughout history, from its archaic beginnings in Latium to the dominant writing system on Earth in modernity. The Latin letters' ancestors are found in the Phoenician, Greek a ...


References


External links

; About romanization
IPA for Urdu and Roman Urdu for Mobile and Internet Users (Download)

Microsoft Transliteration Utility
nbsp;– A tool for creating, debugging and using transliteration modules from any script to any other script. * Randall Barry (ed.) ''ALA-LC Romanization Tables'' U.S. Library of Congress, 1997, . (One of the few printed books with lists of romanizations)

in PDF format
UNGEGN Working Group on Romanization Systems


; Romanization online
Chinese Phonetic Conversion Tool
nbsp;– Converts between Pinyin and other formats
Cyrillic Transliteration and Transcription ONLINE (Cyrillic -> Latin)

eiktub
nbsp;– An Arabic Transliteration Pad
Lingua::Translit
nbsp;–
Perl Perl is a family of two high-level, general-purpose, interpreted, dynamic programming languages. "Perl" refers to Perl 5, but from 2000 to 2019 it also referred to its redesigned "sister language", Perl 6, before the latter's name was offic ...
module covering a variety of writing systems e.g. Cyrillic or Greek. Provides a lot of standards as well as common transliteration schemes.
Arabeasy
nbsp;– Arabic Transliteration (free chrome extension exists, also works for Persian, Urdu)

 – Russian Transliteration (free chrome extension exists) {{Romanization Latin script Multilingual orthographies Orthography