Who came up with the spellings for all these names on Farscape?

[conuly]

They're not the most intuitive ones if you're assuming English orthography.

Rygel? Could be worse, but Rigel doesn't even get a redline, probably because i is more expected in that position.

D'Argo? What does the apostrophe mean? Don't talk to me about non-English phonetics, because with the translator microbes, who cares?

Zhaan? Quite aside from the oddly doubled a, that is NOT where I'd put the h. Zh, I typically assume when reading English, represents the sound in the middle of pleasure. (Edit: And here, the zh appears to represent the initial sound in zoo. Which ought to have been written as a z.)

Aeryn? I don't even know where to start.

But of course, these are all transliterations, aren't they? These folks don't habitually spell their names this way, they do it in some other alphabet. The person who came up with the spellings, therefore, must be the same person who came up with T'raltixx.

Is it possible that John Crichton simply can't spell? And if so, what should we make of this?

Well, I notice that most or all of his pop culture references are to things you watch or listen to, not books. I also notice that he's still dedicated to his tape recorder even though it's gotta be easier in space to get pen and paper than replacement cassettes and double A batteries. And he does have some weird inability to ever get other species names right, always adding in the wrong ending, which could indicate some phonological issues.

Conclusion: I think he might be dyslexic.

Secondary consideration: Dyslexia often goes hand-in-hand with ADHD. I can believe it.

Comments

[moon_custafer]

Alternate theory— iirc, a lot of John’s pop-cultural references are sff: is it possible his guesses as to how alien names are spelled are influenced by genre cliches, i.e. he’s unconsciously over-exoticizing?

[conuly]

Jenn, who hasn't even seen the show I don't think, ventured that hypothesis tonight. I guess it could be. Or he could just be trolling them in his head, which I think is why he spews pop culture at them all the time.

[oloriel]

Rigel doesn't get a redline because it's an actual star, presumably. Perhaps that's also why he didn't chose it, because it's, well, a real place. Star. Thingy.

I assume that the names are supposed to give you some kind of hint as to the cultural inspiration behind the places? And of course, to some extent weird and inconsistent naming is more or less a prerequisite of the genre...

[conuly]

No, I don't think they are supposed to do that. At least, nothing about Aeryn screams either "Aaron" or "Erin" to me.

[peoriapeoriawhereart]

And yet I've seen Aeryn on people I think were named independently of Farscape. Question, are the spelled names from credits that were legible to 'normal' viewers or were they easter eggs?

[oloriel]

Huh. It definitely gives off a pseudo-Celtic vibe for me. Erin with a helping of fairydust, basically.

[conuly]

Sure. But the character doesn't.

[oloriel]

Huh. Then perhaps it's really just drawing on genre conventions without caring for (or understanding) the reasoning behind it.
Or it's the Mormon Weird Spelling syndrome?

[fred_mouse]

The friends I have who named their kid Aeryn seem to have a Greek mythological/Ancient Greek theme for their kids names, but I haven't been able to work out the source of that one.

[chelseagirl]

*cough* The cat sitting on my lap at this very moment is named Aeryn. What would you suggest? Spelling it Erin, which has a specific association with Ireland, and therefore seems inappropriate for an alien? And then there's Aerin Lauder (of the Estee Lauder family), so it's not like there's no precedent in realtime.

[conuly]

Arin, maybe? Which avoids the weird aer combo AND the y in the middle.

[wolby]

(Disclaimer that I haven't seen the show)

Zhaan makes sense to me, which seems like a success of orthography? Zhahn is oddly harder to read and not as obvious in pronunciation til you sound it out. Sahn doesn't do it because English; you could also make a case for a french j Jahn, which at least makes it clear that this is this culture's version of 'Jonathan.' (Tangent, but I'm fascinated by this phenomenon; my name, Akiva, is the Yiddish version of Jacob.)

If you've read the Ancillary books, I'd be curious to hear your thoughts on Anaander Mianaai (sp?), which I've tried pronouncing dozens of ways and they all seem wrong.

[conuly]

Yeah, except Zhaan's name doesn't have an ʒ. It has a regular z in that position.

I'd be curious to hear your thoughts on Anaander Mianaai (sp?), which I've tried pronouncing dozens of ways and they all seem wrong.

I just read it "Tyrant" and move on.

[wolby]

Oh nooooooooo. Then I definitely ascribe to your headcanon.

Probably the best move, but I don't think I can make my brain drop it at this point.

[silveradept]

That would make a good headcanon. And might make Farscape make more sense on a rewatch.

[conuly]

Well, the dyslexia thing is largely unsubstantiated, but I think ADHD is well-supported. Of course, it's hard to tell what's innate and what's several flavors of insanity plus or minus a few heaping doses of PTSD by the end of the show first season.

[silveradept]

There is that part, as well.

[conuly]

Exactly how many people have fucked with his mind for the lulz since the beginning of the series?

[cmdr_zoom]

*cough* frelled.
;)

[conuly]

:D

[greghousesgf]

Why not? It's my own personal head canon that Sherlock Holmes might have been dyslexic because in the books he's always having Watson read letters and stuff to him.

[conuly]

Makes sense.