Retikan Standard
A pigdin of Tropical Seaspeak and Itakian Standard, this is the language that is used for all trade, business, and military actions, both on and off-world. It maintains the singular vowel sounds of Seaspeak and the hard/soft consonants of Itakian Stardard.
Due to Retikan Seadwellers typically being in power longer than Retikan Landdwellers, the language shares more grammatical similarities with Seaspeak than Itakian. Uses the Itakian 'X' in place of the Seaspeak 'Z'.
Names are often spelled differently between Retikan Standard and the originating language.
This is the language used to address the other Alpha and Beta Quadrant races, and is recognized in their universal translators.
Geographical Distribution
All inhabitants of Retika, both Seadwelling and Landdwelling speak this language as of Earth year 2410.
Phonology
All letters in Retikan Standard are pronounced. There are no silent letters. In addition, there are no double letters.
Vowels: Singular pronunciations, imported from Tropical Seaspeak. Five vowels: "A, E, I, O, U".
- A - Pronounced as in the word "awesome"; occasionally slurred into an 'uh' sound, as in "attention"
- E - Pronounced as in the first 'e' in "exclamation"
- I - Pronounced as in the "E" in "E-mail"
- O - Pronounced as in the word "Ocean"
- U - Pronounced as a 'double o', like the word "tool"
Consonants: Singular and Double pronunciations, imported from Itakian Standard. Nineteen consonants: "B, C, CH, D, F, H, J, K, L, M, N, P, R, S, SH, T, W, X, Y."
Letters with a single pronunciation:
- B - Single pronunciation - as in "boy"
- CH - written and perceived as a single letter in Retikan Standard; pronounced as a 'zh', like the 'j' in the French word "Bonjour"
- D - pronounced like the 'd' in dog
- H - only ever found at the beginning of words; pronounced like the 'h' in 'hallway'
- J - pronounced like the 'g' in "geode"
- K - never found in front of a 'r' in Retikan Standard; pronounced like the 'k' in "karat"
- L - pronounced like the 'l' in "limbo"
- M - pronounced like the 'm' in "mother"
- N - pronounced like the 'n' in "never"
- S - pronounced like the 's' in 'sale'
- SH - written and perceived as a single letter in Retikan Standard; pronounced like the 'sh' in "shiny"
- T - pronounced like the 't' in "time"
- W - pronounced like the 'w' in 'water'
- X - pronounced like the 'z' in "zebra".
- Y - pronounced like the 'y' in "yellow"
- A note on the letter 'y': This letter is always a consonant in Retikan Standard, it never takes the place of a vowel.
Letters with multiple pronunciations:
- C - If in front of an 'R', then pronounced like the first c in "incarcerated"; if not, then pronounced like the second 'c'
- F - if at the beginning of a word, pronounced like the 'f' in "fairy" if in the middle or the end of a word, pronounced like the 'v' in "value"
- P - if found at the beginning of a word, pronounced like the 'p' in 'patron"; if found at the end of a word, pronounced like the 'p' in "mop"
- R - if found at the beginning of a word, pronounced like the 'r' in 'retail'; if found at the end of a word, pronounced like the 'r' in "never". "R's" in the middle of words can be pronounced either way, but typically use the first pronunciation.
Additional Pronunciation Notes:
- There is no equivalent to the long 'a' or a similar sound in English. The word 'amen' would always be pronounced "Ah-mehn". Other iterations of the long 'a', such as in 'great' or 'hate' are replaced with an 'e'.
- There is no equivalent to the short 'i' in English. It is replaced by the short 'e' sound For instance, the word "irradiated" would be pronounced "Eh-reh-dee-eh-tehd"
- There is no equivalent to the short 'u' sound in English. They would always be replaced with the short 'e' sound or the 'double oo' sound. For instance, the word 'up' would be pronounced 'ehp' and the word 'put' would be pronounced 'poot'
- There is no equivalent for the English 'ch'. A word like 'chimney" would be pronounced 'zhehm-nee'." A word with a hard 'ch' like 'Christmas" would be adjusted by a Universal Translator to "Crestmas,' or else be pronounced (incorrectly until corrected) as "ZHREEST-mahs".
- There is no equivalent for the 'th' sound in English. A world like 'theology" would be pronounced 'teh-HEH-ohl-oh-gee'
- There are no equivalents of double vowels in Retikan Standard. A word like "Ocean" would be mispronounced as "OH-keh-ahn" until corrects.
Morphology
- Most words originate in either Seaspeak or Itakian, however in some cases words are combined, such as the Retikan Standard word for "ship" which is an amalgamate of the words for "Shadow" in Seaspeak and "Floater" in Itakian.
- Imports the Seaspeak pronouns (suffixes) of -ku and -mo ("you/yours" and "me/my", respectively)
- Imports the Itakian suffix -cas (adjusted to -kas for the Standard Alphabet; "theirs" or "all")
- Imports the Itakian prefixes wo', te', and re' for gendering individuals. ("Mr", "Ms", and "Mx", respectively)
Syntax
Imports most grammatical structuring from Seaspeak
Adjectives come before the noun; adverbs come after the verb.
Directly imported Itakian phrases are easily recognized as adjectives and adverbs are 'backwards' as compared to Seaspeak phrases.
Capitalization patterns are imported from Seaspeak and are somewhat similar to Federation standards. Proper names have the first letter capitalized, however not the beginnings of sentences.
Punctuation patterns are imported from Itakian Standard and fairly similar to Federation standard punctuation, with only apostrophes being unusual.
Apostrophes denote a Itakian gendered prefix, such as "Wo' James Kirk" or "Te' Kathryn Janeway" or "Re' Taylor Adams"
- A note on "Re' ": This is not a prefix for 'it'. This is a respectful gender-neutral prefix used when the gender of an individual is unknown or the individual identifies as non-binary.
Common Phrases
Comments