Widespread misspelling of the name of my city

[Pimpom]

The name of my city is Aizawl and it is pronounced 'eye-zawl' with the 'awl' sounding as in crawl, shawl, trawl, scrawl, etc. It is a common sound in English. But many Indians, especially plains people, write and pronounce it Aizwal or Aizawal. It's not a typo; apparently they mentally convert it to these incorrect sounds and spellings even when the correct spelling is right in front of them in writing or when a native pronounces the name in front of them.

The practice is far too widespread to be regarded as an occasional mistake made by a few careless individuals. My contacts in mainstream India have informed me that many Post Office branches use them as the official spelling. Many online forms don't recognize the correct name. The state government regularly receives communications from Delhi using the wrong spelling for the city. It's a state capital, for god's sake!!

No one would be offended if the name was a long and complicated one - like Thingsulthliah or Rawpuichhip which are small towns in the state, but it is not. It has only six letters and the pronunciation follows a common English pattern.

When HDFC was preparing to open a branch here quite some time ago, their pre-opening signboard spelled it "Aizwal". I wrote to them, pointing out the error and explaining the background. Their reply claimed that it had been corrected in their records but even now, more than ten years later, they are still using the incorrect spelling as the official name of the branch (not just on the signboard).

It is a constant source of irritation for my people. How would natives of other places feel if people from other parts of the country insisted on changing the spelling of their home town - like deliberately writing Dehli, Mumbia, Koltaka, Chennia, Bengarulu, Bhopla, Luckwon, etc etc ?

So please spread the word where you can. The name is Aizawl and there are no alternative spellings or pronunciations.

 

[rsaeon]

People of Hyderabad know this well but I think most of us embraced it without giving it too much thought. Hydra-bad is not frowned upon but Hyder-abad sometimes sounds odd if 'der' is stressed.

Language is fluid and ever evolving, so names do end up changing to what the populace prefers rather than what has been decided/assigned by people in power. Phonetic spellings usually win out over the course of time.

Colonial-era localities like Lord's Bazaar became Laad Bazaar well before I was born. Other examples: the Mililary Barracks of the Nizam became Barkas, the center of the city is accepted as Abids purely because of a single shop owned by a trader named Abids, Red Hills was named that just because they found red soil there.

One of the Nizam's established a hospital on the outskirts to treat fevers, it's known as the Koranti Hospital. It's supposed to be known as Quarantine Hospital, haha.

 

[lockhrt999]

This problem arise from the fact that for the longest time, people only had access to the spelling which they saw in the reading material. People never heard the correct pronunciation of tricky words. That is why ganga river turned into ganges river. Ganga was probably pronounced as Ganja by some british people which some people heard and imagined the spelling would be gange or something.

There are uncountable number of words who have alternate spellings just because their original pronunciation wasn't clear. Tons of words which came from britain to india and tons of words exported back to britain have either just alternate pronounciation or both alternate pronunciation and alternate spelling.

For example the imported word 'module' has correct pronunciation like 'mojule' but in India everyone calls it 'modul' which is also correct. Here only pronunciation changed.

Alternately, exported word like 'payjama' meaning night pant has turned into 'pajama' in british or american context. Here pronunciation as well as spelling changed.

Another example of word 'china'. It's called 'chin or cheen' in India and china. But someone from abroad read the word and it sounded like 'chayana' to them and that's how we got 'china'.

--
Coming back to Aizawl. I'll remember the correct spelling. In my business, it's amazing to see that NE states place more online orders than UP, Bihar, Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand combined considering NE has much, much smaller population.

I know the correct pronunciation but I choose to pronounce it as 'e-zwol' on purpose. The correct pronunciation is an extremely derogatory slur in Marathi language. The correct pronunciation in Maharashtra would get someone fired from the job instantly. Let me assure you that we mean no disrespect, no offence and there's no connection at all. It's a pure stupid coincidence. Most banks have their headquarters in Maharashtra which can explain why bank employees pronounce it differently. If my guess is right, everyone in maharashtra has their own invented pronunciation for Aizawl. We are sorry but there's no other way. Please forgive us.

 

[logistopath]

I understand the frustration. I believe a good portion of the blame lies on large entities that can influence the common man easily, like the railways, NHAI, etc. I always wonder how difficult it is to involve local people who are well versed with the local language and English to help these entities write names in local languages properly. Many a time, the average person reads the name in his local language, and creates his own version of English spelling; especially those who have just a passing knowledge of English. There are instances where the railways and NHAI have wrongly spelt in English also.
It is not always possible to transliterate correctly too. For example, Aizawl cannot be correctly written in Tamil, since Tamil does not have the "za" pronunciation at all. At best, it can be written to pronounce as Aisal or Aisawal or Aichal or Aichawal. Anyone who reads the Tamil version of Aizawl is bound to incorrectly spell it in English unless he actively seeks to know what is correct. So it is not a matter of disrespect; rather, it is to do with ignorance.
P.S: Now Google maps is also playing a huge role in wrongly spelling names in local languages. Other than important landmarks and cities/towns, most other places are merely transliterated, and the outcome is absolutely pathetic.

 

[Pimpom]

Thanks for your interest, guys. Let me expand a bit.
My language is unusual in that there are no alternate spellings or pronunciations for any word or name. The phonetics have no 'in-between' sounds like that represented by a schwa or something between e and i, b and v, etc. Our alphabet is derived from the English alphabet with none of the ambiguities and inconsistencies in usage. Spellings are always exact and each letter is pronounced (no silent letters) and pronounced the same way every time, except that vowels may have a long or short sound.

A is always pronounced as in fat or father, never as in male or mall
E as in pet or tell
I as in hit or miss
O as in most, never as in pot
U as oo as in moon
We don't have the letter C except in combination with H, that is CH which occupies a single place in the alphabet. It is used as in the word "choose".
Same thing with W. It's in the alphabet only in combination with a to make AW
NG also has a single place in the alphabet. It is always used as in ring, never as in range.
We never use PH for F.
We don't have Q, X or Y.
We have one special character which is written as T with a dot below it. Pronounced almost like 'tree'

So our alphabet is
A AW B CH D
E F G NG H
I J K L M
N O P R S
T Ţ U V Z

 

[lockhrt999]

Thanks for your interest, guys. Let me expand a bit.
My language is unusual in that there are no alternate spellings or pronunciations for any word or name. The phonetics have no 'in-between' sounds like that represented by a schwa or something between e and i, b and v, etc. Our alphabet is derived from the English alphabet with none of the ambiguities and inconsistencies in usage. Spellings are always exact and each letter is pronounced (no silent letters) and pronounced the same way every time, except that vowels may have a long or short sound.

A is always pronounced as in fat or father, never as in male or mall
E as in pet or tell
I as in hit or miss
O as in most, never as in pot
U as oo as in moon
We don't have the letter C except in combination with H, that is CH which occupies a single place in the alphabet. It is used as in the word "choose".
Same thing with W. It's in the alphabet only in combination with a to make AW
NG also has a single place in the alphabet. It is always used as in ring, never as in range.
We never use PH for F.
We don't have Q, X or Y.
We have one special character which is written as T with a dot below it. Pronounced almost like 'tree'

So our alphabet is
A AW B CH D
E F G NG H
I J K L M
N O P R S
T Ţ U V Z

I don't think your language is unusual in any way. I think many of Indian languages are like that. Spelling matches pronunciation.

 

[seshu]

it would be better to use social media & other mediums to get support for such issues ...

 

[Pimpom]

I've done that too, but I don't participate much in social media. Besides, a large majority of people on social media pay shallow attention to matters like this unless it affects them personally.

 

[rdst_1]

I don't think anyone would have a problem pronouncing Aizawl. The main problem is that the spelling we always saw was Aizwal. Or maybe our brain did that, but, for as long as I can remember, I saw it written as Aizwal in our books.

 

[skoka123]

I don't think anyone would have a problem pronouncing Aizawl. The main problem is that the spelling we always saw was Aizwal. Or maybe our brain did that, but, for as long as I can remember, I saw it written as Aizwal in our books.

You must be a lot younger than me then. I used to remember in my school days the capital of Mizoram as Aizawl.

 

[montsa007]

And I thought I was the only one frowning when someone said "Bambai"
Over the period of time I learnt to let it go.

 

[Pimpom]

That's not the same thing. The vast majority of Indians and foreigners call it Mumbai in both writing and speech. I bet you'll feel very differently if everyone outside MH calls it Bambai or Mubmia and insist that these are correct or that it doesn't matter.

My people are not so narrow-minded that we are offended by occasional mistakes. What we do mind is that the wrong spelling and pronunciation has overshadowed the correct one in the minds of most Indians.

 

[superczar]

That's not the same thing. The vast majority of Indians and foreigners call it Mumbai in both writing and speech. I bet you'll feel very differently if everyone outside MH calls it Bambai or Mubmia and insist that these are correct or that it doesn't matter.

My people are not so narrow-minded that we are offended by occasional mistakes. What we do mind is that the wrong spelling and pronunciation has overshadowed the correct one in the minds of most Indians.

This is true for a lot of places though - I don't think there is any malafide intent involved.
From what I can recall, when I was in school, way back in the 80s, the city was always spelt as Aizwal in textbooks and thats how i would read it phonetically too.

Later I had a colleague from Mizoram who would keep pronuncing it Aiz-awl and I used to wonder why is he saying it wrong (lol)

Also, while it isn't fair to compare a city with a locality - but in Pune, there is a major IT hub called Hinjawadi
The area used to be a village till the early 2000s.
Now the name of the village was Hinjavadi but somehow the govt officials ended up putting Hinjewadi on their records . The area was officially termed as MIDC (Maharastra Ind dev Corp) Hinjewadi and that was that.
As is the norm, the phoentic equivalent stuck and thats what everyone calls it to this date.

A couple of years ago, the local village council started a campaign and put up hoardings to try move people to the correct spelling and that's how I learnt the place has always been spelt/ spoken wrong.

The point of the story being that in this case too, there was no ill intent of any kind - just an unfortunate sequence of events.
Not sure how and when Aizawl started to be termed / spelt incorrectly but I suspect it happened a long time ago

 

[montsa007]

That's not the same thing. The vast majority of Indians and foreigners call it Mumbai in both writing and speech. I bet you'll feel very differently if everyone outside MH calls it Bambai or Mubmia and insist that these are correct or that it doesn't matter.

My people are not so narrow-minded that we are offended by occasional mistakes. What we do mind is that the wrong spelling and pronunciation has overshadowed the correct one in the minds of most Indians.

Mubmia, never heard that yet.

 

[blr_p]

In my business, it's amazing to see that NE states place more online orders than UP, Bihar, Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand combined considering NE has much, much smaller population.

Now that is a surprise. Or maybe it isn't. It's a reflection of what is not available locally.

Aren't logistics harder in the NE ? or have things turned around in the last five years. Roads and bridges coming up cut delivery times by days in some cases.

Best person to explain this will be @iPwnz

 

[montsa007]

Now that is a surprise. Or maybe it isn't. It's a reflection of what is not available locally.

Aren't logistics harder in the NE ? or have things turned around in the last five years. Roads and bridges coming up cut delivery times by days in some cases.

Best person to explain this will be @iPwnz

I too get orders from NE, however they prefer to buy lot of stuff in 1 go possibly to save on shipping, i am not sure if logistics are hard but Delhivery has a good reach.

 

[blr_p]

I too get orders from NE, however they prefer to buy lot of stuff in 1 go possibly to save on shipping, i am not sure if logistics are hard but Delhivery has a good reach.

A lot of my orders are fulfilled from noida or the north. That's a five day wait to blr.

NG also has a single place in the alphabet. It is always used as in ring, never as in range.

Ng is a common Chinese surname and AFAIK is pronounced as -eng

it would be better to use social media & other mediums to get support for such issues ...

Done in a humourous way in local languages it could go viral. Serving the purpose

You must be a lot younger than me then. I used to remember in my school days the capital of Mizoram as Aizawl.

I've always known it as Aizawl and did not even know this was an issue. Remembering it as the Mizo capital takes effort. Kohima comes easier for me.

And I thought I was the only one frowning when someone said "Bambai"
Over the period of time I learnt to let it go.

I won't. It will always be like that for me

 

[rdst_1]

You must be a lot younger than me then. I used to remember in my school days the capital of Mizoram as Aizawl.

I am 35,if that helps. But even Superczar remembers it as Aizwal being written in our books. Both my Mom and Masi are Geography teachers and even they learnt and taught it as Aizwal.

Here's a map chart being sold on Amazon which writes it as Aizwal - https://amzn.eu/d/27MbWUY

 

[Pimpom]

Then those teachers, books and maps are wrong. I don't have time to write a long explanation now, so I'll write a short one:

About 20 years ago, the Secretary of Education asked me to evaluate the contents of a catalog presented to him by an Indian publisher of school textbooks. (I've never worked as a government servant. The request was a personal one). After leafing through the contents, I found a map on the back cover which placed Aizawl in the state of Manipur. That's the quality of many Indian publications.

I called the company and gave them an earful. They apologized and promised to correct the mistake. I don't know if they did.

 

[nRiTeCh]

Why not write to CM instead, instead of debating here?