Talk:Maldivian language

D[h]ivehi?

Does the language name really contain h? It doesn't in Ethnologue. -Hapsiainen 22:06, Dec 7, 2004 (UTC)

In my opinion the correct version should be also without this h, i.e. "Divehi". I checked ISO 639-1 and there is also dv = Divehi.

But in web, many places are using with h. Would be nice to hear opinion from somebody familiar with language names --TarmoK 11:06, 11 May 2005 (UTC)

moved from my user page --TarmoK 12:16, 11 May 2005 (UTC)

Regarding your concern, about how D[h]ivehi is spelled, in talk page. In Maldives it's written with 'h'. However ISO 639-1 has it spelled like Divehi. The likely reason for this could be because, with the letters divehi produce the exact Thaana unicode equivalent. If you include a H the output is different. Below are two differnet outputs.

↓ Incorrect pronounciation
divehi	ދިވެހި	← Correct local form
dhivehi	ދހިވެހި	← Incorrect local form
↑ correct pronounciation

I think for this reason its written without h in ISO specification. However its really pronouced with the letter h. --Oblivious

Complementing to the comment by Oblivious I know that in some languages adding an "h" makes the sound more puffy! Example, writing Nepalese with English alphabet, the sound of the letter D would be as it whould normally be (eg, Dog). However, if the letter h is inserted after D, the sound would be D but with a puff, much similar to "D-hh". My point here is that the same letter is pronounced quite different in different languages. Especially languages with its own script. The "D[h]" in "D[h]ivehi" is pronounced more like the "th" in "The" --Rxs

"the same letter is pronounced quite different in different languages." Absolutely, Romanization =/= IPA, and that's what's going on here. The 'h' is used in the official Dhivehi Romanization scheme to indicate that 'dh' and 'th' are dental, not retroflex. (That same scheme happens to use 'lh' for a retroflex lateral.) There's some discussion in chapter 3 of Amalia Gnanadesikan's published grammar (https://www.degruyter.com/view/product/185743). (And fwiw, this Romanization is much more consistent than the spelling systems of some languages. English, I'm looking at you!) Mcswell (talk) 16:11, 21 June 2017 (UTC)

So the question is, should this be moved to Divehi and make Dhivehi a redirection page? --Oblivious 17:09, 10 Jun 2005 (UTC)

That would be logical, me thinks.--rxs 05:32, 11 Jun 2005 (UTC)

I disagree that in the Maldivian language the word 'Divehi' is really pronouced with the letter h. In fact it is not. It has a plain dental unaspirated 'd'. When writing in the Urdu language, for example, the aspirated letters include a special 'h' following them, but the fact is that Divehi has lost the aspirated sounds.

For the correct use of letters with 'h's added in the languages of South Asia (like for example the word "Buddha", which has an aspirated 'd' sound), please check the Standard Indic table in Dhivehi Writing Systems. It is sad to say this, but the present official transcription of the Maldivian language doesn't make Maldivians look good. Especially since the "-dives" of "Maldives" has the same origin as the "Dive-" in "Divehi". What would you think if you would have to write "England" for the country and "Enghlish" for the language? The present transcription is definitely inconsistent and makes its users look somewhat crass. It is time that Maldivians stop getting obsessed with politics and religion and begin to get their act straight with their culture.Mohonu 17:41, 21 June 2007 (UTC)

If you ask a Maldivian to write "but" he will write "bat", that is Maldivian Latin way. But in English wiki we have to use the ISO standard. So it is not "Dhivehi" but correct way is "Divehi". Deviathan (talk) 10:42, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

Solution/Conclusion

Now everything has updated including ISO and ethnologue. See: http://www.ethnologue.com/show_language.asp?code=div and http://www.sil.org/iso639-3/documentation.asp?id=div The first spelling used in both places is Dhivehi with an "H". This means their first priority too is that. And according to Wikipedia guidelines the common and official usage of the subject has to be preferred in case such a clash occurs. For sure most people use "Dhivehi" and for sure the official spelling too is Dhivehi in the Republic of Maldives as well as most of the official organizations. Leone (talk) 19:59, 23 December 2010 (UTC)

The reason why it is Dhivehi is because according to the commonly used Malé Latin, the ދ (d̪) is written as 'dh', while this system is relatively inconsistent, it is the most used system in Maldives for transcribing the language. IAST is not commonly used or known by Maldivians, so they are prone to use the more common Malé Latin system. According to this system, 'd' is used to transcribe the retroflex /ɖ/, ޑ. I believe the main reason why 'th' and 'dh' are used for dentalised consonants is because Maldivians pronounce the English θ and ð sounds as t̪ and d̪, respectively, so they would have assumed it was the same sound, and used 'th' and 'dh' to transcribe them. There are no aspirated consonants in Dhivehi. Dhoru 21 (talk・contribs) 09:00, 2 July 2022 (UTC)