Thread: Georgian pronunciations

I had a question about how to pronounce Georgian names. I'll go ahead and preface this by saying that I know Georgian and Russian have about as much in common as, say, English and Korean. The reason I'm asking you native Russians this though, is simply b/c I'm assuming your pronunciation is somewhat closer to the original than the English (that is to say, since Georgia has been, for the past century part of USSR or at least the "near-abroad"). Needless to say, you don't exactly hear this names on the evening news here very often (and if you do, based on how Russian names are spoken, they're mangled pretty terribly).

Just how the heck do you pronounce a name like Орджоникидзе, Шевардна́дзе, or Саакашвили -- simply like an average Russian word -- one stress, and the rest is just phoenetic? For instance Орджоникидзе would simply sound like Арджаникидзйи? Or since they are technically foreign words, is there an exception made (maybe for example, both "o"s here are pronounced as "o"s in Georgian -- something that doesn't typically happen in Russian)?

We just read them The stress always falls on the end. For names ending with адзе а is stressed, for names ending with швили, it's the first и, which has to be stressed. Back in times these were sort of two casts, I don't remember which one was higher though...

Originally Posted by MikeM

We just read them The stress always falls on the end. For names ending with адзе а is stressed, for names ending with швили, it's the first и, which has to be stressed. Back in times these were sort of two casts, I don't remember which one was higher though...

Well according to wikipedia, -dze and -shvili are the respective endings for son/child, but with regional variation -- I'm not exactly up to snuff on Georgian history, but it may be possible that the -dze's from the West dominated the -shvili's from the East (or vice versa):

Most Georgian surnames end in -dze ("son") (Western Georgia), -shvili ("child") (Eastern Georgia), -ia (Western Georgia, Samegrelo), -ani (Western Georgia, Svaneti), -uri (Eastern Georgia), etc.

And thank you for answering this question -- most helpful!

I just want to add that we do not soften the consonant in Georgian -дзе, unlike in ordinary Russian words, we just pronounce it as if it were written ДЗЭ [dze]. In real Georgian, дз corresponds to a single consonant sounding like a voiced Russian ц, and Georgian uses a special letter for it, called Dzili (distinguished from both Doni [d] and Zeni [z]).

Originally Posted by Боб Уайтман

I just want to add that we do not soften the consonant in Georgian -дзе, unlike in ordinary Russian words, we just pronounce it as if it were written ДЗЭ [dze]. In real Georgian, дз corresponds to a single consonant sounding like a voiced Russian ц, and Georgian uses a special letter for it, called Dzili (distinguished from both Doni [d] and Zeni [z]).

I had a translit chart somewhere I copied out from an old soviet book for Russian speakers to learn Georgian, I'll try and find it.

I learn Georgian too. I can post the Georgian alphabet chart to you if you like.

Originally Posted by Боб Уайтман

I learn Georgian too. I can post the Georgian alphabet chart to you if you like.

Yay! I started learning once, but only got as far as the alphabet.

That's not an easy language to learn, though. The alphabet is very simple and phonetic, but the grammar...!

Originally Posted by Боб Уайтман

That's not an easy language to learn, though. The alphabet is very simple and phonetic, but the grammar...!

Meh, I'm learning Hebrew now :P

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