Transliteration and sound reproduction between languages can be a big problem. For example, I speak French, Russian, and German, and I’m relentlessly aware of how badly most Americans mangle names in those languages. Spelling differences cause a lot of problems, as do sounds that exist in those languages but not in English.

Just look at the name Simon. We all know how it’s pronounced in english, I presume. But the French pronunciation rules are completely different. The French version doesn’t sound much at all like the English version. But very few Americans know that.

Russian is a more particular problem, because it doesn’t use the Roman alphabet like English and Western European languages. I’ve never met an American who pronounced Russian names anywhere close to correctly.

You’d think we’d do better with Spanish, given Mexico is right on our southern border, but that situation is pretty bad too.

How many people know that a J in Spanish is often pronounced as an English H? Not very many people, which produces laughable results with name reproduction.

So I guess the question is, given that we don’t have any single spelling system with which to render names fairly accurately, how do we cope?

And when traditional transliteration systems produce counterintuitive results, what should we do about that?