How many years have I been fond of Formula 1, so many times I come across heated, often descending to frank obscene disputes about how to pronounce the names of the pilots correctly. Another example: the other day, for the first time in my life, I heard the word “Infinity” from a colleague. It is embarrassing that he works in the structure of this brand. But that's nothing. Literally up to this minute I could not clearly explain why it is necessary to say “Mitsubishi” and not “Mitsubishi”. Now I can. Because I read the material published by Vasily Efanov in Avtovesti.
Having tried to put an end to this issue, we suddenly found ourselves under the crossfire of a heated discussion between physicists and lyricists. More precisely, linguists-translators and official representation. So after all "Mitsubishi" or "Mitsubishi"? Take your time. Not everything is as simple as it might seem.
To decide which is the correct option, let's first approach the issue from a scientific, linguistic point of view. But don't be afraid, everything is simple and even interesting to some extent.
In 1917, the Russian linguist and orientalist Evgeny Dmitrievich Polivanov was the first to develop a system for writing Japanese words in Cyrillic, which is still actively used today - it is precisely known as the Polivanov system.
All pivot tables can be easily found on the Internet, and we will not blow your brains out with the facts that the Japanese alphabet is syllabic. It is now important for us to find out how the controversial syllables should be read. And they should be read, according to Polivanov, as “si”, and not “shi”, “ti”, and not “chi”, “sya”, and not “sha”, “syu”, and not “shu” and etc. Thus, it would be more correct to pronounce "Mitsubishi" after all. End of controversy? No!
Everything would be simple and understandable if it were not for another linguist, a certain James Curtis Hepburn, who at the end of the 19th century proposed his own version for transcribing the Japanese language. In accordance with it, it is more correct to read "Mitsubishi". And it is precisely here that the main reason for the current discrepancies lies: Polivanov's system was created in Cyrillic, and Hepburn's system in Latin.
It would seem - yes, let them pronounce it as they want there across the ocean! But why, then, is the Hepburn variant so firmly rooted in the Russian language? Everything is simple. Even before people began to delve into the nuances of pronunciation, the names of imported goods entering our market were presented in Latin, and under the avalanche of Toshiba computers and Nakamichi audio systems, people somehow did not really think about the origin and correct reading of these names - they taught in school in English lessons that sh is read as "sh", well, that's all! What questions? At the same time, interestingly, specifically with Mitsubishi, at first the situation was better - both options existed in Russian speech approximately on an equal footing. But then the fashion for English-language names took over, including over advertisers, who from every iron convinced that it was necessary to pronounce “shi”. The control shot was the transition to the Hepburn pronunciation of the official Mitsubishi dealership. Polivanov is tired of turning in his grave, in a word.
Well, then such a merciless linguistic phenomenon as transmission according to tradition is included in the matter - this is when people pronounce the word incorrectly for so long, stubbornly and en masse that this incorrect version is eventually taken as the norm. For example, the national Moscow dish “sushi” will never be forced to pronounce it like “sushi” in your life - you just have to put up with it.
A ray of light in this dark realm is shed by geographical names - they, as a rule, took root in the Russian language even before the invasion of foreign brands. We call Hiroshima Hiroshima, although logically we should say "Hiroshima" - in English this city is written as Hiroshima.
In this case, it would be logical to turn to native speakers and listen to how they pronounce controversial sounds, but the Japanese are not helpers in this matter: if you listen carefully, they generally give out some kind of peculiar sound, something between “s” and “ w", "t" and "h". Apparently not to offend anyone. Although even before the end of World War II, the Japanese were on “our” side: in order to transcribe Japanese names in letters of the Latin alphabet, Japan itself introduced the official “kunrei-shiki” system, which prescribed that disputed sounds should also be transmitted in Latin in the same way as the one you already know suggests Comrade Polivanov. But we all remember how the Second World War ended for the Japanese, and it is inconvenient for the Americans to pronounce the hard “s” and “t”, so Hepburn with his “comfortable” transcription came in handy. Armed with such a theoretical base, we turned to the Russian representative office of Mitsubishi to find out their opinion on this matter.
The MMS Rus LLC, which is the exclusive distributor of Mitsubishi cars in Russia, adheres to the following variant of the pronunciation of the Mitsubishi brand - "Mitsubishchi" in their communication. In the original, in Japanese, the pronunciation of the sound ending of the brand sounds like "SHI" - "Mitsubishchi". Thus, the sound is much closer to "SHI" and almost nothing to do with "SI". From a phonetic point of view, Mitsubishi is the closest to the original (Japanese) sound of the brand.
The opinions of the representation and the linguists, as you see, differed. So where is the truth? Maybe all these theoretical calculations of Polivanov are already outdated? To find out, we turned to a person who knows firsthand about the living Japanese language. Aleksey Zavrachaev, a TASS news agency correspondent, a certified Japanese specialist and a great car lover, has been living and working in Japan for a long time and understands the intricacies of the pronunciation of Japanese names like no one else.
“If you go into the current rules of the Russian language, then it is correct to transcribe this word as “Mitsubishi”. Everything is simple here: there is the so-called Polivanov system, according to which each syllable in Japanese corresponds to an analogue in Russian. Thus, options like Mitsubishi are swept aside immediately. I would like to cite sushi and sushi as an example, but here it turns out a different story: sushi won a devastating victory, because, as my teacher of the Russian language at the university said, the norm prohibits, and the uzus (society) implements, ”Alexey takes the side of Polivanov.
The fact that "Mitsubishi" sounds much dearer to the Japanese than "Mitsubishi" is perfectly confirmed by the following video, in which a charming Japanese woman pronounces the names of car brands in the original language. By the way, pay attention to the background in the frame - the girl is clearly in the subject!
In a word, say "Mitsubishi", but do not get into a fight for "sushi" - traditions are strong, what can you do.
To decide which is the correct option - "Mitsubishi" or "Mitsubishi" - first, let's approach the issue from a scientific, linguistic point of view. But don't worry, everything is simple and very interesting.
In 1917, the Russian linguist and orientalist Evgeny Dmitrievich Polivanov was the first to develop a system for writing Japanese words in Cyrillic, which is actively used to this day and is known as the Polivanov system.
All pivot tables can be easily found on the Internet, and we will not blow your brains out with the facts that the Japanese alphabet is syllabic. It is now important for us to find out how the controversial syllables should be read. And they should be read, according to Polivanov, as "si", not "shi", "ti", not "chi", "sya", not "sha", "syu", not "shu" and etc. Thus, it would be more correct to pronounce "Mitsubishi" after all.
And everything would be simple and understandable if it were not for another linguist, Comrade James Curtis Hepburn, who at the end of the 19th century proposed his own version for transcribing the Japanese language. In accordance with it, it is more correct to read "Mitsubishi". And it is precisely here that the main reason for the current discrepancies lies: Polivanov's system was created in Cyrillic, and Hepburn's system in Latin.
You can make a lot of sushi from this tuna. Yes, that's right, sushi.
It would seem - yes, let them pronounce it as they want with their Hepburn across the ocean! But why, then, is the Hepburn variant so firmly rooted in the Russian language? Everything is simple. Even before people began to delve into the nuances of pronunciation, the names of imported goods entering our market were presented in Latin, and under the avalanche of Toshiba computers and Nakamichi audio systems, people somehow did not really think about the origin and correct reading of these names - they taught in school in English lessons that sh is read as "sh", well, that's all! What questions? At the same time, interestingly, at first the situation was better with Mitsubishi specifically - both options existed in Russian speech approximately on an equal footing. But then the fashion for English-language names took over, including over advertisers, who from every iron convinced that it was necessary to pronounce "shi". The control shot was the transition to the Hepburn pronunciation of the official Mitsubishi dealership. Polivanov is tired of turning in his grave, in a word.
Well, then such a merciless linguistic phenomenon as transmission according to tradition is included in the matter - this is when people pronounce the word incorrectly for so long, stubbornly and en masse that this incorrect version is eventually taken as the norm. For example, the national Moscow dish "sushi" will never be forced to pronounce it as "sushi" in your life - you just have to put up with it.
A ray of light in this dark realm is shed by geographical names - they, as a rule, took root in the Russian language even before the invasion of foreign brands. We call Hiroshima Hiroshima, although logically we should say "Hiroshima" - in English this city is written as Hiroshima.
Toshiba laptops work fine only for those who know how to pronounce their name.
In this case, it would be logical to turn to native speakers and listen to how they pronounce controversial sounds, but the Japanese are not helpers in this matter: if you listen carefully, they generally give out some kind of peculiar sound, something between "s" and " w", "t" and "h". Apparently not to offend anyone. Although, even before the end of the Second World War, the Japanese were on "our" side: to transcribe Japanese names in the letters of the Latin alphabet, Japan itself introduced the official "kunrei-shiki" system, which prescribed that controversial sounds should also be transmitted in Latin in the same way as the familiar one suggests Comrade Polivanov. But we all remember how the Second World War ended for the Japanese, and it is inconvenient for Americans to pronounce solid "s" and "t", so Hepburn with his "comfortable" transcription came in handy. Armed with such a theoretical base, we turned to the Russian representative office of Mitsubishi to find out their opinion on this matter.
LLC "MMS Rus" - the exclusive distributor of Mitsubishi cars in Russia - adheres to the following variant of the pronunciation of the Mitsubishi brand - "Mitsubishchi" in its communication. In the original, in Japanese, the pronunciation of the sound ending of the brand sounds like "ShI" - "Mitsubishchi". Thus, the sound is much closer to "SHI" and almost nothing to do with "SI". From a phonetic point of view, Mitsubishi is the closest to the original (Japanese) sound of the brand.
Ekaterina Kolesnikova, Senior PR Manager, Mitsubishi Motors Russia
The opinions of the representation and the linguists, as you see, differed. So where is the truth? Maybe all these theoretical calculations of Polivanov are already outdated? To find out, we turned to a person who knows firsthand about the living Japanese language. Aleksey Zavrachaev, a TASS news agency correspondent, a certified Japanese specialist and a great car lover, has been living and working in Japan for a long time and understands the intricacies of the pronunciation of Japanese names like no one else.
"If you go into the current rules of the Russian language, then it is correct to transcribe this word as "Mitsubishi." Everything is simple here: there is the so-called Polivanov system, according to which each syllable in Japanese corresponds to an analogue in Russian. Thus, options like "Mitsubishi" are swept aside I would like to cite sushi and sushi as an example, but here it turns out a different story: sushi won a devastating victory, because, as my teacher of the Russian language at the university said, the norm prohibits, and the uzus (society) implements, "Alexey takes the side of Polivanov.
The fact that "Mitsubishi" sounds much dearer to the Japanese than "Mitsubishi" is perfectly confirmed by the following video, in which a charming Japanese woman pronounces the names of car brands in the original language. By the way, pay attention to the background in the frame - the girl is clearly in the subject!
In a word, say "Mitsubishi", but do not get into a fight for "sushi" - traditions are strong, what can you do.
So again:
Mitsubishi
CORRECT: Mitsubishi
WRONG : Mitsubishi
Do you think you already know the whole truth about foreign languages? No matter how. There are still many fierce discussions ahead about how to properly pronounce certain names - German, Italian, French Korean ... The philological war is just beginning, and we will still surprise you!
Disputes about the correct pronunciation and spelling of the Mitsubishi car brand name, which have been going on for several years, have been resolved.
“There are two approaches: the system of Hepburn, who popularized one of the forms of romanization of the Japanese language, according to which the name is pronounced “Mitsubishi”, and the linguist and orientalist Polivanov, who was the first to develop a system for writing Japanese words in Cyrillic, according to his version, it is more correct to pronounce “Mitsubishi” - told in company.
The company's headquarters in Tokyo responded to the request of the Russian representative office, explaining that it is correct to write and pronounce "Mitsubishi". Now all dealers of the company must receive the Russian spelling "Mitsubishi Motors".
The precedent with the ambiguity in the pronunciation of the name Mitsubishi Motors in Russia became the reason for making changes to the global standards of the Japanese brand around the world. In accordance with the new standards, the name of the brand and the dealership must be in the language of the country in which they are located. Thus, the familiar Mitsubishi Motors will become even more understandable and close to the Russian-speaking population, transforming into Mitsubishi Motors.
Other news
In Russia, the penalty has been increased for drivers who do not want to let people through at a pedestrian crossing. From now on, the amount for this violation will vary from 1,500 to 2,500 rubles. Until that time, drivers were fined a fixed amount of 1,500 rubles.Buying a new car is always not only a pleasant and exciting moment, but also a big burden on your budget. Therefore, since 2017, government programs have been in place to provide financial support to customers at the Aries-Auto dealership, which can significantly save on buying a car.The bodies of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Russian Federation, at the suggestion of the Government of the Russian Federation, plan to change the procedure for registering accidents in the absence of victims, under which traffic police officers will not come for registration, and participants in an accident will be required to remove cars from the roadway, fixing vehicles using the ERA-GLONASS satellite system or dedicated smartphone app.To decide which is the correct option - "Mitsubishi" or "Mitsubishi" - first, let's approach the issue from a scientific, linguistic point of view. But don't worry, everything is simple and very interesting.
In 1917, the Russian linguist and orientalist Evgeny Dmitrievich Polivanov was the first to develop a system for writing Japanese words in Cyrillic, which is actively used to this day and is known as the Polivanov system.
All pivot tables can be easily found on the Internet, and we will not blow your brains out with the facts that the Japanese alphabet is syllabic. It is now important for us to find out how the controversial syllables should be read. And they should be read, according to Polivanov, as "si", not "shi", "ti", not "chi", "sya", not "sha", "syu", not "shu" and etc. Thus, it would be more correct to pronounce "Mitsubishi" after all.
And everything would be simple and understandable if it were not for another linguist, Comrade James Curtis Hepburn, who at the end of the 19th century proposed his own version for transcribing the Japanese language. In accordance with it, it is more correct to read "Mitsubishi". And it is precisely here that the main reason for the current discrepancies lies: Polivanov's system was created in Cyrillic, and Hepburn's system in Latin.
You can make a lot of sushi from this tuna. Yes, that's right, sushi.
It would seem - yes, let them pronounce it as they want with their Hepburn across the ocean! But why, then, is the Hepburn variant so firmly rooted in the Russian language? Everything is simple. Even before people began to delve into the nuances of pronunciation, the names of imported goods entering our market were presented in Latin, and under the avalanche of Toshiba computers and Nakamichi audio systems, people somehow did not really think about the origin and correct reading of these names - they taught in school in English lessons that sh is read as "sh", well, that's all! What questions? At the same time, interestingly, at first the situation was better with Mitsubishi specifically - both options existed in Russian speech approximately on an equal footing. But then the fashion for English-language names took over, including over advertisers, who from every iron convinced that it was necessary to pronounce "shi". The control shot was the transition to the Hepburn pronunciation of the official Mitsubishi dealership. Polivanov is tired of turning in his grave, in a word.
Well, then such a merciless linguistic phenomenon as transmission according to tradition is included in the matter - this is when people pronounce the word incorrectly for so long, stubbornly and en masse that this incorrect version is eventually taken as the norm. For example, the national Moscow dish "sushi" will never be forced to pronounce it as "sushi" in your life - you just have to put up with it.
A ray of light in this dark realm is shed by geographical names - they, as a rule, took root in the Russian language even before the invasion of foreign brands. We call Hiroshima Hiroshima, although logically we should say "Hiroshima" - in English this city is written as Hiroshima.
Toshiba laptops work fine only for those who know how to pronounce their name.
In this case, it would be logical to turn to native speakers and listen to how they pronounce controversial sounds, but the Japanese are not helpers in this matter: if you listen carefully, they generally give out some kind of peculiar sound, something between "s" and " w", "t" and "h". Apparently not to offend anyone. Although, even before the end of the Second World War, the Japanese were on "our" side: to transcribe Japanese names in the letters of the Latin alphabet, Japan itself introduced the official "kunrei-shiki" system, which prescribed that controversial sounds should also be transmitted in Latin in the same way as the familiar one suggests Comrade Polivanov. But we all remember how the Second World War ended for the Japanese, and it is inconvenient for Americans to pronounce solid "s" and "t", so Hepburn with his "comfortable" transcription came in handy. Armed with such a theoretical base, we turned to the Russian representative office of Mitsubishi to find out their opinion on this matter.
LLC "MMS Rus" - the exclusive distributor of Mitsubishi cars in Russia - adheres to the following variant of the pronunciation of the Mitsubishi brand - "Mitsubishchi" in its communication. In the original, in Japanese, the pronunciation of the sound ending of the brand sounds like "ShI" - "Mitsubishchi". Thus, the sound is much closer to "SHI" and almost nothing to do with "SI". From a phonetic point of view, Mitsubishi is the closest to the original (Japanese) sound of the brand.
Ekaterina Kolesnikova, Senior PR Manager, Mitsubishi Motors Russia
The opinions of the representation and the linguists, as you see, differed. So where is the truth? Maybe all these theoretical calculations of Polivanov are already outdated? To find out, we turned to a person who knows firsthand about the living Japanese language. Aleksey Zavrachaev, a TASS news agency correspondent, a certified Japanese specialist and a great car lover, has been living and working in Japan for a long time and understands the intricacies of the pronunciation of Japanese names like no one else.
"If you go into the current rules of the Russian language, then it is correct to transcribe this word as "Mitsubishi." Everything is simple here: there is the so-called Polivanov system, according to which each syllable in Japanese corresponds to an analogue in Russian. Thus, options like "Mitsubishi" are swept aside I would like to cite sushi and sushi as an example, but here it turns out a different story: sushi won a devastating victory, because, as my teacher of the Russian language at the university said, the norm prohibits, and the uzus (society) implements, "Alexey takes the side of Polivanov.
The fact that "Mitsubishi" sounds much dearer to the Japanese than "Mitsubishi" is perfectly confirmed by the following video, in which a charming Japanese woman pronounces the names of car brands in the original language. By the way, pay attention to the background in the frame - the girl is clearly in the subject!
In a word, say "Mitsubishi", but do not get into a fight for "sushi" - traditions are strong, what can you do.
So again:
Mitsubishi
CORRECT: Mitsubishi
WRONG : Mitsubishi
Do you think you already know the whole truth about foreign languages? No matter how. There are still many fierce discussions ahead about how to properly pronounce certain names - German, Italian, French Korean ... The philological war is just beginning, and we will still surprise you!
Having tried to put an end to this issue, we suddenly found ourselves under the crossfire of a heated discussion between linguists-translators and official representation. Not everything is as simple as it might seem. In order to decide which option is still correct - "Mitsubishi" or "Mitsubishi" - first, let's approach the issue from a scientific, linguistic point of view. But don't worry, everything is simple and very interesting. Our colleagues from the AvtoVesti magazine sorted out the issue.
In 1917, the Russian linguist and orientalist Evgeny Dmitrievich Polivanov was the first to develop a system for writing Japanese words in Cyrillic, which is actively used to this day and is known as the Polivanov system. Disputable syllables should be read, according to Polivanov, as "si", not "shi", "ti", not "chi", "sya", not "sha", "shu", not "shu" and so on. Thus, it would be more correct to pronounce "Mitsubishi" after all.
And everything would be simple and understandable if it were not for another linguist, Comrade James Curtis Hepburn, who at the end of the 19th century proposed his own version for transcribing the Japanese language. In accordance with it, it is more correct to read "Mitsubishi". And it is precisely here that the main reason for the current discrepancies lies: Polivanov's system was created in Cyrillic, and Hepburn's system in Latin.
It would seem - yes, let them pronounce overseas as they want with their Hepburn! But why, then, is the Hepburn variant so firmly rooted in the Russian language? Everything is simple. Even before people began to delve into the nuances of pronunciation, the names of imported goods entering our market were presented in Latin, and under the avalanche of Toshiba computers and Nakamichi audio systems, people somehow did not really think about the origin and correct reading of these names - they taught in school in English lessons that sh is read as "sh", well, that's all! What questions? At the same time, interestingly, specifically with Mitsubishi, at first the situation was better - both options existed in Russian speech approximately on an equal footing. But then the fashion for English-language names took over, including over advertisers, who from every iron convinced that it was necessary to pronounce "shi". The control shot was the transition to the Hepburn pronunciation of the official Mitsubishi dealership. Polivanov is tired of turning in his grave, in a word.
Well, then such a merciless linguistic phenomenon as transmission according to tradition is included in the matter - this is when people pronounce the word incorrectly for so long, stubbornly and en masse that this incorrect version is eventually taken as the norm. For example, you will never force anyone to pronounce the Ukrainian dish "sushi" as "sushi" in your life - you just have to put up with it.
In this case, it would be logical to turn to native speakers and listen to how they pronounce controversial sounds, but the Japanese are not helpers in this matter: if you listen carefully, they generally give out some kind of peculiar sound, something between "s" and " w", "t" and "h". Apparently not to offend anyone.
Armed with such a theoretical base, we turned to the Russian representative office of Mitsubishi to find out their opinion on this matter: “In the original, in Japanese, the pronunciation of the sound ending of the brand sounds like “SCHI” - “Mitsubishchi”. Thus, the sound is much closer to "SHI" and almost nothing to do with "SI". From a phonetic point of view, Mitsubishi is the closest to the original (Japanese) sound of the brand.
The opinions of the representation and the linguists, as you see, differed. So where is the truth? Maybe all these theoretical calculations of Polivanov are already outdated? To find out, we turned to a person who knows firsthand about the living Japanese language. Aleksey Zavrachaev, a TASS news agency correspondent, a certified Japanese specialist and a great car lover, has been living and working in Japan for a long time and understands the intricacies of the pronunciation of Japanese names like no one else.
"If you go into the current rules of the Russian language, then it is correct to transcribe this word as "Mitsubishi." Everything is simple here: there is the so-called Polivanov system, according to which each syllable in Japanese corresponds to an analogue in Russian. Thus, options like "Mitsubishi" are swept aside I would like to cite sushi and sushi as an example, but here it turns out a different story: sushi won a devastating victory, because, as my teacher of the Russian language at the university said, the norm prohibits, and the uzus (society) implements, "Alexey takes the side of Polivanov.
The fact that "Mitsubishi" sounds much dearer to the Japanese than "Mitsubishi" is perfectly confirmed by the following video, in which a charming Japanese woman pronounces the names of car brands in the original language. By the way, pay attention to the background in the frame - the girl is clearly in the subject!