"Yoshi" from Lilly to Dory

This is my friend Yoshi:

While we were in Mexico she was given this name by a Mayan fellow named Ricardo, who transformed it into "Yoshi" after having a great deal of trouble pronouncing her actual name, which is Chelsea.

I was thinking about this the other day, and I think I've figured out how he got "Yoshi" out of "Chelsea."

Let's start with the beginning: "Ch."  This is a sound that doesn't exist in the Mayan dialect of Tzotzil.  There is a sound similar to this, but it's softer.  Closer to a "sh" sound, or something in between the two.

(A note: when you see an "x" in written Mayan words, such as "uxmal" or "yaxchilan," it is pronounced with that "sh" -like sound.  The "x" comes from the Spanish conquistadores, who when documenting words they learned from the natives or the names of places would simply replace a sound they didn't know how to write with an "X."  In actual Mayan writing, this sound is usually represented by a "tz" combination, like the middle sound in "Tzotzil."  If you're wondering about the beginning "Tz" in "Tzotzil," this is pronounced more like a "D-z."  The whole word sounds more like "d-zo?-sheell" in English, with a glottal stop after the "o.")

So, Ricardo could have replaced the "Ch" with the "X" or "tz" sound, but instead he used a "y."  Why?  Well, that "X/tz" sound is never found at the beginning of a word in his dialect, but is often preceded by a vowel sound.  It was difficult for him to begin a word with this sound, so he replaced it with a sound that is used fairly often at the beginning of words in Tzotzil; "y".  Kind of like how Spanish speakers sometimes have trouble with beginning a word with an "s" sound followed by a consonant, like in "stop," or "scary."  Often they will add an "eh" sound to the beginning, so it sounds more like "eh-stop," and "eh-scary."  This is a familiar sound in Spanish: "escuela," "especial," "estudio," etc.

The next sound after "Ch" is "eh."  This is the part Ricardo had the most difficulty with.  Tzotzil is very fond of rounded vowels, like the "o" in "only" or the "a" in "always."  But it doesn't like those flat sounds like the "a" in "cat" or the "e" in "everyone" or "Chelsea."  It was much easier to turn that sound into the rounded "o" that he's used to.

The next part of her name is the "l."  Now, this is the interesting part.  The "l" in "Chelsea" is what is known in Linguistics as a "dark L."  It's the difference between the "l" sound in "lake" and the "l" sound in "milk."  The one in "milk" is the dark L.  It's something English speakers have trouble distinguishing; we think of them both as an "L."  But say the two words, "lake" and "milk" to yourself a few times, and you'll notice that in "milk" you really don't make an "L" sound at all.  It's the same in "Chelsea," which is why Ricardo had trouble.  There is no dark L in Tzotzil, or any Mayan dialect for that matter.  Instead of trying to replace it, he simply omitted the "l" sound altogether.

The next sound is "s," which is another sound that doesn't exist in Tzotzil at all.  Ricardo turned it into the previously mentioned "X/tz" sound, which to English speakers sounds closer to a "sh." (that's why we say it "Yoshi," but in actuality Ricardo pronounced it more like "Yo(X)ee")

The ending, "ea," (pronounced "ee") wasn't a problem for Ricardo at all; this is a sound familiar to Tzotzil, so he left it.

The spelling, "Yoshi" comes simply from our interpretation of Ricardo's pronunciation, which we likened to the name of the character from the "Mario" games :)

Love,
Lilly