Talk:Dune (novel)/Archive 2

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The wrong IPA for "Atreides" in our Dune articles?

Currently we are using /əˈtreɪdiːz/ for the IPA pronunciation with this Youtube video as a source that shows Herbert's notes where it is phonetically given as "Ah-tray-a-dees". Better still is this interview on Youtube where Herbert himself says correct pronunciation. Notice Herbert's official version is clearly four syllables while our current IPA is giving it incorrectly as only three syllables (note that "eɪ" only produces the long-a sound). I'm not particularly good with IPA but I believe the better way might be /əˈtreɪɪdiːz/. Jason Quinn (talk) 16:08, 13 October 2021 (UTC)

@Xyzzyva: THe IPA for the Paul Atreides article was originally added by this edit on 16 February 2010. So if I am correct, this has been around for quite some time. Jason Quinn (talk) 16:08, 13 October 2021 (UTC)

You're right about the four syllables. Check an IPA web site to confirm your change, then go ahead and make it. Martindo (talk) 01:42, 14 October 2021 (UTC)

Yes, /əˈtreɪɪdiːz/ seems appropriate. "Ah-tray-a-dees" and the audio of Herbert's own pronunciation alone would suggest /əˈtreɪədiːz/, but the i in Atreides suggests /ɪ/ is the correct diaphoneme to use in our WP:DIAPHONEMIC transcription, given most Americans lack the distinction between Lenin and Lennon, bizarre and bazaar, etc. Nardog (talk) 06:55, 14 October 2021 (UTC)

I've made this edit at Paul Atreides. A similar attempt at Leto I Atreides raised two more questions:

1. There the IPA had the same issue as above but there was another difference. Its IPA starts with "ʌ" (sounds like the American 'u' in 'cut') instead of "ə" (sounds like the English 'a' in 'above'). Both of these are reasonable to my ear. Perhaps the 'ʌ' is ever-so more correct but given things are within the "margin of error", I'm partial to 'ə' simply because I think the schwa sound will familiar to many more readers.
2. The template is currently using {{IPA-en}} but I think since this is not (directly) an English word we should be using {{IPA-all}}. My first clumsy attempts at using IPA-all had the template not recognizing the use of 'eɪ' as a sound so there might be some language-based technicalities to IPA to which I am unfamiliar.

Anyway, I'm leaving the change to the Paul Atreides article but not making more for the moment. The edit summary has a link here so maybe it will attract more attention to our discussion. I need to think about these two new questions for a bit before I make changes everywhere I can find them. Jason Quinn (talk) 02:24, 15 October 2021 (UTC)

See Phoneme. IPA symbols enclosed in slashes (and even some of those in square brackets) represent not concrete sounds per se but abstract categories deduced from phonemic contrasts. /ʌ/ rarely occurs when unstressed, word-initial and immediately preceding stress, much less when represented by ⟨a⟩.

As long as you're representing how speakers of English pronounce (or are supposed to pronounce) a word, of whatever origin, according to the phonological system of English, {{IPAc-en}} is the template to use. Nardog (talk) 04:12, 15 October 2021 (UTC)

Thanks, Nardog. I started looking for other places in our Dune articles where this matters. Thankfully there's not as many as I would have guessed. But I did find that the IPA is used also on the Alia Atreides. It too introduces some extra aspects of IPA to consider (apologies, I am learning IPA as I go here). The Alia article already used the proper 4-syllable pronunciation but it introduces two news aspects: a) using a dot for a syllable break like so, /əˈtreɪ.ɪdiːz/, and b) it used 'ᵻ' instead of 'ɪ' for the the penultimate syllable's sound. My interpretation of the article for 'ᵻ' is that is that the sound under discussion is a "messy" IPA topic and even if the ambiguity in notational usage is ignored, the proposed sound distinction between 'ᵻ' and 'ɪ' is so fuzzy that it doesn't much matter which one is used. My searches have found less advice on how to properly use syllable breaks in IPA. I think (based on 10 minutes of searching) it's mostly a matter of judgement: You don't use them all the time but you use them when it appears to help. In this case, I think it does kind of help here because it splits up 'eɪɪ', which might be confusing to readers. All this said, I'm now thinking that the best form is now, /əˈtreɪ.ɪdiːz/. Jason Quinn (talk) 05:08, 15 October 2021 (UTC)

⟨ᵻ⟩ used to be a distinct diaphoneme but it was deprecated a few years ago so {{IPAc-en|ᵻ}} is now the same as {{IPAc-en|ɪ}}. Some editors prefer to put a syllable break where two vowels occur in a row. In some languages like Italian, this could in fact be necessary to distinguish some words from others, but there's no such ambiguity in English (⟨eɪɪ⟩ is sufficiently unambiguous because ⟨e⟩ never occurs by itself in our system). I for one consider the practice uncalled-for as no dictionary does it (they indicate either all syllable breaks or none), but it is nonetheless the case that some editors prefer it. Nardog (talk) 05:37, 15 October 2021 (UTC)

Given that information, then I'm fine with sticking with /əˈtreɪɪdiːz/ as the final form. Thanks again. You've been very helpful. I'll make the changes in the articles when I have a moment. Jason Quinn (talk) 06:03, 15 October 2021 (UTC)

Going by Herbert, who didn't use IPA, I think what we're looking for is /əˈtreɪədiːz/, or better yet (to show secondary stress and break that up a little) /əˈtreɪəˌdiːz/. Using /əˈtreɪɪdiːz/ comes off as exaggerated. If Herbert had meant the latter, he would have written "Ah-tray-ee-dees".  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  02:03, 28 November 2021 (UTC)

Baron Harkonnen’s Homosexuality

Has there been any discussion of adding information concerning Baron Harkonnen’s homosexual attractions, how Herbert depicted them, and how his depiction may have been influenced by his personal views and relationship with his gay son, Bruce? I ask before making changes myself to see if there has been past discussion I should be aware of and to solicit advice on how and where it’d be best to add this information. Thanks! Dbusb (talk) 04:42, 16 November 2021 (UTC)

I know the movies gave this much more weight, so you'd have to be careful with sources that extrapolate that back into the novel. And given the time it was written, it likely will be in more modern sources. --Masem (t) 05:05, 16 November 2021 (UTC)

Yes, you have to be careful to avoid original research/synthesis. For example, there may be sources confirming that Herbert was estranged from his gay son who later died of AIDS, but just including that fact without a reliable source making the connection with Frank's depiction of homosexuality would be inappropriate. We can't use sources to infer things that aren't sourced. Also, homosexuality is such a minor element of the novel, I think any sourced discussion of this would probably be more appropriate for the Vladimir Harkonnen article, where the character's homosexual tendencies are already mentioned. Thanks.— TAnthony^Talk 18:44, 16 November 2021 (UTC)

Concur with TAnthony.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  02:06, 28 November 2021 (UTC)

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Archive 3

Sietch (camp) or Seiche (standing waves on an enclosed body of water)

I happened across the term "Seiche" elsewhere on Wikipedia and despite a different pronunciation guide, it struck me that the sounds are similar enough to be confused. This made me wonder at the origins of the two words, and whether the French term Seiche may have been known to Frank Herbert. Seiche has been in use for quite a long time in Switzerland, referring to distinctive wave patterns on lakes. Then looking at the wiki for Dune I see Seitch given as a term from the Caucasus War meaning "camp". But a prominent feature of a Seitch in Dune was the hidden cache of water, making 'water camp' seem a plausible definition. Is all this this mere coincidence, or is it that, as often happens, words are borrowed from other places and then gradually morphed in sound and spelling? Have we any linguists who can discuss these similar-sounding terms? What about experts on Dune and/or Frank Herbert, and his travels abroad? YodaWhat (talk) 00:19, 29 August 2022 (UTC)

"The world's best-selling science fiction novel"

The article claims Dune is the world's best selling science fiction novel. But George Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four has sold 35 million copies, which is some millions more than Dune. It is a different kind of science fiction, often called dystopian or soft/social sci-fi, but most still consider it science fiction. So unless we're talking about sci-fi subgenres, the article is not entirely correct. Rhynchosaur (talk) 09:52, 21 February 2023 (UTC)

I changed it to "one of" rather than "the" best-selling. Wikipedia generally tries to fact-check claims by over-enthusiastic writers in a Reliable Source, thereby forestalling a Michael_Crichton#GellMannAmnesiaEffect. Thanks for doing this. Martindo (talk) 07:11, 24 September 2023 (UTC)