# Sign unvieled for Trump Heights **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [June 18, 2019, 6:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sign-unvieled-for-trump-heights/835703 "2019-06-18T18:25:20Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 14\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![carnivorousplant](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnivorousplant/32/3563_2.png) [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2019, 6:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sign-unvieled-for-trump-heights/835703/1 "2019-06-18T18:25:20Z")
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu introduces the new [Golan Heights community of Ramat Trump, or Trump Heights.](https://www.jta.org/quick-reads/sign-unveiled-for-ramat-trump-in-the-golan) Fir those literate in Hebrew: Does the sign read," peh mem alef reish teit"? TRAMP. ---
**Author:** ![KarlGauss](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/karlgauss/32/3713_2.png) [@KarlGauss](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KarlGauss)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2019, 6:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sign-unvieled-for-trump-heights/835703/2 "2019-06-18T18:35:41Z")
> [@carnivorousplant](#): > > Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu introduces the new [Golan Heights community of Ramat Trump, or Trump Heights.](https://www.jta.org/quick-reads/sign-unveiled-for-ramat-trump-in-the-golan) > > Fir those literate in Hebrew: > > Does the sign read," peh mem alef reish teit"? > TRAMP. It’s context dependent And in this context it’s clearly TRUMP. ---
**Author:** ![carnivorousplant](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnivorousplant/32/3563_2.png) [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2019, 6:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sign-unvieled-for-trump-heights/835703/3 "2019-06-18T18:51:18Z")
Thanks, Karl. ---
**Author:** ![Telemark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/telemark/32/372_2.png) [@Telemark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Telemark)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2019, 6:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sign-unvieled-for-trump-heights/835703/4 "2019-06-18T18:55:48Z")
> [@carnivorousplant](#): > > Does the sign read," peh mem alef reish teit"? > TRAMP. There are no vowels written so the vowel sounds are all context dependent. ---
**Author:** ![carnivorousplant](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnivorousplant/32/3563_2.png) [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2019, 7:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sign-unvieled-for-trump-heights/835703/5 "2019-06-18T19:00:17Z")
> [@Telemark](#): > > There are no vowels written so the vowel sounds are all context dependent. What is the aleph doing there? It is silent, I understand. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2019, 7:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sign-unvieled-for-trump-heights/835703/6 "2019-06-18T19:29:40Z")
I’ve never quite understood just what aleph is in Hebrew, if it’s not a vowel. ---
**Author:** ![puzzlegal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/puzzlegal/32/3827_2.png) [@puzzlegal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puzzlegal)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2019, 7:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sign-unvieled-for-trump-heights/835703/7 "2019-06-18T19:33:20Z")
it’s not a vowel. It’s sort of like a really faint “w”. It’s a place-holder that can allow a vowel to sit there as its own syllable without a “real” consonant sound. I’m not sure Hebrew has a vowel that sounds exactly like the “u” in “trump”, though, so it might come out “tramp”, or more likely “tremp” or “troomp”. ---
**Author:** ![DPRK](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/4491bb/32.png) [@DPRK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DPRK)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2019, 7:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sign-unvieled-for-trump-heights/835703/8 "2019-06-18T19:53:05Z")
> [@puzzlegal](#): > > it’s not a vowel. It’s sort of like a really faint “w”. It’s a place-holder that can allow a vowel to sit there as its own syllable without a “real” consonant sound. Definitely not the case. As a consonant, aleph represents a glottal stop. However, in this case, as in Arabic, the aleph occurs as a _mater lectionis_ representing a long “a” in this case. “W” would be represented by a “waw”, but there is no “w” in “Trump”. > [@](#): > > I’m not sure Hebrew has a vowel that sounds exactly like the “u” in “trump”, though, so it might come out “tramp”, or more likely “tremp” or “troomp”. Few languages have anything that sounds exactly like the far-out English vowels. Obviously, in this case they picked an “a”. ---
**Author:** ![KarlGauss](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/karlgauss/32/3713_2.png) [@KarlGauss](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KarlGauss)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2019, 7:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sign-unvieled-for-trump-heights/835703/9 "2019-06-18T19:56:56Z")
> [@puzzlegal](#): > > it’s not a vowel. It’s sort of like a really faint “w”. It’s a place-holder that can allow a vowel to sit there as its own syllable without a “real” consonant sound. > > I’m not sure Hebrew has a vowel that sounds exactly like the “u” in “trump”, though, so it might come out “tramp”, or more likely “tremp” or “troomp”. Hebrew vowels are not (usually) written explicitly. On the other hand, when teaching/learning the written language, it may be easier to include them (they are [diacritical marks](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hebrew_diacritics)) in order to guide the learner but at the risk of making them dependent on such cues. IMO. ---
**Author:** ![DPRK](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/4491bb/32.png) [@DPRK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DPRK)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2019, 8:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sign-unvieled-for-trump-heights/835703/10 "2019-06-18T20:16:00Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > I’ve never quite understood just what aleph is in Hebrew, if it’s not a vowel. Sometimes an originally consonantal aleph has become silent. Other times, as we discussed, it can represent a vowel, a property shared by “yod”, “waw”, and “he”. Original old-school Hebrew did not include any vowels at all. > [@KarlGauss](#): > > Hebrew vowels are not (usually) written explicitly. On the other hand, when teaching/learning the written language, it may be easier to include them (they are [diacritical marks](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hebrew_diacritics)) in order to guide the learner but at the risk of making them dependent on such cues. IMO. Use of diacritical marks is a much later innovation compared to the used of matres lectionis. And actually if you look at Modern Hebrew literature (books, web sites, newspapers, etc.) you will not find any diacritical marks except in poetry and to resolve true ambiguity. People learning Hebrew naturally also learn the vowel signs, and perhaps less commonly the accent signs. ---
**Author:** ![carnivorousplant](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnivorousplant/32/3563_2.png) [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2019, 8:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sign-unvieled-for-trump-heights/835703/11 "2019-06-18T20:26:02Z")
“Context” is supposed to make clear whether I’ve lost my cat, cot or cut. Obviously, I have never been called to the bima. ---
**Author:** ![BigT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bigt/32/12044_2.png) [@BigT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BigT)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2019, 9:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sign-unvieled-for-trump-heights/835703/12 "2019-06-18T21:15:36Z")
Okay, but how exactly is this a vowel pronounced in Hebrew? Wikipedia says it uses /a/, but that vowel can sometimes be very close to the a in tramp. Or it can be darker, closer to the a as mall. Personally, when the uh (/ʌ/) vowel is unavailable, and particularly when followed by a nasal consonant, I prefer /ɔ/ (“aw”) or /o/ (“oh”) vowels first. If you say trawmp or trohmp, it sounds pretty close to Trump. Plus, well, even if it’s pronounced differently, if the transliteration would be “Tramp,” that seems something you’d want to avoid. ---
**Author:** ![markn\_1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f9ae1b/32.png) [@markn\_1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/markn_1)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2019, 10:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sign-unvieled-for-trump-heights/835703/13 "2019-06-18T22:34:52Z")
> [@BigT](#): > > Okay, but how exactly is this a vowel pronounced in Hebrew? Wikipedia says it uses /a/, but that vowel can sometimes be very close to the a in tramp. Or it can be darker, closer to the a as mall. I don’t know any Hebrew, but the IPA symbol for the vowel in “tramp” (as I pronounce in American English) is /æ/, and the vowel in “mall” is /ɔː/ although some dialects probably pronounce it /ɑː/ or /ɒ/. The /a/ symbol represents a sound that does not occur in English, but is the sound in German “Mann” and French “gare”, according to Wikipedia. > **[Help:IPA/English](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Help:IPA/English)** > > Throughout Wikipedia, the pronunciation of words is indicated using the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA). The following tables list the IPA symbols used for English words and pronunciations. Please note that several of these symbols are used in ways that are specific to Wikipedia, and differ from those used by dictionaries. > If the IPA symbols are not displayed properly by your browser, see the links below. > If you are adding a pronunciation using this key, such pronunciations should gener... > **[Help:IPA](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Help:IPA)** > > Here is a basic key to the symbols of the International Phonetic Alphabet. For the smaller set of symbols that is sufficient for English, see Help:IPA/English. Several rare IPA symbols are not included; these are found in the main IPA article or on the extensive IPA chart. For the Manual of Style guideline for pronunciation, see Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Pronunciation. > For each IPA symbol, an English example is given where possible; here "RP" stands for Received Pronunciation. The foreign lang... ---
**Author:** ![glowacks](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/glowacks/32/5548_2.png) [@glowacks](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/glowacks)\ **Post date:** [June 19, 2019, 2:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sign-unvieled-for-trump-heights/835703/14 "2019-06-19T02:22:50Z")
For reference, the vowel in “Trump” is represented by an ‘a’ in the Romaji transcription of what he is called in Japanese - “Toranpu”. It is systematic that they use an ‘a’ to replace that vowel, because they think their ‘a’ is closer to the English “short u” than their ‘u’, mainly because the latter is effectively completely unpronounced when not long, and the long version sounds quite different, more like the English “long u”. The English “short u” and “long u” really don’t have anything to do with each other in pronunciation, much like all the other “short/long” distinctions, so there’s little reason to think that the two sounds would be transcribed by something that would be back-transcribed by the same letter.