# Why add an apostrophe to "Hawaii"?
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-add-an-apostrophe-to-hawaii/221464
**Category:** Factual Questions
**Created:** [December 28, 2003, 10:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-add-an-apostrophe-to-hawaii/221464 "2003-12-28T22:36:01Z")
**Posts on this page:** 18
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@zamboniracer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/zamboniracer)
#### Post date: [December 28, 2003, 10:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-add-an-apostrophe-to-hawaii/221464/1 "2003-12-28T22:36:01Z")
Lately I’ve noticed that some people - specifically ESPN and the good folks in Hawaii who hosted a Christmas day college football game there, although their are certainly others too - have taken to adding an unneeded apostrophe to the term Hawaii right between the I’s, so that the place is supposedly now spelled " Hawai’i ".
What’s up with that? Why make the change, and who decided to change it, and why don’t we spell it phonetically (Ha-why-yee), since its spelling is just an English bastardization of the old native Hawaiian language anyway.
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### Author:  [@aaslatten](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aaslatten)
#### Post date: [December 28, 2003, 10:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-add-an-apostrophe-to-hawaii/221464/2 "2003-12-28T22:40:37Z")
This is from _The Hawaiian Language and Hawaiian-ENglish Dictionary: A Complete Grammar Study_ by Henry P. Judd:
“The gutteral break represents the elision of k in other Polynesian dialects. It is indicated by the hamzah (’). The break is an essential part of the word.”
Interestingly, though, this particular book does not use the apostrophe in “Hawaii” or “Hawaiian.”
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### Author:  [@moriah](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/moriah)
#### Post date: [December 29, 2003, 12:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-add-an-apostrophe-to-hawaii/221464/3 "2003-12-29T00:21:28Z")
Wasn’t Hawai’i settled by the Klingons?
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### Author:  [@adirondack\_mike](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adirondack_mike)
#### Post date: [December 29, 2003, 12:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-add-an-apostrophe-to-hawaii/221464/4 "2003-12-29T00:59:49Z")
It gives you that extra air of sophistication to impress your worldliness on friends, family, associates, and those poor souls who just happen to be passing by.
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### Author:  [@GorillaMan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GorillaMan)
#### Post date: [December 29, 2003, 1:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-add-an-apostrophe-to-hawaii/221464/5 "2003-12-29T01:01:42Z")
It shows you’re down with the smart racially-aware guys.
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### Author:  [@Polycarp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Polycarp)
#### Post date: [December 29, 2003, 1:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-add-an-apostrophe-to-hawaii/221464/6 "2003-12-29T01:11:30Z")
> [@](#):
>
> \*Originally posted by zamboniracer \*
> What’s up with that? Why make the change, and who decided to change it, and why don’t we spell it phonetically (Ha-why-yee), since its spelling is just an English bastardization of the old native Hawaiian language anyway.
Because phonetically it **isn’t** “Ha-why-yee” but “Hah-wah-ee-ee” with both final I sounds distinctly sounded, and an open juncture or (preferably) glottal stop between them. Precisionist usage calls for the apostrophe separating the I’s, though most common usage omits it, just as most people refer to the largest city in California by only two words from its official name, El Pueblo de Nuestra Señora la Reina de Los Angeles de Porciuncula.
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### Author:  [@commasense](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/commasense)
#### Post date: [December 29, 2003, 1:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-add-an-apostrophe-to-hawaii/221464/7 "2003-12-29T01:46:52Z")
I was under the impression, from hearing people there say it, that it was pronounced “Ha-VAH ee” with a guttural break between the second and third syllables.
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### Author:  [@nineiron](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nineiron)
#### Post date: [December 29, 2003, 2:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-add-an-apostrophe-to-hawaii/221464/8 "2003-12-29T02:16:46Z")
You’re velcome.
🙂
Sorry.
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### Author:  [@Nametag](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nametag)
#### Post date: [December 29, 2003, 2:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-add-an-apostrophe-to-hawaii/221464/9 "2003-12-29T02:54:00Z")
> [@](#):
>
> …just as most people refer to the largest city in California by only two words from its official name, El Pueblo de Nuestra Señora la Reina de Los Angeles de Porciuncula.
Rubbish. Its official name is “The City of Los Angeles.” _Nuestra Señora de Los Angeles de Porciúncula_ was the name of a river near which LA was founded (later just called el rio Porciúncula), but the settlement was actually named _El Pueblo de la Reina de los Angeles_ in 1781. I doubt that anyone called it that for long, and it certainly hasn’t been official at any time during California’s statehood. Los Angeles is a part of Los Angeles County, and that’s certainly been its name since 1850.
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### Author:  [@SparrowHawk](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SparrowHawk)
#### Post date: [December 29, 2003, 3:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-add-an-apostrophe-to-hawaii/221464/10 "2003-12-29T03:02:40Z")
They probably use an apostrophe because they haven’t got [an _okina_](http://www.olelo.hawaii.edu/eng/resources/fonts.html), the thing like an upside-down apostrophe which indicates a glottal stop in Hawaiian.
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### Author:  [@Geek\_Mecha](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Geek_Mecha)
#### Post date: [December 29, 2003, 4:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-add-an-apostrophe-to-hawaii/221464/11 "2003-12-29T04:58:36Z")
Hawaii is pronounced “ha VAI ee”, and I do not believe the spelling is a Westernized one. In the Hawaiian language, the letter W is pronounced like a V almost always if it is not the first letter of the word. So Waikiki is pronounced Waikiki, but Halawa is pronounced Halava. I say almost always because I can think of an exception off the top of my head: the town of Wahiawa. The second W is pronounced the same as the first.
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### Author:  [@panache45](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/panache45)
#### Post date: [December 29, 2003, 5:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-add-an-apostrophe-to-hawaii/221464/12 "2003-12-29T05:29:57Z")
> [@](#):
>
> \*Originally posted by SparrowHawk \*
> \*\*They probably use an apostrophe because they haven’t got [an _okina_](http://www.olelo.hawaii.edu/eng/resources/fonts.html), the thing like an upside-down apostrophe which indicates a glottal stop in Hawaiian. \*\*
Any font that has an open-quote would have an okina, since it’s the same character.
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### Author:  [@Kyla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kyla)
#### Post date: [December 29, 2003, 7:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-add-an-apostrophe-to-hawaii/221464/13 "2003-12-29T07:57:02Z")
> [@](#):
>
> \*Originally posted by aaslatten \*
> \*\*This is from _The Hawaiian Language and Hawaiian-ENglish Dictionary: A Complete Grammar Study_ by Henry P. Judd:
>
> “The gutteral break represents the elision of k in other Polynesian dialects. It is indicated by the hamzah (’). The break is an essential part of the word.”
> \*\*
I have to say, since the hamzah is an Arabic word/symbol, I find this awfully bizarre.
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### Author:  [@olham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/olham)
#### Post date: [December 29, 2003, 8:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-add-an-apostrophe-to-hawaii/221464/14 "2003-12-29T08:45:22Z")
> [@](#):
>
> …why don’t we spell it phonetically (Ha-why-yee), since its spelling is just an English bastardization of the old native Hawaiian language anyway.
The Hawaiians did not have a written language before the missionaries came and so the Latin characters (with only the consonants hklmnpw) and the okina and kahako/macron make up the official written alphabet.
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### Author:  [@Dr.Rieux](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr.Rieux)
#### Post date: [December 29, 2003, 11:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-add-an-apostrophe-to-hawaii/221464/15 "2003-12-29T11:27:53Z")
The heck with it–I say we go back to spelling in “Owyhee.”
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### Author:  [@Johanna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johanna)
#### Post date: [December 29, 2003, 11:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-add-an-apostrophe-to-hawaii/221464/16 "2003-12-29T11:34:02Z")
**Kyla** , linguists use the Arabic names of the characters _‘ayn_ ‘ and _hamzah_ ’ for these two symbols wherever they appear in typography, regardless of which language it is.
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### Author:  [@Kyla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kyla)
#### Post date: [December 29, 2003, 7:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-add-an-apostrophe-to-hawaii/221464/17 "2003-12-29T19:07:04Z")
> [@](#):
>
> \*Originally posted by Jomo Mojo \*
> \*\ ***Kyla** , linguists use the Arabic names of the characters _‘ayn_ ‘ and _hamzah_ ’ for these two symbols wherever they appear in typography, regardless of which language it is. \*\*
Well, you learn soething new every day! More if you read the SDMB.
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### Author:  [@aaslatten](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aaslatten)
#### Post date: [December 29, 2003, 7:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-add-an-apostrophe-to-hawaii/221464/18 "2003-12-29T19:07:06Z")
Also, the Hawaiians didn’t have a written version of their language before the missionaries invented one, as far as I’ve read.