What lore do you ignore?

[Turnintino]

There's a cursory pronunciation guide for Seeker prefixes in the Race Naming Conventions thread. So, based on that, it should be "yah-SHTO-la" and "goo-RA-ha" respectively (or "goo-RAH-a", perhaps; the pronunciation for given names isn't detailed, except to say that aitches are usually unvoiced by non-Miqo'te because of their peculiarity -- and with that in mind, it's possible that the "sh" in "shtola" wouldn't be pronounced as a digraph in the Miqo'te language either, but that's neither here nor there).

Some actors get close enough with "yeh-" or "yuh-SHTO-la", which really doesn't bother me much, but you'll hear others say "ish-TO-la" (following the pronunciation logic used for "Ysayle").

Conversely, there's at least an internal consistency to the pronunciation of "G'raha" in the dub that makes that change a lot more palatable to me, since although it's different, the difference is always the same. But would I like to hear the "proper" pronunciation? Yes lol.

All that said, I do have one gripe with the aforementioned pronunciation guide, and that's its treatment of F. If I'm understanding correctly, we're told it works the same way the dub treats the prefix in "G'raha", where it simply merges with the first syllable of the given name. It works for a name like F'lhammin, or with any given name that starts with a vowel, or R, Y, or W, but that's it. Try to say "fsteak" lol.

[Iscah]

Seeker name pronunciation really deserves to be its own thread, not tacked into this separate topic.

"goo-RA-ha"

The thing is, that is essentially how it's pronounced, but the "oo" part is so short that you skim over it and end up with "gRA". It's generally how Japanese representation of English sounds would work.

I think it relates back to your last paragraph. The "oo" sound would come out more if you needed it as a a dividing sound because the following given name doesn't flow nicely from the starting letter. Thus F'lhaminn can be pronounced with "fLA" but with a less compatible name it would be more of a "fu".

[RyuDragnier]

There's a cursory pronunciation guide for Seeker prefixes in the Race Naming Conventions thread. So, based on that, it should be "yah-SHTO-la" and "goo-RA-ha" respectively (or "goo-RAH-a", perhaps; the pronunciation for given names isn't detailed, except to say that aitches are usually unvoiced by non-Miqo'te because of their peculiarity -- and with that in mind, it's possible that the "sh" in "shtola" wouldn't be pronounced as a digraph in the Miqo'te language either, but that's neither here nor there).

Some actors get close enough with "yeh-" or "yuh-SHTO-la", which really doesn't bother me much, but you'll hear others say "ish-TO-la" (following the pronunciation logic used for "Ysayle").

Conversely, there's at least an internal consistency to the pronunciation of "G'raha" in the dub that makes that change a lot more palatable to me, since although it's different, the difference is always the same. But would I like to hear the "proper" pronunciation? Yes lol.

All that said, I do have one gripe with the aforementioned pronunciation guide, and that's its treatment of F. If I'm understanding correctly, we're told it works the same way the dub treats the prefix in "G'raha", where it simply merges with the first syllable of the given name. It works for a name like F'lhammin, or with any given name that starts with a vowel, or R, Y, or W, but that's it. Try to say "fsteak" lol.

I think I get why they pronounce her name the way they do. Y is pronounced ee in Japanese. That's why the game series Ys is pronounced eess. They're probably using Japanese pronunciation here, as Y'shtola pronounced in Japanese would be ee-shi-toe-la.

[Turnintino]

Do you happen to speak Spanish? I ask because consider the sound made for the Spanish Y.

I don't (despite being Latino in SoCal lol), but I'm familiar. A little tangential, but that the Y tribe's animal totem is the jaguar always makes me think of that. Although Spanish is hardly the only language that similarly pronounces the J sound.

[...]

All I can really say is that that all makes sense to me. The naming guide already tells us that non-Miqo'te pronounce their names differently, and it seems likely that many of the more Eorzean-integrated Miqo'te themselves probably fell in line with them. Regardless, we know there's an in-world discrepancy.

That said, if we're taking that pronunciation guide at face value, it's already doing the work of making their names more pronounceable for the common tongue, prefixes included. So while I don't think every voice actor (or character, when it's a choice made for them by the actor) should all use the same precise pronunciation, I still wish there were a greater sense of unity there. Not ruining my experience by any stretch, but ya know.

I think a bit about how the Miqo'te language might sound, or what their accent might be if everyone weren't mostly British, and it kind of frustrates me a little bit that we haven't gotten the same treatment for them in that department as we later got for races like the Hrothgar or Viera -- in terms of accent work, I mean. Of course, both's languages have clear real life counterparts that they're based on, whereas the Miqo'te language is completely invented, so the former are easier to cast for. Still, it's something I wonder about.

Speaking of Viera and accents, though, I've always thought it was pretty funny that Lyna's Icelandic accent was apparently... genetic? lmao

[...]

For the record, I'm not confused by the idea that someone could look at "Y'shtola" as written and pronounce it that way. In a vacuum, it's not at all unreasonable. And it's clear that the current English ADR team has no interest in referring to what is essentially supplemental material for role-players. But nor are they interested in referring to the original Japanese pronunciation of her name, for which the romaji is usually rendered "Ya Shutora". That seems to agree more with the pronunciation purported by the thread on naming conventions. So the problem ultimately comes down to the more ambiguous way the name was localized in English, and the way English-speakers are inclined to read it.

Consequently, in the English dub post-ARR, you can hear Alphinaud say "yeh-SHTO-la" and then hear Thancred say "ish-TO-la" lol. The actors are making conflicting choices about the pronunciation, and it doesn't seem as if the ADR director is making any attempt to unify them. And I really wish they would do at least that much, accuracy notwithstanding. But c'est la vie!

[Wyssahtyn]

Y is pronounced ee in Japanese.

...lolwut.

[RyuDragnier]

...lolwut.

You know how the Ys franchise is pronounced, yes?

[Cleretic]

You know how the Ys franchise is pronounced, yes?

Wrong, and bad choice of evidence anyway: Ys is written イース, which is roughtly 'isu' with that long 'ee' sound.

The Japanese Y sound is one of those consonants that only exists with trailing vowel sounds, but is usually with that sharp, shorter 'Y' sound; 'Ya', 'Ye', 'Yo', and so on. Y'shtola and Y'mhitra's names specifically starts with the 'Ya' character, but their names are in katakana so it's treated as a loan word.

[RyuDragnier]

Wrong, and bad choice of evidence anyway: Ys is written イース, which is roughtly 'isu' with that long 'ee' sound.

The Japanese Y sound is one of those consonants that only exists with trailing vowel sounds, but is usually with that sharp, shorter 'Y' sound; 'Ya', 'Ye', 'Yo', and so on. Y'shtola and Y'mhitra's names specifically starts with the 'Ya' character, but their names are in katakana so it's treated as a loan word.

I stand corrected then.

[DreadCrow]

You know how the Ys franchise is pronounced, yes?

Ys being pronounced the way it does have absolutely nothing to do with Japanese and everything to do with a legendary French city that was supposedly swallowed up by the ocean.