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Posted by Shik (Member # 343) on :

As promised, an update.

My wwwebsearch yield a single non-Trek answer: a catalog of papers from the late anthropologist Anthony Forge, who did a study of tribes in Papua New Guinea in the late 50s/early 60s. The specific reference was to a color slide of fieldwork labeled "Mango at Wambundu, 1958 - 1963."

From there, I contacted the Papua New Guinea governemnt via email & I received the following reply today:

"Forge organised a symposium in Switzerland in 1984. The papers were
collected and printed in Sepik Heritage - Tradition and Change in Papua New
Guinea, 1990, by Carolina Academic Press, North Carolina. This may have
some references to Wambundu. In the traditional context Wambundu has a
number of meanings. Wam means end and bundu means man. So wambundu may mean
for example end man or end of man. Wambundu also may refer to a traditional
mask/basket worn by men during initiation rites. For further information
you could try Father Cherubim Dambui, former East Sepik Premier, who
attended the symposium. He is contactable on [email protected]"

Normally, I'd continue along the trail, but I have major life problems at the moment requiring my immediate attention. Hopefully someone else will continue to sniff out the trail.

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Posted by TSN (Member # 31) on :

The real question is, how in the world did someone working on Trek hear of this name? :-)

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Posted by First of Two (Member # 16) on :

That's not all that suprising. Many words used on Trek have been derived from words used in that general area of the world. For instance, "Ferengi" and "Jem'Hadar" both are amazingly similar to Indian words that mean, respectively, 'foreigner' and 'teacher' (I'm not sure about that last one, and I may have the meaning completely wrong)

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Posted by Delta Vega (Member # 283) on :

IIRC, Jem'Hadar is a rank in the Indian military.

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Posted by Michael Dracon (Member # 4) on :

From Dictionary.com

Jemidar: The chief or leader of a hand or body of persons; esp., in the native army of India, an officer of a rank corresponding to that of lieutenant in the English army. [Written also jemadar, jamadar.]

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Posted by The_Tom (Member # 38) on :

Incidentally, that supersoldier on TNG, Roga Danar had the rank of Sub Hadar, IIRC.

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Posted by Alpha Centauri (Member # 338) on :

Looking from a Trek-perspective, wouldn't it be amazing? How would this be explained? Two major races with equivalent words in Earth languages would not be a coincidence, I think.

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Posted by Yakaspat The Trekker (Member # 355) on :

Two civilizations with the same spelling would be remarkable, sure. But, two civilizations with the same word sounds...I think "phonics" is the word...however, would simply be a interesting coincidence. Think about how many words on Earth mean different things in different cultures. Of course, that is easily explained on Earth. However, of all the species in the Star Trek Universe, hundreds of Federation members, thousands upon thousands of others, it is bound to occur that different worlds have similar words. Consider the "parrellel worlds" theory, in which civilations, under similar circumstances, will develop in a similar way. We have seen dozens of species on Trek, and they all more or less have the same body structure, similar clothing, similar weapon's styles, and similar buildings. That a few words would be similar, can easily be explained by the evolution of thought and communication.

Lance http://thetrekker.homestead.com

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Posted by Masao (Member # 232) on :

I think the similar spellings would be easy to explain by transliteration into English being limited to only 26 letters. Words from different languages would sound slightly different when pronounced by native speakers but are transliterated identically in English. Japanese is even more limited: "Shitty" and "City" are transliterated identically in Japanese katakana since there is no "si" sound in Japanese. (This is a constant source of amusement for English teachers).

Anyways, spellings may be irrelevant because I don't know if either "hadar" term ever appeared on screen within an episode (not as a title).

Of course, the simple explanation for similarity of the terms is similarity of writers. But something about alien names has always bothered me. First, most alien females names end in a or i, which seems rather Terran. Second, how come, by coincidence, we never get Alien terms that sound like English words. Why don't we ever get Aliens named Tahm (pronounced "Tom"), Bhehti (pronouced Betty), or Dd'iikch (pronouced "Dick")?

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Posted by Timo (Member # 245) on :

Well, we did get a Romulan woman named Caithlin in ST5... It's not very likely that this is the original Romulanese spelling, now is it? Then again, Gaelic/English translations and translitterations are a thing unto themselves...

Timo Saloniemi

Posted by Basill on :

quote---

Masao wrote:

"Why don't we ever get Aliens named Tahm (pronounced "Tom"), Bhehti (pronouced Betty), or Dd'iikch (pronouced "Dick")?" ---

Well there is the Star Trek: New Frontier book series. I know it is not canon, but the writer of those books has done exactly as you suggest. The captain of the Excalibur is named Calhoun, but it is actually some alien name like Kal'oon or something. He accepts the distortion to fit in. It is all explained in the first book, but it has been a long while since I read it. Never mind the mere coincidence that Calhoun is like some Terran, new frontierish, cowboy kind of name that fits his characterization perfectly.

Good thing then that his name is not Dd'iikch

Basil

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Posted by Timo (Member # 245) on :

The guy's real name was something like M'k'nzy, which he changed to MacKenzie smoothly enough when he joined the SF Academy (the books say the pronunciation is similar but not identical, with several difficult gutturals in M'k'nzy). Since he also needed a "surname" and had none, he chose the name of his hometown, Calhoun - thus, MacKenzie Calhoun, or Mac to his few friends.

Timo Saloniemi

Posted by Sol System (Member # 30) on :

According to the novelization for V, the Romulan ambassador was named after her...grandmother, I think, who had been human. Which was part of the reason she was assigned to such a miserable location. Noncanonly speaking, of course.

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