I figured it would help if we had a master thread for all alternate terminology/vocabulary discussions. Most of the threads started for asking this kind of advice die pretty soon, only lasting for a couple of posts or a couple of pages at most. So, to prevent cluttering the forums with these kind of mini-threads, let's just have this one central marketplace of ideas. :) Hope you find this useful.


Some useful links :

http://wiki.alternatehistory.com/doku.php/alternate_history/alternate_terminology

http://wiki.alternatehistory.com/doku.php/alternate_history/alternate_geographic_names

http://wiki.alternatehistory.com/doku.php/resources/etymology


Some examples of past discussions about alternate etymology :

https://www.alternatehistory.com/discussion/showthread.php?t=160522

https://www.alternatehistory.com/discussion/showthread.php?t=246217

https://www.alternatehistory.com/discussion/showthread.php?t=283971

https://www.alternatehistory.com/discussion/showthread.php?t=241486

https://www.alternatehistory.com/discussion/showthread.php?t=262243
 
alternate name for telephone

I've been trying to think of an alternate term for the device known in OTL as a telephone. One that is both different yet plausible. Interestingly, the first ever device called a telephone was a system of horns for communicating between ships in fog.

Sadly there never did seem to be many alternative names for telephone floating around, which is surprising since almost all other great inventions had a load of different potential names that could have become generic. (phonograph/gramophone/grafophone, kinetoscope/cinematograph and so-on.)

I have thought of porterfone, (a greek latin kitbash from port to carry and phone sound or voice), but I note that there is no word at all so far as I know where port in this context appears at the beginning of the word. Yes we have portercabbins and porterloos, but both of these are things that can themselves be moved, whereas the telephone is a device for moving/carrying something else, i.e the voice.

My other candidate is parlegraph or parolegraph, a sort of abbreviation, (from French), of the term speaking telegraph, a term bandied about during the early phase of experimentation, and of course this is what the telephone really was to a great extent.

Anyone any thoughts?
 
Telephones are a bit tricky to get right, I suppose. I myself am thinking about revising the terms for telephones in one of my timelines.

Thande has an unusual, colloquial term for telephone in his Look to the West timeline: Quister. It's an abbreviation of "ventriloquist (machine)", because the deriders of the early telephone accussed it of being some elaborate ventriloquist trick or something.

I like your "parlegraph", TBH. :) Sounds right to me, has the right composition in terms of meaning. Even if the "-graph" suffix is usually linked with visual communication, you could make the argument that the parlegraph is a successor to the telegraph in the minds of ordinary people and businessmen. Therefore, it would make sense as a term.
 
Telephones are a bit tricky to get right, I suppose. I myself am thinking about revising the terms for telephones in one of my timelines.

Thande has an unusual, colloquial term for telephone in his Look to the West timeline: Quister. It's an abbreviation of "ventriloquist (machine)", because the deriders of the early telephone accussed it of being some elaborate ventriloquist trick or something.

I like your "parlegraph", TBH. :) Sounds right to me, has the right composition in terms of meaning. Even if the "-graph" suffix is usually linked with visual communication, you could make the argument that the parlegraph is a successor to the telegraph in the minds of ordinary people and businessmen. Therefore, it would make sense as a term.

Maybe voxgraph could work as well, due to vox meaning "voice" in Latin and it could be seen as a successor to the telegraph, making it a shortened from of "voice telegraph".
 
Maybe voxgraph could work as well, due to vox meaning "voice" in Latin and it could be seen as a successor to the telegraph, making it a shortened from of "voice telegraph".

Yeah, that's not out of the question either. :) I prefer his "parlegraph" suggestion, but you're onto something here.

As I've noted in the previous post, it's hard coming up with a really original name for the telephone that is something different than a colloquialism or the limited amount of OTL terms you could kitbash the ATL word from.

I suppose if you had other major global "languages of learning" in an ATL besides Latin and Greek, they could also spread their own native invented terms for the device, and the words the term was composed from. I dunno... Maybe one of the Indian languages, or Arabic, become such scholarly/scientific languages and you get some of the tech terminology from them, including the one for telephones ?
 
Petike said:
Telephones are a bit tricky to get right...I like your "parlegraph".
If it was a teletype-like machine, yes: "graph" ="writing". What you want is, say, televox or transvox (if you don't mind mixing Greek & Latin; I would try & avoid that).
 
If it was a teletype-like machine, yes: "graph" ="writing". What you want is, say, televox or transvox (if you don't mind mixing Greek & Latin; I would try & avoid that).

A good point. I had some similar permutations in those two terms I might rework for that timeline concept I had.
 
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