There are multiple spellings Roman-script-users choose when spelling this favored Tea from Yunnan. Personally, I choose to spell the word as "Puerh," which comes from the Wade-Giles system of Romanization of Chinese words. However, unlike in that system, I don't use the hyphen. The spellings without the 'h' at the end come from Pinyin, which is a more common way of spelling Chinese words in Roman script, and one that I use to text in Chinese on a phone.
So, why do I feel like I can spell it how I want, without the hyphen? Well, really the only correct way of spelling Puerh would be using the Chinese characters, which are: 普洱. So, since we have to make an approximation for Roman-script-readers anyway, and since there are multiple systems (and more than just the two listed above) that give different spellings, there seems to be some space to choose the spelling we like. English in particular rarely uses hyphens or accents for common words, and since I use this specific word so often on my website and in my life, I wanted to give it a spelling that is easier to type, text, and pronounce. The 'h' ending gives a slightly different focus on the word, making it a bit breathier and more visually distinct from words like "pure" while not depending on a hyphen, apostrophe, or accent. And though this spelling may encourage an ending to the word that sounds a bit too much like "air," I'm okay with that (see pronunciation guide below) as it looks better. To me, anyway.
Feel free to use the spelling you like best, too. In any case, it might be worth recognizing the characters!
普洱 - Puerh
茶 - Tea
普洱茶 - Puerh Tea
Pronunciation Guide:
普洱 "pu" has a slight rise in it, then "erh" drops into the throat. For the second syllable, the closer you are to a slightly aspirated "er" sound the better, so long as the sound is in your throat. That said, Cantonese speakers will have more of an "ar" sound for the second syllable.
茶 in Mandarin is pronounced "cha." It uses a rising tone and a vowel sound like "ah." For Cantonese, replace the "ch" with a "t."
Reference: https://web.archive.org/web/20160507081118/http://tearroir.com/news/puer-vs-pu-erh-whats-the-deal-with-the-different-spellings#.Vy2jKi-l2J8
Comments