I apologize in advance for the length of this post, but hey, at least I'm on topic, and somebody might just learn something!
My credentials: I have a degree in English from a well respected University, and am slowly but surely learning to speak and read Japanese as time permits. Therefore, I have several "Learn Japanese" books, and I have used them for information for this post. Now, on with the show.
My comment was in reference to Reiyuka's point, Kei... not yours. But since you have thrown down the gauntlet, I shall rise to the occasion. I'm too old and gruff to let someone try to school me!
First of all, it depends on context, in some cases such as "oneechan" a hyphen is not used (although they usually translate that as "sis," don't ask me why, it really means "honored older sister"). This is especially true when dealing with titles instead of proper names. Furthermore, using a hyphen for honorifics is NOT a universal convention. For example, Kamisama is as correct as Kami-sama (look up "God" on www.freedict.com if you don't believe me). This is mostly a matter of personal preference. Most translators, when they bother including the honorific at all, add in a hyphen to seperate it out from the main word. This is to help with understanding for people who do not read or speak Japanese. However, this is merely a convention that some people follow and some people don't. I have several manga where they leave out the honorifics entirely because they think nobody in America understands them, which robs a lot of the meaning from the story.
As I pointed out, the real correct way to write it is in a combination of hiragana and Kanji. The first two characters of the logo are the sound for "a" in hiragana, so it is "Aa." The third character is the hiragana version of an exclamation point, Bringing it up to "Ah!" The next three characters are kanji for "goddess" (The fourth character is Kanji for woman, followed by two Kanji that mean "God," which is how you write "megami" in kanji). The seventh character is hiragana for the sound "sa" and the eighth is hiragana for "ma." This brings us to the ninth character, which is the same as the third, an exclamation point (which is usually dropped when translated into English by the Japanese companies *shrug*). Hmm... something's missing... oh, a character for a hyphen, not to even mention the word "my" ("mai" would be correct, I believe, although "waga" probably would be too)! This Kosuke Fujishima guy must be some kind of hack! Going by a strict interpretation, it would be "Aa! Megamisama!"(Ah! Goddess!) :sheep:
Finally, I'll point out that if it is hyphenated, "sama" should be capitalized. According to the MLA style, when referencing the title of a movie or television show, said title should be underlined or italicized and all major words should be capitalized. In addition, the first and the last word should always be capitalized, and the second part of a compound word is considered a seperate word for those purposes.
Really though, it all boils down to a matter of personal preference and how you were taught. "Romanji" is more a way of helping pronunciation and ease of reading than a "set in stone" list of rules. Heck, I use a hyphen too, because it is easier to understand, but it really isn't incorrect if someone leaves it out. Just because someone doesn't do it the same way you do, does not mean they are wrong. I'm really not trying to come down on you hard (although it may seem that way because I tend to ramble once I get going), just respect the fact that other people have a different style of romanization than you do, but that doesn't mean they are wrong.
Larry
PS. I was just kidding about what I said concerning Kosuke Fujishima. I have nothing but respect for Fujishima-sama.
06-Mar-2005