metameta, looks to me like your question was answered swiftly, by ammelah. In a "duh" moment, I was trying to come up with something more specific, but "transcribe" is what you do when you write something phonetically.

Oh, and Bridget, thank you for that! I've never studied any languages ouside the Indo-European family. I'm still wondering, though, how Feng Shui for example is transliterated as such when I'm given to understand it's pronounced more like "Fung Shway."