Re: CHAT: F.L.O.E.S.

Nik Taylor wrote:

> Christophe Grandsire wrote:
>
>>In the same way, [tM] is written normal te-small u.
>
>
> My dictionary says it uses *to* with little u.
>
>
>>So by
>>analogy, I'd expect [hM], if it appears anywhere, to be written normal
>>he-small u.
>
>
> I'd expect _ho_ little u.  My dictionary's kana table doesn't list it,
> tho.
I can't find either ho + small u or he + small u in EDICT, but both do +
small u and to + small u are used in borrowed words for [dM] and [tM].

>>Yep, but I prefer writing it "chi" personally. I don't like the "exact
>>transliteration method". I find it difficult to read, and with all those
>>borrowings that bring new syllables like [ti] and [tu], the "exact
>>transliteration" method becomes cumbersome.
>
>
> I'd just stick apostrophes in, writting [ti] as _t'i_.
That's exactly what I started to do on the Japanese flash cards I was
making way back when I was trying to learn Japanese. I thought of it as
similar to the romanization problem with syllable-final n in words like
"hon'ya" 本屋, which would be mispronounced if spelled "honya". (There
are even a few minimal pairs, e.g., kanyuu 加入 "become a member" vs.
kan'yuu 勧誘 "invitation".)

But it just occurred to me that the same convention of using apostrophes
to separate sounds (which I've also used to break apart -h digraphs and
prevent /ng/ from being read as /N/) could also be used for vowels. This
would allow me to use digraphs for uncommon vowels, like "eu" for /M/
and "eo" for /7/, without getting into ambiguity with sequences like
"aeu" (which could be either /&u/ or /aM/): /&u/ would be ae'u, and /aM/
would be a'eu! So since I'm still having trouble with the vowels in
Unified Azirian Spelling, I think I should take another look at the
digraph option (along with things like under-dots for open-mid vowels).

   Since that's
> basically what the Japanese method itself is doing, showing a
> "contraction", so to speak, of _tei_.  I find both systems equally easy
> to read, and prefer the phonemic version, because it shows morphology
> more obviously.  Especially when you deal with colloquial pronunciations
> like _korya_ = _kore wa_ and _-tya/-cha_ = _te wa_.  The phonemic system
> shows that it's the same process, the Hepburn romanization makes it look
> like there's an actual change of sound.
>
> And as for sounds like [tsa], I'd write _twa_.
Why not "tsa"? Even though ツァ does look like "tsu" + small "a", I
don't expect there'd be a /w/ sound in it (but I haven't actually héard
a Japanese pronunciation of ピッツァ, so I could be wrong about that.)

But "hwa" for [fa] (as in ファイル "file") does make sense, so by
analogy I guess there's a certain logic to using "twa" for [tsa].

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