Re: Ideographic Conlangs

Tim May wrote:
> Really, the point is that - as a general rule - all scripts encode
> particular spoken languages, as opposed to the neoplatonist idea that
> heiroglyphs directly stood for ideas without the mediation of
> language, which is suggested by the term "ideographic".
And even if there were ZERO phonetic elements, it would still represent
the WORDS of a language.  So that if, for example, the language did not
distinguish between "blue" and "green", they would use a single
character for both, or, on the other hand, it would distinguish "elder
brother" and "younger brother" only if the language distinguished
those.  It may distinguish homophones, of course, if the speakers are
aware of the two concepts being different from each other (like the two
meanings of "bat", for example)

There's also the possibility that it would encode differences from other
influential languages, as in the differing Chinese characters for "he"
and "she".

> * Also, I think some kanji are used in situations where they're
>   basically phonetic, but I'm not sure to what extent this is
>   significant in the modern language.
AFAIK, it's only used in names nowadays.

> they'd use a homophonous character (this is before the kana came
> into being)
That's how the kana evolved.  The kana are basically simplified
characters.

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