Re: Georgian [was Re: cyrillic?]

Quoting Isaac Penzev <isaacp@...>:

> Thomas R. Wier wrote:
>
>
> > Some nitpicks:
>
> Thanks for the information! I should be more attentive!
>
> > ...Gamq'relije... ...Tamaz Uierma dac'era...
>
> What kind of transliteration is this? I tried to be consistent with PJ
> Hillery's site :(
I don't know that there's a standard romanization, but the use
of single Latin letters for affricates, such as <c> for [ts] and
<j> for [dz], seems very common in English textbooks.  I base mine
on the textbook written by my professor, Howard Aronson, which
is not interestingly different from that of George Hewitt.

> > First names do not take case endings:
>
> Ah, good. From what I understood (from the books I have), they just
> shouldn't
> decline when used with the family names. Akhla metsodineba!
>
> > I use the spelling translation "Uieri" because
> > the Georgian word _uiri_ means "donkey".
>
> Hehe. Three vowels in row make it sound like Maaori....
Except that they are not phonetically vowels:  /u/ and /i/
have allophones of [w] and [j] respectively when onsets.

> BTW my small vocabulary in the end of the book says that "donkey" is _viri_.
> I didn't know this word when I quoted you! Million apologies!
Ah, you're right -- I mistransliterated.  But because [w] is an
allophone of /v/ *as well as* [u], it's still necessary to make
clear distinctions!

> P.S. What encoding is the best for sending e-mails in Georgian? Mail
> Standard?
Yes, as far as I know.  I write vanishingly little about Georgian
in email format.

 =========================================================================
Thomas Wier            "I find it useful to meet my subjects personally,
Dept. of Linguistics    because our secret police don't get it right
University of Chicago   half the time." -- octogenarian Sheikh Zayed of
1010 E. 59th Street     Abu Dhabi, to a French reporter.
Chicago, IL 60637

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