Re: Ayeri: Menan Coyalayamoena ena McGuffey

On Fri, 8 Apr 2005 16:58:37 -0500, JS Bangs <jaspax@...> wrote:

>Aha, so your writing system is the only one that I've seen that
>approaches what the Yivrian system is: an abiguda and an abjad. Normal
>writing is without vowels marks, but even in fully voweled writing
>there is no symbol for /a/ (except word-finally), and there is a
>virama to compensate.
Erm, you usually write all vowels except /a/ because this one already
belongs to the consonants. If you left out vowels, the language could hardly
be understood. Imagine words like "aeo" ("five", marked for the headword
being an animate patient), or "adaea" ("there"). With an occurency rate of
about 25% I think this is justified to leave out /a/ behind *consonants*.
And Henrik: No, I didn't intend to drop writing combinations with /i/ (not
necessarily diphthongs!) to the left of a consonant. I just pointed out that
it makes things a little more difficult, but I think you're nevertheless
getting used to this quirk quickly.

My point was to introduce a virama (mute sign) for *beginners* to make
reading easier. The *lack* of /a/ would be marked. In normal writing, the
mute sign does not appear, maybe except for names or words the reader is not
supposed to know (similar to Hebrew and Arabic habits). Texts in primers
would gradually have less virama(s?), as the pupil gets to know more words
and gains more reading practice.

Carsten

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