Re: USAGE: Abugidas

John Cowan wrote:

>Andreas Johansson scripsit:
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>>I've, BTW, always been somewhat mystified that someone ever came on the
>>idea of having graphemic zero indicate /a/ (or /O/ and so on depending
>>on language) rather than phonemic zero. In a language like Sanskrit
>>it may perhaps save typing, but it's certainly the last idea I would
>>have stumbled on. People are weird.
>>
>>
>
>Well, Tengwar (as used to spell Quenya, anyhow) is an abjad with mandatory
>vowel marks, but the step from that to an abugida is small, as JRRT
>himself indicates rather offhandedly in a footnote:
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Wait a minute - isn't an abjad a vowel-optional writing system, by
definition?

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