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Re: What is an alphabet? Re: Optimum number of symbols

From:J Y S Czhang <czhang23@...>
Date:Thursday, May 30, 2002, 3:02
In a message dated 05/29/2002 06.07.40 AM, the much-esteemed John Cowan
(jcowan@REUTERSHEALTH.COM) writes:

>The romanization of Zhuang (a Tai language of China) is interesting in >this respect. Standard Zhuang has six tones, which are written using >special tonal letters. AFAICT tone 1 has no special letter. >Tone 2 is written with a reversed s, tone 3 with Cyrillic ZHE, tone 4 >with Cyrillic CHE, tone 5 with a sort of Gaelic-style G, and tone 6 >with a Cyrillic hard sign. If you squint at these, they look like the >digits 2-6 respectively.
::linguavore drooling:: ===> :P~~~ Intriguing. I wonder who came up with that system of Romanization and when... 0_o? From your description, it seems like it's possibly a very nice, simple user-friendly system besides perhaps having a certain orthographic elegance. And is there more info on Zhuang (anywhere easily accessible)? Hanuman Zhang {HANoomaan JAHng} /'hanuma~n dZahN/ ~§~ _Ars imitatur Naturam in sua operatione._ <from Latin> = "Art is the imitation of Nature in her manner of operation." " The most beautiful order is a heap of sweepings piled up at random." ~ Heraclitus, c. 500 BCE ~§~ jinsei to iu mono wa, kinchou na geijyutsu to ieru deshou ~§~ <from Japanese> = lit. "one can probably say that 'life' is a precious artform")

Replies

Danny Wier <dawier@...>
John Cowan <jcowan@...>