Re: *a/*a: ablaut

At 12:30:10 AM on Friday, February 15, 2008, Roger Mills
wrote:

[...]

> While on the subject: I've noticed that most writers here
> use & for schwa because of the a-circle problem. Seems as
> good as anything, as long as we're consistent. (But in one
> of the ASCII-ified SAMPAs, I believe, & represents
> low-front æ (ae lig.)--

The SAMPA that I've seen uses [{], which is just plain
perverse. <g> Kirshenbaum uses [&], as does Miguel's
system.

[...]

> Allow me to mention that some mail-lists I belong to
> enforce a quite strict "No cross, no crown" policy-- i.e.
> no religion, no politics.

As an old Usenet habitué I've both a fairly high tolerance
and a rather keen appreciation of the danger. Today verged
on getting out of hand; it would be nice if tomorrow we
could return to nice, peaceful topics like OIT, proto-human,
and why glaciers have Würms.

Brian