--- In qalam@yahoogroups.com, "suzmccarth" <suzmccarth@...> wrote:

> --- In qalam@yahoogroups.com, "Peter T. Daniels" <grammatim@...>
> wrote:
> > suzmccarth wrote:
> >
> > > > What do you think "logographic" means?
> > >
> > > It implies to me a lexical mapping rather than phonological and
> > > morphological mapping between written and spoken language.
> > > Logographic would mean to me that Chinese characters represent
> > > words. Have I somehow misunderstood this meaning of
> logographic? I
> > > realize it is broadly accepted as a descriptive term but it

seems

> > > that it obscures comparisons between writing systems that are
> useful
> > > for observing how people interact with a writing system -
> problems
> > > in reading and writing.
> >
> > Yes. "Logographic" means that what the symbol encodes is a word

(a

> > morpheme, to be more precise). Or, as C. F. Hockett put it, a
> > logographic system is a syllabary that distinguishes homophones.

Why can't I just skip Hockett altogether and say that Chinese is a
syllabary and there is no logographic/phonographic dichotomy in
writing systems - there are only phonological and morphological
elements and a syllabic/phonemic continuum.

Suzanne McCarthy

> > language. A logographic writing system encodes both the
> phonological and
> > the semantic part.
> > --
> > Peter T. Daniels grammatim@...