--- In qalam@yahoogroups.com, "Richard Wordingham"
<richard.wordingham@...> wrote:

> Given all these issues, I wonder whether it does make sense to think
> of Thai as an alphasyllabary. The syllables have to be treated as
> units, but they do not leap out at the reader as separate units.

Is Thai taught as a syllabary - with a syllable chart? This may
sound a bit mechanistic, but in the scripts that I am thinking of -
Cree, Tamil, Hangul, Amharic, the script is usually taught as a
syllabary. This is because the syllables have become indivisible or
opaque or not linearily organized.

So a script may be an alphasyllabary - with aksharas but in some
cases, they are so transparent that most writers can construct the
aksharas as they go along. In other cases most can't. It seems to
be a continuum. That is, being syllabically organized is one thing
but having less accessible units is a continuum. That is why I would
say the script may be of the type with syllabically organized units,
an alphasyllabary, but it may on the continuum be closer or further
form a syllabary. (on the segmental continuum not on the historic
continuum!)

The evolution of the script, for example Tamil and Cree, is vastly
affected first by mechanical printing and now by computers. Also by
phonemicizing missionaries and linguists and then by nativizing
reformers who are working the script back to its origins. There are
trends both ways for these scripts. A macro-trend for Tamil towards
the syllabary but many reversals as grantha characters are accepted
or rejected.

Suzanne