Re: Number of writing systems

Michael Everson wrote:

>
> Suzanne,
>
> I think it's odd that your argument is an appeal to a 1989 and a 1968
> authority. Neither SignWriting nor Blissymbolics were available to
> those researchers, so it is hardly surprising that they did not take
> such non-phonic writing systems into account.

Why weren't they available?

SignWriting is mentioned in WWS, by the world's leading authority on
movement notation.

> >I was trying to stay out of it but I have caved. There is agreement
> >in the academic community on writing sytems,
>
> Is there, indeed?
>
> >"Every writing is language specific in the sense that
> >phoneticization means to create systematic relations between
> >graphical signs and the sound pattern of a given language." -- The
> >Writing Systems of the World by Florian Coulmas, 1989, page 33
>
> Coulmas' definition is incomplete. Not all languages use sounds. Sign
> languages do not use sound, though they have analogues to phonemes
> and they certainly have grammar. And they can be *written*.
> SignWriting is a writing system, a real writing system, which is used
> by people all over the world.

Has anyone said it isn't? It doesn't follow any sort of linguistic
principles, so it's unfortunate that it has attracted a certain
following.

> >Other systems such as Blissymbols and IPA would be better treated
> >under the title of Language and Symbolic Systems as Yuan Ren Chao
> >called his book, 1968.
>
> I cannot fathom how anyone could suggest with a straight face that
> IPA is not a "writing system". It is an extended Latin alphabet with
> diacritical marks, which can be used regularly to represent the
> sounds of any number of languages. Some IPA transcriptions are even
> nearly identical to the natural orthographies which derive from them
> (modulo the introduction of case for instance).

Once again, it isn't possible to evaluate your claim if you don't say
what _you_ mean by "writing system."

> It would be nice if those of you with opinions about Blissymbolics
> would educate yourselves about it before saying anything about it.
> Blissymbolics is a language. It is a written language, used by people
> who cannot speak (and by their carers, who can). It is writing
> because, well, it is *written*. It is a series of graphs on paper,
> with consistent shapes, laid out one after the other. Diacritical
> marks are used to represent parts of speech (tense, mood,
> definitiveness, and other things).

If it is a language, it's ipso facto not a writing system. A writing
system _represents_ a language.

> Blissymbolics is ideographic in the truest sense; it is a set of
> characters each of which indicates an idea or concept. It has
> vocabulary, and users can innovate by combining vocabulary to create
> new terminology. Bliss, as writing, does not represent phonemes. It
> *is* ideographic, in a way which logographic Chinese is not; Chinese
> characters often have a phonetic component. Bliss has no phonemes,
> and needs none -- and its users cannot produce phonemes reliably,
> which is why Bliss is a blessing for them. With it, they can
> communicate with others.

Ergo it's not a writing system; it's a language.

> I am personally acquainted with many people in the Bliss community,
> both users and their carers. I have participated in discussions about
> vocabulary development, and about the creation of new
> Bliss-characters. I have spoken with people whose only expressive
> language is Blissymbols.
>
> Most of the world's writing systems use graphic symbols singly or in
> combination to represent the sounds of spoken languages. Not all

That's the standard definition of "writing system." What's yours?

> languages are spoken, however, yet even non-spoken languages can be
> represented with graphic symbols. And when that is done, it is

(modulo their mode, of course; Stokoe's writing system for ASL is
"cheremic," i.e. phonemic; SignWriting is merely iconic)

> *writing*. It is not "symbolic system". That, Suzanne, is a term
> better reserved for musical symbols, laundry tags, and traffic
> signage. Sign languages and Bliss are languages, and SignWriting and
> Blissymbolics are writing.

Now you want to make a distinction between "Bliss" and "Blissymbolics"?
--
Peter T. Daniels grammatim@...