suzmccarth wrote:
>
> --- In qalam@yahoogroups.com, "Peter T. Daniels" <grammatim@...>
> wrote:
> > This idea certainly didn't begin with DeFrancis -- it was
> recognized by
> > DuPonceau in 1838,
>
> DuPonceau's letter can be read here

I'm referring to a book -- Chicago's copy was in Special Collections,
i.e. Rare Books, so it wasn't possible to actually read it through!

> http://pinyin.info/readings/texts/duponceau.html
>
> and the modern locus classicus is the debate between
> > Creel and Boodberg in the 1930s. (I think one of them published in
> T'ung
> > Pao and the other in a journal with Harvard in the title, but maybe
> > not.) The refs. are probably in his *The Chinese Language: Fact and
> > Fantasy* of 1985 if not in the later more general book.
>
> Yes, the debate between Creel and Boodberg is described in
> DeFrancis, The Chinese Language: Fact and Fantasy.
>
> http://pinyin.info/readings/texts/ideographic_myth.html
>
> > Actually the Principles say they have attempted to provide a graph for
> > every sound _that is distinctive_ in some language or other -- it's not
> > meant for transcriptions on a level much below the phonemic.
> > Phoneticians have devised other transcription systems that are better
> > suited for recording minute differences in speech sounds.
>
> So phonemic but not for any given language. How does it rate as a
> writing system?

As I keep saying, it isn't one! It's not used for recording utterances,
just for recording sound. Unless, of course, some here wish to propose
different definitions of "writing system."
--
Peter T. Daniels grammatim@...