Re: [M_L] Re: Languages with writing systems?

The most useful source I know for the number of written languages is the United Bible Societies' catalog of the languages of the world into which at least one book of the Bible has been translated. The most recent edition I have, from 1990 [the orange one], lists 1,946 such languages; one more was published [the green one], but it's sold out, and now they only put the information on their website any more.

Thus given Ethnologue's maximal number of languages around 6000, and the UBS's minimal number of written languages around 2000 (likely significantly more than that by now), the number of the world's languages with writing systems must be something over 1/3.

I once tried to list all the different writing systems currently in use (counting all the uses of Roman, Cyrillic, and Arabic as 1 each, and counting Japanese as 1) and came up with about 32 (depending on how many ones of very limited use like Cherokee and Pahawh Hmong you want to include) -- somewhere between 30 and 35.
--
Peter T. Daniels grammatim@...

----- Original Message ----
From: Don Osborn <dzo@...>
To: qalam@yahoogroups.com
Cc: Sangeeta Bagga-Gupta <sangeeta.bagga-gupta@...>
Sent: Tuesday, October 10, 2006 6:11:50 PM
Subject: FW: [M_L] Re: Languages with writing systems?

One of the members of the Multilingual_ Literacy group, Sangeeta Bagga-Gupta
of Örebro University in Sweden, asked about the number of the world's
languages that have writing systems. You may want to jump past my windy
comments to her original question below. TIA for any feedback.

Don Osborn

From: Multilingual_ Literacy@ yahoogroups. com
[mailto:Multilingual_ Literacy@ yahoogroups. com] On Behalf Of Don Osborn
Sent: Tuesday, October 10, 2006 5:14 PM
To: Multilingual_ Literacy@ yahoogroups. com
Subject: [M_L] Re: Languages with writing systems?

Hi Sangeeta, As a short answer to your question, I don't know of any
authoritative estimates of the number (or %) of languages with writing
systems, though I suspect that there may be no simple answer. Here are
a few thoughts along that line.

First, the number of 6000-7000 languages often mentioned in the press
and academic literature is the count of the well-known resource,
Ethnologue http://www.ethnolog ue.org/ which tends to count variant
forms of a language as separate.

All of this goes back to the definition of a "language" so a second
thought is that in the case of various "dialects" the issue of whether
there is a standard form of the language is another issue. The case of
Arabic may be a particular or extreme example, but Ethnologue counts
about 20 "languages" for Arabic - there are significant differences
among the spoken colloquial varieties, but there is really only one
standard written form. So on the one hand, one might say that Arabic
is counts as 100% (=1/1) in tallying the number of languages with a
writing system in the world, but on the other hand, perhaps it
accounts for 4-5% since, from what I am told, it is not common to
write the colloquial speech. I think that there are a number of other
languages are in more or less similar situations (several "languages"
closely related, of which only one is written to any appreciable extent).

Other readers please correct me on details in the case of Arabic, but
if you consider that one might be able to write any of the colloquial
varieties, even though this might not be done, then the issue is
clouded further. That is a third thought.

Fourth, and getting closer to the point that (as I understand it)
concerns Sangeeta, there are certainly a lot of languages that have
been put to writing relatively recently, such that (1) the system of
writing is not widely known, (2) there are competing systems of
writing, or (3) the only writing is that done by some researchers of
one sort or another. This set of circumstances is particularly common
across Africa, but certainly observed elsewhere. It is aggravated in
some cases by educational policies or the lack of language planning.

All of this is something I'm thinking about and communicating with
colleagues about. Having seen a proposed system for classifying
languages according to the technical resources available for them
(tau, mu and pi languages), I am inclined to think that it would be
very helpful to have a similar sort of classification about writing
and languages - that is the degree of establishment and use of written
forms of a language. It does not seem to have a simple answer like x%
or y% of languages having writing systems - it all depends on what one
means by "having a writing system" or what it means to be a "written
language." And this is much like the criteria for definition of what
is a "language" itself (i.e., separate language as opposed to dialect
of a language etc.). (I guess this counts as #5)

Another (sixth) thought is a question: how do you deal with languages
with written traditions in more than one alphabet, such as Amazight
(Berber)? Admittedly this is an easier question, but it points to
another level of complexity.

A seventh and final thought is the definition of a "writing system."
Although we take it to mean something that can represent the spoken
language or a full range of thought comparable to the spoken language,
there are some who define written systems more widely to include
various symbols with meaning that may be used individually or in
combinations to express certain things.

I'm sorry if this clouds the issue more than clarifies, but at the
moment it seems like this is the reality.

I'll forward this to another list - Qalam - that deals specifically
with writing systems to see what kind of responses it gets there.

All the best!

Don

--- In Multilingual_ Literacy@ yahoogroups. com, "Don Osborn" <dzo@...>
wrote:

>
> Sangeeta Bagga-Gupta has a question very pertinent to discussing
> multilingual literacy, and that is the number of languages with
> writing systems. I will offer some thoughts later, but in the
> meantime, encourage others to reply as well. DZO
>
> ------------ --------- --------- --------- ---
>
> I have a query to the members of the Multilingual literacy discussion
> group. I have a source that puts the figure of number of languages in
> the world today to around 6000. The number of languages with a written
> system is often put to 100-120. I bumped into another source recently
> that suggests that 10-12 procent of the worlds known languages have a
> written system. The latter seems way too many. I'd be very happy to
> hear from list members of what estimates they are aware of. I'd also
> be very happy to get references to sources.
>
> Thanks!
>
> Sangeeta
>
> --
> Associate Professor/Docent
> Department of Education/Pedagogis ka institutionen Communication,
> Culture & Diversity - Deaf Studies (KKOM-DS) Research Group Örebro
> University SE 701 82 Örebro Sweden
>
> http://www.oru se/pi/sangeeta
>