[85938] in tlhIngan-Hol
Re: Klingon orthography (was: Okrand at qep'a')
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Mark J. Reed)
Wed Jun 24 19:48:41 2009
In-Reply-To: <BA6D15DB-F9FE-4001-8441-5C396F7F0405@evertype.com>
Date: Wed, 24 Jun 2009 19:46:51 -0400
From: "Mark J. Reed" <markjreed@gmail.com>
To: tlhingan-hol@kli.org
Errors-to: tlhingan-hol-bounce@kli.org
Reply-to: tlhingan-hol@kli.org
First, I find the use of English-style capitalization quite
distracting. I'm used to reading {q} and {Q} as separate letters, so
have trouble recognizing {Qastahvis}.
I agree that there's room for improvement in the system, but I don't
necessarily agree that it's worth a reform effort.
Nevertheless, my thoughts follow.
> ===
> In IPA this is
>
> [a b tʃ ɖ ɛ ɣ x ɪ dʒ l m n ŋ o pʰ q qχ r ʃ tʰ tɬ u v w j ʔ]
Though we would normally not transcribe things so narrowly as to
indicate the aspiration on the voiceless stops, as indeed you didn't
in your passage...
> A casing orthography would give:
Cased IPA: Just Say No. :)
> ===
> In Americanist-type transcription one might render these:
>
> a b č d e ǧ h i j l m n ŋ o p q x r š t ł w v w y ʔ
I think that both [ł] for {tlh} and [x] for {Q} are counterintuitive;
you need some indication of the affrication. And my natural
inclination is to ǧ as [dʒ] instead of [ɣ].
> a b c d e g h i j l m n ŋ o p q ꝗ r s t ł u v w y ’
Yeah, the ꝗ comes through as an empty box here.
> a b c ḍ e ǧ h i ǰ l m n ṅ o p k χ r ṣ θ tl u v w y ’
If using <c> with no diacritic for {ch}, why do you need a diacritic
for your {D} replacement?
> a b c d e g h i j l m n ṅ o p k χ r s t tl u v w y ’
Better. :)
If replacing {q} with <k>, why not use <q> for {Q}?
I could see θ for {tlh} - misleading though it is - but not for {t}.
The "aspirated t" meaning of θ is not exactly au courant. :)
Also, the dot over the n is too subtle in this font; barely
distinguishable from plain n.
My monographical suggestion would be this:
a b c d e g h i j l m n ñ o p k q r s t þ u v w y ’
Only two non-ASCII characters, both in Latin-1 and readily typed on
most systems' "international" keyboard. They even have uppercase
forms if you insist upon using case distinctions.
Or, if you're not averse to digraphs:
a b ch d e gh kh i j l m n ng o p q qh r s t th u v w y '
-
Mark J. Reed <markjreed@gmail.com>
