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I don't know if there was obviously an error or not. Maybe it was just a flaw in the original design . . . or maybe having published it and worked with it, Read thought of a modification to incorporate in a new project.

At any rate, anyone familiar with Shaw's alphabet, but not familiar with this discussion, would be confused at finding the characters switched in the fonts. The alphabet was published as a finished product. Our corpus of official texts is so small there's not much we can do, other than publish a "Shaw version 2.0" as a new, improved product. I doubt we want to do that.

There is much wisdom in the statement that when we begin making modifications, there could be no end. Do we need extra combined characters? What about the "lightning bolt" shaped long e character? It's not very smooth to write. Etc. etc.

Lee

-----Original Message-----
From: Ross DeMeyere <ross@...>
To: Lee A. Miller <LeeM1023@...>; Bob Richmond <rsrichmond@...>; shavian@... <shavian@...>; Lionel Ghoti <ghoti@...>
Date: Monday, March 22, 1999 10:05 AM
Subject: [shavian] Re: changing "ha-ha" and "hung"


>Attention Shavia,
>
>This development is most upsetting to me.
>I see both sides of this argument.
>1) there was obviously some error...
> why it wasn't corrected right away escapes me.
> Read probably said the same thing,
> 'well, the damn things printed now, not a thing we can do...'
> I also agree that the bulk of the printed samples use
> hung and haha a certain way, therefore we have precedence.
>2) on the other hand, as Read went on to his next project
> he did correct the error in Shaw Alphabet by using the
> ShawAlphabetHung as ha-ha in his new script, thus
> while not admitting an error, correcting it for himself.
> Me, being an idealist, and having some doubts about
> the correctness of the two characters anyways, was given
> a new piece of very official looking documentation on
> an error and its correction, and I jumped on it (sorry)
>
>I have deleted the font files on my site and will upload them
>again later in the week, with ha-ha and hung in the positions
>that the consensus of our little team of experts decides.
>I personally am favouring the change, but also don't want to
>be the only one providing information that is contrary to
>what the others writing and describing Shaw Alphabet are
>producing. So no matter which way it swings, I will be there.
>
>Ross DeMeyere
>
>
>
>----------------------------------------------------------
>
>DeMeyere Design Incorporated +1 612 789 2052
>1951 McKinley ST NE FAX +1 612 789 8028
>Minneapolis MN 55418-4816 <mailto:ross@...>
>U.S.A. <http://www.demeyere.com/>
>
>----------------------------------------------------------
>
>
>
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Dennis Falk (Quozl) notes the problem of spelling diphthongs followed by "r" sounds. There are at least three diphthongs that create problems here. The Androcles orthography spells all these with the diphthong plus "array": thus "poor" is poo-er (p. 129), "fire" is fy-er (p. 54), and "hour" is ow-er (page 108).

This is a very murky area of English phonetics. Our ears are uncertain as to whether such words have one syllable or two - it depends on the number of morphemes in the word. But we do not always pronounce one-morpheme and two-morpheme words the same way.

Try to enShaw these horrors: The dour Scotsmen were indeed doers of the word. After the umpire called the strike, the booers in the stands went on to throw bottles and trash on the field, generally behaving like boors.

I'd have to write doo-r, doo-er and boo-er, boo-r. But this distinction is inconsistent with the Androcles orthography.

I hadn't noticed this problem before! Brits on the list, how do you pronounce these odd pairs of words (ignoring if you please the un-cricket behavior of some baseball fans!)?

Bob Richmond
http://members.aol.com/RSRICHMOND/shavian.html

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Sort of an open letter to Ross DeMeyere and other people designing fonts:

We may need some conventions for font names, and we may wish to standardize how we specify fonts in Web sites.

My present HTML for specifying Shaw Alphabet fonts is:

face="ShawGothic, Shaw Gothic, ShawRough, Shaw Rough, Lionspaw, Shaw"

This code will need to change when Ross changes the names of the fonts, assuming that we will all re-download them and re-install them. We should then attempt to suppress the old names ShawRough and ShawGothic in favor of the new names, assuming that's what Ross will want us to do.

I think we all deserve compliments from each other for the politeness - as well as the speed - with which we settled the question of changing ha-ha and hung.

Bob Richmond
http://members.aol.com/RSRICHMOND/shavian.html

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Dear All,

Firstly I'd like add to what Bob Richmond said - it's a very good thing that
we sorted out the 'problem' with the letters. I should hope that we never
have to worry about it again.

Secondly, I'll come to the point of this post: a unified Shavian web site.

I suppose the subject explains itself, really; because closer unification of
support always brings good results, I believe a sure step in the future of
Shavian would be the creation of a unified Shavian web site, i.e.
"www.shavian.org" or something like that. At present, we all have different
web sites, which obviously makes new would-be Shavia confused as to which
site to visit for the best source of information; I have also noticed that
the information on them is not always consistent with that of the others
(I'm guilty of this too). If the alphabet is to gather interest on a much
wider scale, the alphabet must have a central point to which all the current
information, knowledge, advice and help can be posted, so that this
community can have a unified voice.

This does not mean that all the seperate Shavian sites have to be abandoned;
it merely suggests that the resources of the current large Shavian community
be pulled together to better spread the use of the Alphabet - further than
it can go at the moment. The community has certainly been pulled together
because of this mailing list (thanks Lionel!); if a mailing list can do THIS
to the influence of the alphabet, just think what a central Shavian web site
could do!

The name "shavian.org" is currently unused, so I hereby propose to all those
'veterans' amongst us that we poll our resources and start the creation of
this central site.

Well, to quote a well-known line: "ALL THOSE IN FAVOUR SAY 'AYE'!"

Hugh Birkenhead


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* AYE *

I vote for the creation of the website.

Cheers,
Philip

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Hello Shavia,

I just joined the list and tried to get up to speed by reading the archive
of old posts at eGroups.com. I noticed the discussion about switching hung &
ha-ha and subsequently comments that the discussion was resolved. What was
the consensus? Was it in the message by Dennis Falk entitled 'Consensus on
"huNG" & "Haha"'? For some reason, eGroups does not display messages by him.

Cheers,
Philip

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Dear Shavia,

I claim the privilege of answering the query on how to pronounce "dour" and
"doer", "boor" and "booer". I was born in Germany of a British father and
German mother and acquired traits of an American accent through school;
however, I dare say I can speak British well enough if occasion demands,
since that is the accent I spoke when I was a child (and even now, when I'm
around my father).

I pronounce "dour" and "boor" (and "poor") with the "oo" in "wool" (and in
one syllable), whereas "doer" and "booer" (and, if you want, "pooer") have
the "oo" in "ooze" (and have two syllables). Hence, I suppose I would write
"dour" as dead+wool+array and "doer" as dead+ooze+err.

Cheers,
Philip

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>
> Hello Shavia,
>
> I just joined the list and tried to get up to speed by reading the archive
> of old posts at eGroups.com. I noticed the discussion about switching hung &
> ha-ha and subsequently comments that the discussion was resolved. What was
> the consensus? Was it in the message by Dennis Falk entitled 'Consensus on
> "huNG" & "Haha"'? For some reason, eGroups does not display messages by him.

The consensus was to continue to follow the original "huNG" & "Haha" as
has been published over the last nearly-40 years, rather than the
so-called "corrected" forms...

As for my posts, they should be there- I'm posting via email, not web...

D.M.Falk, aka Quozl

Hi!
I found your comments very interesting. I remember that there were two
other alphabetic symbols in Shaw's alphabet. One was for the KH sound in
the Scottish pronunciation and I am not sure but the other may have a sound
in the Wales language. Is it possible for someone who has the older Shaw's
alphabet to put that on the screen? About pronunciation: Mr Read commented
in a letter he sent to me that he was unhappy about the numerous discussions
about how to write a word. There were difficulties when people wrote in
their particular dialect without being aware of a more international way of
pronouncing English. I think it becomes apparent, particularly in a global
village, that we adapt the way we write the Shaw's alphabet to a
pronunciation that would be used by international radio broadcasts such as
Voice of Moscow or Voice of America. I would be curious what kind of
reference these programs do use when they want to determine what the
majority of English listeners will understand. The book Androcles and the
Lion would be suitable enough. However, since not everyone may have this
book, we might consider recommending a dictionary that no one will argue
with. In this way we will not get tied down in investing our ego in how we
pronounce words. If anyone wants to write to me in the Shavian alphabet I
would be delighted. I think it is by reading the writing of others that we
can get a "complete" feeling of its usage. My address is 430 E. 15th Ave.,
#2, Eugene, Oregon 97401. I think we need not change the script that Mr.
Read left us but I think we should be given the creative opportunities to
develop new fonts and even letters if they can be shown to be useful.
Obviously, it is by how many people choose to use the new fonts or scripts
that will determine if they are useful or not. Mr. Read was quite open to
doing this as he would not have gone on and developed QuikSkript. However,
there is a point when we have to decide what alphabet we should use to
discuss these issues. If beginners do not use the traditional Shavian
alphabet then they may feel it is not worth the candle. I am curious about
the history of Kingsley Read. I wish now that I knew his date of birth. If
anyone does know this, please let me know. Unfortunately, I lost contact
with his descendants. He was about 95 when he died. He was involved in the
theater and the Shavian plays.




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To be seen, at lest, this time I've decided to post from the website, as for some reason, my posts to this list via email won't display on the web...
As for the previous poster's comments, Shavian was intended to work with English as spoken in an upperclass society in Britain, I forget exactly what the reference was...
Shavian has a "kh" as in "loCH"? 'Tis news to me... :)
D.M.Falk, aka Quozl, somewhere in Eureka, California...

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