Shavian eGroup Archive Browser

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I've put together a Shavian font for PalmOS. It's fairly readable to me, but may still need a little tweaking. If anyone is interested in it the file has been uploaded to the files area on eGroups and on a web site in Zip and PZ archives.
If you don't have a Palm but want to play with it anyway, you can download POSE (PalmOS Emulator) from the developer area of palm.com and I'll send you a ROM to run it with if you don't have one handy and don't want to sign on as a developer.

http://www.bestweb.net/~jaguar/syracuse.html

--
Michael J. Rider, aka Ixbalam http://i.am/ixbalam

"Of course, the last thing my parents wanted was a son who wears a
cocktail dress that glitters, but they've come around to it." -Devine

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Hello,

This email message is a notification to let you know that
a file has been uploaded to the Files area of the shavian
group.

File : /fonts/other/Syracuse.zip
Uploaded by : jaguar@...
Description : Shavian font for PalmOS 2.0 or higher

You can access this file at the URL

http://www.egroups.com/files/shavian/fonts/other/Syracuse%2Ezip

To learn more about eGroups file sharing, please visit

http://www.egroups.com/help/files.html


Regards,

jaguar@...

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As a compromise between these two opposing positions, couldn't we adopt two
or more national spelling standards?

In the UK people speak in a wide range of sometimes mutually unintelligible
accents. Some people pronounce the "r" in words like "barn" and some don't.
Some people rhyme "hut" and "put". And so on. However, there is a national
standard called RP (Received Pronunciation), sometimes known as Standard
British English or BBC English. The phonetic transcriptions of words in
dictionaries use this standard.

In North America I believe there is a similar standard. So I would suggest
we adopt an "official" British Shavian spelling based on RP and an
"official" American one based on standard American English. There could be
national standards for other countries, such as Australia, if necessary.

That way somebody producing, say, a dictionary for a Shavian transliteration
program could announce that it was for American English. Such a program
might incorporate variant spellings, or even an automatic
American-to-British conversion option. At the very least, it would be
consistent. Any words added to the dictionary would have to reflect standard
American pronunciation.

Meanwhile people who wanted to write in a way that accurately represented
their own pronunciation would be at liberty to do so. However, their
spellings would not be regarded as "official" and would not be used in
shared resources like dictionaries.

My apologies if this idea has already been discussed ad nauseam.

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This idea has NOT been discussed ad nauseam. Your suggestion is very
rational, unfortunately this group tends to be rather irrational and not open
to common sense. That's why I merely sit on the sidelines and rarely say
anything.

Until Shavian advocates realize the need for a standard, Shavian doesn't
stand a snowballs chance in hell of ever being adopted.


In a message dated 9/8/00 9:04:57 PM, sosostris@... writes:

<< As a compromise between these two opposing positions, couldn't we adopt two
or more national spelling standards?

In the UK people speak in a wide range of sometimes mutually unintelligible
accents. Some people pronounce the "r" in words like "barn" and some don't.
Some people rhyme "hut" and "put". And so on. However, there is a national
standard called RP (Received Pronunciation), sometimes known as Standard
British English or BBC English. The phonetic transcriptions of words in
dictionaries use this standard.

In North America I believe there is a similar standard. So I would suggest
we adopt an "official" British Shavian spelling based on RP and an
"official" American one based on standard American English. There could be
national standards for other countries, such as Australia, if necessary.

That way somebody producing, say, a dictionary for a Shavian transliteration
program could announce that it was for American English. Such a program
might incorporate variant spellings, or even an automatic
American-to-British conversion option. At the very least, it would be
consistent. Any words added to the dictionary would have to reflect standard
American pronunciation.

Meanwhile people who wanted to write in a way that accurately represented
their own pronunciation would be at liberty to do so. However, their
spellings would not be regarded as "official" and would not be used in
shared resources like dictionaries.

My apologies if this idea has already been discussed ad nauseam.
>>

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Simon Barne proposes >>two or more national spelling standards<<, noting the
existence of British >>(Received Pronunciation), sometimes known as Standard
British English or BBC English.<< and supposing that >>In North America I
believe there is a similar standard.<<

There is no such North American standard - even the consensus American
English once taught to radio announcers (Ronald Reagan was a superb speaker
of this standard, Richard Nixon a mediocre one) is pretty well defunct.

Everybody interested in this issue should look at one of Charles Harrington
Elster's recent books such as "Is There a Cow in Moscow"? or the more recent
"Big Book of Beastly Mispronunciations". Elster, an extremely prescriptive
linguist (actually he's not a linguist at all), lays down the law on the
(North American) pronunciation of a large number of words. His basic resource
is a very large collection of pronouncing dictionaries, going back to
approximately to the Jurassic Period. Usually he lets you know how his Momma
pronounced something, which is my basic take on English pronunciation, and my
Momma (were she still living) could beat up Mr. Elster's Momma.

Elster never mentions the existence of a North American standard. More
surprisingly, he does not discuss British Received Pronunciation.

Elster's books will show you the real impossibility of standardizing
pronunciation even in fairly localized areas of the English speaking world.

Bob Richmond
Knoxville, Tennessee USA

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I don't believe the issue is standardizing pronunciation as much as it is
standardizing spelling. However the two can influence each other no
doubt. I am impressed by languages such as Spanish and others whose
orthography and pronunciation go hand in hand. While there are some
variations in pronunciation, when you understand regional variations, you
can alter your prounciation of the spelling to match that region. The
spelling remains the same.

The same is true in perhaps a more obtuse way with Chinese. Standard
spelling, but variant pronunciations.

I do agree though that in order for Shavian to have any realistic impact,
it cannot be based on individual pronunciation as such. There has to be
some kind of spelling standard. Not all regional variations are
significant in their need to be written down. If Shavian advocates are
compelled to have individual expression, then perhaps American regional
standards could be possible. However, if that happens, then all likelihood
of Shavian going beyond hobby status becomes nearly nil.

Shavian advocates may not like standardization, but without it, it has
little hope of capturing the interest and imagination of more "practical"
people. I know this because my wife and others whom I have shown this to
have little to no interest in learning a system that has no
standardization. That would probably be true of most people.

Stuart Thiessen


>Elster's books will show you the real impossibility of standardizing
>pronunciation even in fairly localized areas of the English speaking world.
>
>Bob Richmond
>Knoxville, Tennessee USA


Stuart Thiessen
4616 Hickman
Des Moines, IA 50310
(515) 280-0005 Pager (2800005.beeper@...)

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In a message dated 9/9/00 7:35:18 AM, RSRICHMOND@aol.com writes:

<< Elster's books will show you the real impossibility of standardizing
pronunciation even in fairly localized areas of the English speaking world. >>

And by your own admission he's not a linguist?

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Bob Richmond claims there is no North American standard. Has he never used a
dictionary such as Webster's Third New International Dictionary
(Merriam-Webster, Springfiels, 1993)?

True, there are regional pronunciations. But more and more there is a North
American Standard fostered by radio, television and movies. Indeed, a recent
article in the Journal of the American Bar Association stated that many law
firms and large companies will not hire applicants for high level positions
if they have an identifiable regional accent -- regardless of the region.
There is a growing emphasis on a standard pronunciation.

Moreover, English is a system of communication. People learn it because they
want to communicate with people around the world; not with the people next
door. They have their own native languages for that purpose. Encouraging
highly idiosyncratic versions of Shavian destroys the usefulness of the
spelling system. It's hard enough for children and foreigners to learn to
spell English now. If they are forced to learn a hundred regional variation
before they can begin to understand works of literature writing by one who
speaks another dialect; forget it. There goes the culture. Who needs that
headache?

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Right on the money!

In a message dated 9/9/00 7:55:13 AM, sthiessen@... writes:

<< I don't believe the issue is standardizing pronunciation as much as it is
standardizing spelling. However the two can influence each other no
doubt. I am impressed by languages such as Spanish and others whose
orthography and pronunciation go hand in hand. While there are some
variations in pronunciation, when you understand regional variations, you
can alter your prounciation of the spelling to match that region. The
spelling remains the same.

The same is true in perhaps a more obtuse way with Chinese. Standard
spelling, but variant pronunciations.

I do agree though that in order for Shavian to have any realistic impact,
it cannot be based on individual pronunciation as such. There has to be
some kind of spelling standard. Not all regional variations are
significant in their need to be written down. If Shavian advocates are
compelled to have individual expression, then perhaps American regional
standards could be possible. However, if that happens, then all likelihood
of Shavian going beyond hobby status becomes nearly nil.

Shavian advocates may not like standardization, but without it, it has
little hope of capturing the interest and imagination of more "practical"
people. I know this because my wife and others whom I have shown this to
have little to no interest in learning a system that has no
standardization. That would probably be true of most people.

Stuart Thiessen >>

Long ago in the past there was a discussion similar to this. I'm glad it has
returned, as I also believe there should be some degree of concensus in
spelling standard, if only for official publishing purposes. The way I see
it, the objections raised concerning creating a standard do not come about
because it would forseeably cause problems, but because of the fact that
standardization is even being mentioned at all. It is like the concept of
'standardization' is supposed to be 'anti-shavian', because the ideal of
individualism in Shavian is so appealing. It is quite clear to me - whether
or not there is a standard in existence, it would by no means 'force' me to
change my spelling habits. In fact, everyone about the globe could still
spell how the heck they wanted to, and if two people, one from Liverpool in
England, the other from Texas, USA, met on the internet, their informal
spelling could be quite noticeably different. But the point is, if
publishers are LOOKING to write their material (which would be viewed by
thousands, even millions of people, possibly from different places around
the world) in some form of 'standard' english, they need something to use.
Otherwise different publishers would all end up using inconsistent spellings
in each of their publications. At present, publishers have a choice of two
major sets of spellings - UK and USA english. This is simple - just two
choices, and it is easy to select which one to use depending on the country
of sale. There aren't even that many differences between the two sets
anyway. Why would publishers ever want to use Shavian if they could run the
risk of complaints from readers demanding to know why they used 'this
accent' or 'that accent' instead of their own accent? The 'print' standard
would stop this from happening, because it would end up being viewed as
'neutral' by all. BUT the point is it would *NOT* change anyone from writing
to each other in their own way, if they so desired!

There is also the case of if an Internet user were to type a word (which
could be spelt a number of different ways depending on their regional
dialect) into a search engine text box, it would be impossibly difficult for
the search engine to find what the user wanted, unless it had an enormous
library of variations on individual words. And I'm sure everybody must
agree, that is a ridiculous thing to require of search engines and other
similar utilities, especially when they see that at present, no such
nonsense is needed of them, and no one has cause to complain. There is also
potentially no limit to the number of spelling variations on a particular
word - the longer the word, the more variations there could be. They NEED to
know a STANDARD to use at such times or they will get NOWHERE.

I think maybe we have to accept that there is a line to be drawn between
personal ease of writing and ability of the writing to be read by others.
Shavian can sure make writing easier to learn and to create, but we CANNOT
just throw everything about the current spelling system out of the window,
including the standardization that exists in current English spelling. Sure,
you'll have to spend time teaching it to kids, but we do anyway at the
moment. Teaching the STANDARD to kids is not the thing that takes time and
causes grief, it's the fact that the standard uses the HOPELESS roman
alphabet and an outdated and stupidly inconsistent set of spellings so it is
impossible for any child to understand WHY the standard spelling is spelt
the way it is. At least with Shavian it will be FAR closer to any one
person's pronunciation than ever before. Let's face it - it's never going to
be dead right with everybody! But at least Shavian would enable the standard
to barely resemble speech, and not turn it into some impossibly illogical
'secret code' as the current alphabet does.

Hugh B
www.mixsynth.btinternet.co.uk

P.S. The essays from Androcles and the Lion (and in fact the book itself)
often seem to be treated as the 'mantra' by Shavia, particularly that of
Peter MacCarthy. Maybe it might be time to admit, these people weren't gods,
they hadn't had as much time when they published the book as we've had to
debate the practicalities of an alphabet such as Shavian - we are in the
here and now, we can decide the way the alphabet is going to go, we don't
have to abide religiously to the 'rules' laid down in that one book
(especially as they are only meant to be suggestions). I'm sure they would
have hated us turning the book into some sort of 'constitution' that we were
eternally forbidden to disobey...