Richard,
>
> >
> > >> "Long-Leg Turned Iota", (see Pullum + Ladusaw, 1996:89);
> >
> > Isn't this a dotless j (not a UCS character)?
>
> This is a so-called (by Sinologists) "apical vowel", the more front
> unrounded one. It's shape is basically that of a "dotless i", the bottom
> of which descends slightly below the baseline, the head of which curves
> up to the left and then down. The form given in P+L is slightly
> different from versions I've seen printed in China, which are seriffed,
> and actually sit on the baseline.
>
> In the STEDT Font Reference this is:
> "syllabic alveolar fricative, plain"; at decimal 189
In Unicode, this is encoded at U+027F LATIN SMALL LETTER REVERSED R
WITH FISHHOOK. That was explicitly encoded for the Sinologists
alveolar apical vowel.
>
> >
> > >> "Right-Tail Turned Iota", (see Pullum + Ladusaw, 1996:90);
> >
> > Isn't this LATIN SMALL LETTER L WITH RETROFLEX HOOK (U+026D)?
> >
>
> This is another "apical vowel", the more back unrounded one. It is
> basically a small backward "esh".
>
> In the STEDT Font Reference this is:
> "syllabic retroflex fricative, plain"; at decimal 180
In Unicode, this is encoded at U+0285 LATIN SMALL LETTER SQUAT REVERSED
ESH. That is for the Sinologist's retroflex apical vowel.
>
> I should like to work with people interested in this problem, to
> assemble a list of characters currently or formerly used by Asian
> linguists for phonetic transcription, to determine exactly which are
> present in the standard and which ought perhaps gain consideration for inclusion.
You really do need to get a copy of the standard, then. Information
about ordering it is available at http://www.unicode.org. Or, if
you prefer, you can just go to amazon.com and enter "Unicode" in a
query to find out all about it.
--Ken
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.2 : Tue Jul 10 2001 - 17:20:41 EDT