Re: Why are kana called "letters", not "syllables"?

From: Michael Everson ([email protected])
Date: Mon Sep 25 2000 - 08:50:59 EDT

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Ar 18:44 -0800 2000-09-22, scr�obh [email protected]:
>Why, for instance, is HIRAGANA LETTER ME called HIRAGANA
>LETTER ME and not HIRAGANA SYLLABLE ME? It might
>be explained by how they are used, for instance,
>Japanese palindromes, I hear, work kana by kana.

The short answer is that "it's one of those things".

The longer answer has to do with legacy names in coded character sets and
stuff like that.

Michael Everson ** Everson Gunn Teoranta ** http://www.egt.ie
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