From: Peter_Constable@sil.org
Date: Mon Dec 09 2002 - 18:44:40 EST
On 12/09/2002 04:30:54 PM ekeown wrote:
>> Does this have any implications regarding the issue as to whether there
is
>> another distinct accent needing to be encoded?
[snip]
>However, I think the main differences between the big scholars
>will end up being in how one programs with the accents, once
>they are enough semantically differentiated that we can really
>write algorithms with them.
Without knowing exactly what you have in mind, we need to be careful about
"semantic" differentiation: Unicode should support distinctions between
characters, but it should necessarily not be required to support linguistic
distinctions in the text those characters are used to represent. Thus, if a
manuscript consistently uses two different symbols contrastively, that
provides evidence in support of encoding two characters. But if a symbol is
used for two distinct meanings, that distinction in meaning alone is
generally not a good argument in favour of encoding distinct characters.
That might not be what you had in mind, but I thought it would be good to
clarify that point.
> Yeivin and Dotan, for example, have
>very different views of the structural meaning of the
>accents,
Does that mean that Dotan would or might disagree with Yeivin on the issue
that later manuscripts neutralise a distinction that was made in earlier
manuscripts between the servi used with pazer and that used with oleh
we-yored? (I realise Dotan and others might not have ever written on the
topic, thus leaving no basis to answer that question.)
- Peter
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Peter Constable
Non-Roman Script Initiative, SIL International
7500 W. Camp Wisdom Rd., Dallas, TX 75236, USA
Tel: +1 972 708 7485
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