From my response to the issues, you will probably realise by now that the suggested IPA Sound system is wrong. In Assamese we donot have these sounds for the letters shown. As I said, in Assamese one letter does not represent one sound. Like English, Assamese is not a phonetic language. Please try to understand this basic issue about the Assamese language. That way we can avoid many confusions. We should not try to create a new languiage.
Rajen Barua
>From: "S Saikia" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
>Reply-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
>To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
>Subject: [Assam] Transliteration Of Assamese Sounds
>Date: Thu, 24 Jul 2003 13:38:57 -0500
>
>
>
>
>
>hi all.....
>
>In order to overcome the obstacles in the transliteration of
>Assamese words I propose the following transliteration scheme mostly
>based on the standard devanagari ITRANS transliteration charts. This
>scheme is not meant for use in software program just becaue it is
>too complicated and scores of mor practical systems can be figured
>out to do the same ... The following is based on the sound of the
>letter in International Phonetic Alphabet and its equivalent
>_expression_ in English and can be used to write Assamese words in
>English...
>
>
>
>
>VOWELS
>-------------
>
>Transliteration Suggested Sound/IPA _expression_
>------------------- -----------------------------------------------
>
>a ................ Near-Open Central Unrounded(Inverted a)
>aa ............... Open Front Unrounded (Lower case a)
>i .................. Close Front Unrounded (Lower case i)
>ii or I ........ Close Central Unrounded (Barred i)
>u .............. Close Back Rounded (Lower case u)
>uu or U ........ Close Back Un-Rounded (Turned m) (???)
>rri or R^i ..... Near- Close Front Un-Rounded (Small Capital I)
>e .............. Open- Mid Front Unrounded (Epsilon)
>ai ............. Close-Mid Central ROunded (Barred O )
>o ............. Close- Mid Back Rounded (Lower Case O )
>au ............. Close- Mid Back Unrounded (Baby Gamma )
>
>CONSONANTS
>--------------------
>
>Transliteration Suggested Sound/IPA Symbol
>-------------------- ------------------------------------------
>
>ka ............. Voiceless Velar Plosive (Lower Case K)
>kha ............ Aspirated Ka(???????)
>ga ............. Voiced Velar Plosive (Lower case g)
>gha ............ Aspirated ga (????????)
>nna or N^a ..... Voiced Uvular Nasal (Small Capital N)
>cha ............ Voiceless Aveolar Fricative (Lower Case s)
>chha ........... Voiceless Post-Aveolar Fricative (Esh)
>ja ............. Voiced Postaveolar Fricative (Yogh)
>jha ............ Palatalised ja ( ja^j)
>jjnna or JNa ... Voiced palatal Nasal(Left tail N at left)
>tta or Ta ...... Voiceless Aveolar Plosive (Lower case T)
>ttha or Tha .... Aspitated Ta (tta^h)
>dda or Da ...... Voiced Aveolar Plosive (Lower case D)
>ddha or Dha .... Aspirated Da (dda^h)
>nna or Na....... Voiced Aveolar Nasal(Lower Case N)
>ta ............. Voiceless Retroflex Plosive (T with Right Tail)
>tha ............ Aspirated ta (ta^h)
>da ............. Voiced Retroflex Plosive (Right Tail D)
>dha ............ Aspirated da(da^h)
>na ............. Voiced Retrofelx nasal (N with right tail)
>pa ............. Voiceless Bilabial Plosive (Lower Case p)
>pha ............ Voiceless Bilabial Fricative (Phi)
>ba ............. Voiced Bilabial Plosive (Lower Case b)
>bha ............ Voiced Bilabial Fricative (Beta)
>ma ............. Voiced Bilabial Nasal (Lower Case M)
>ya ............. Voiced palatal Fricative (Curly Tail J)
>ra ............. Voiced Aveolar Approximant (Turned R)
>la ............. Voiced Aveolar Lateral Approximant (Lower Case L)
>wa ............. Voiced Retroflex Lateral Approximant(l with
>tail)(?)
>xha ............ Voiceless Labiodental Fricative (Lower Case F)
>xhha ........... Voiceless Epiglottal Fricative (Small Capital H)
>xa ............. Voiceless Uvular Fricative (Chi)
>ha ............. Voiceless Glottal Fricative (Lower Case H)
>ksha or xa ..... Aveolo-palatal Fricative (Curly Tail C)
>jya ............ Voiced Palatal Approximant( Lower case J)
>ra(?)
>ra(?)
>
>In the above chart there has been quite a few deviations from the
>devanagari system. For Example the "sha, shha, sa" have been
>transliterated as "xha, xhha, xa" because unlike Hindi or Sanskrit,
>the "s" in those is often pronounced as "x" e.g. Axam in assamese
>instead of Asam in Hindi. Also the "va" has been transliterated as
>"wa" in Assamese.
>
>I stated before and I repeat now, that I am not a phonetician. What
>I am trying to do is to present enough starting material for a
>debate so that the long-standing dispute on how Assamese words
>should be transliterated into english might be put to rest once and
>for all. The sounds I have "suggested" for the corresponing Assamese
>Alphabet is by no means the final word nor do I claim that all of
>them are correct....It is simply a suggestion so that it can be
>discussed and the correct sounds be recorded. I have tried to model
>the above on the transliteration charts of ancient Egyptian.
>
>If a system like the one stated above can be agreed upon by one and
>all, then to transcribe Assamese words we just have to replace the
>assamese letters with their corresponding english group of
>alphabets..(omitting the the "a" in the consonants whne they appear
>at the end of the word). It will remove all ambiguity whatsoever on
>the question of how an assamese word should be written in English.
>
>The only way the system envisioned can be a success is if people
>debate over the transliteration and the sounds of the language until
>it reaches an acceptable level of accuracy.
>
>The reference to the devnagari script transliteration chart can be
>found at...
>http://www.angelfire.com/linux/tugg/devnagari.html
>
>The IPA help file which contains the IPA chart and all the sound
>files for individual sound for reference can be downloaded from
>http://www.sil.org/computing/speechtools/softdev2/Downloads2/SatDL2/Release2/setup-ih.exe
>
>or you can go to the link from
>
>http://www.angelfire.com/linux/tugg/devnagari.html
>
>
>
>yours,
>
>Syamanta Saikia
>
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