Re: [silk] Linguistics query
On Wed, Jun 4, 2014 at 7:21 AM, Udhay Shankar N ud...@pobox.com wrote: Idly wondering, and I thought the folks here might have some insight: Does the alphabet used by any Indian language have the concept of upper and lower case? (for the purposes of this query, let us explicitly exclude the Roman alphabet) Indic Scripts does not make a distinction of Upper and Lower Case. I.e Writing systems which have its roots in Brahmic script. CJKV languages do not make this distinction too -- ((Udhay Shankar N)) ((udhay @ pobox.com)) ((www.digeratus.com)) -- Ramakrishna Reddy GPG Key ID:67E226F5 Fingerprint = BA51 9241 72B9 7DBD 1A9A E717 ABB2 9BAD 67E2 26F5
Re: [silk] Linguistics query
On Wed, 2014-06-04 at 07:21 +0530, Udhay Shankar N wrote: Idly wondering, and I thought the folks here might have some insight: Does the alphabet used by any Indian language have the concept of upper and lower case? (for the purposes of this query, let us explicitly exclude the Roman alphabet) That is an interesting question and to my knowledge the answer is no. A question that stems from this is Why on earth does the Roman alphabet come in two forms?. Greek seems to have this quirk. shiv
[silk] Linguistics query
Idly wondering, and I thought the folks here might have some insight: Does the alphabet used by any Indian language have the concept of upper and lower case? (for the purposes of this query, let us explicitly exclude the Roman alphabet) Udhay -- ((Udhay Shankar N)) ((udhay @ pobox.com)) ((www.digeratus.com))
[silk] Linguistics query
Till recently I used to work on a project developing a beautiful, harmonized font family for all the world's written languages https://code.google.com/p/noto/ (that have been encoded in Unicode). Among the major Indic languages/scripts that are encoded in Unicode, none have the concept of upper and lower cases encoded in the standard. The Brahmi script from which Indic scripts are descended was also uni-case. Brahmi is said to be descended from Phoenician via Aramaic which both are also uni-case. While we are on the subject... for some odd reason, some Tamil magazines tend to use regular text for headings and italicized text for bodies of articles. But there is considerable variation between magazines and I have never been able to find out how this convention came about. Thaths On Wed Jun 04 2014 at 7:22:05 AM, Udhay Shankar N ud...@pobox.com wrote: Idly wondering, and I thought the folks here might have some insight: Does the alphabet used by any Indian language have the concept of upper and lower case? (for the purposes of this query, let us explicitly exclude the Roman alphabet) Udhay -- ((Udhay Shankar N)) ((udhay @ pobox.com)) ((www.digeratus.com))
Re: [silk] Linguistics query
On Wed, Jun 4, 2014 at 8:56 AM, Sudhakar Chandra tha...@gmail.com wrote: While we are on the subject... for some odd reason, some Tamil magazines tend to use regular text for headings and italicized text for bodies of articles. But there is considerable variation between magazines and I have never been able to find out how this convention came about. And on a related topic...I find that many north Indian language newspapers and magazines stick to the numbers as written in that language, but Tamizh (I don't know about other south Indian languages) magazines/newspapers have adopted Roman numerals for numbering the pages. Was this the practice from the start? Were Tamizh numbers ever used in recent, living memory?
Re: [silk] Linguistics query
On Wed Jun 04 2014 at 9:19:56 AM, Deepa Mohan mohande...@gmail.com wrote: And on a related topic...I find that many north Indian language newspapers and magazines stick to the numbers as written in that language, but Tamizh (I don't know about other south Indian languages) magazines/newspapers have adopted Roman numerals for numbering the pages. Was this the practice from the start? Were Tamizh numbers ever used in recent, living memory? When I asked my parents about this recently, they said that while they were taught the Tamil numerals in school, they never actually came across them in day to day life going back to the 50's. Not having memorized the Devanagari numerals, I personally hated encountering them on bus signs and license plates in North India. Thaths
Re: [silk] Linguistics query
On Wed, Jun 4, 2014 at 9:33 AM, Sudhakar Chandra tha...@gmail.com wrote: On Wed Jun 04 2014 at 9:19:56 AM, Deepa Mohan mohande...@gmail.com wrote: And on a related topic...I find that many north Indian language newspapers and magazines stick to the numbers as written in that language, but Tamizh (I don't know about other south Indian languages) magazines/newspapers have adopted Roman numerals for numbering the pages. Was this the practice from the start? Were Tamizh numbers ever used in recent, living memory? When I asked my parents about this recently, they said that while they were taught the Tamil numerals in school, they never actually came across them in day to day life going back to the 50's. Not having memorized the Devanagari numerals, I personally hated encountering them on bus signs and license plates in North India. Which brings me to the question, when is sticking to one's language protecting the language and culture, and when is it being reactionary? When is adopting more commonly used conventions (eg Roman numerals) being progressive and globalizing and when is it abandoning one's traditions? Change may be a constant...but it is one of the most passion-stirring processes for human beings!
