From: ct2r+@andrew.cmu.edu (Canh Hoang Tran)
Newsgroups: soc.culture.vietnamese
Subject: Re: [LANG] The Unofficial Rules of placing marks (second edition)
Date: 21 Nov 92 21:41:44 GMT
Article-I.D.: andrew.of3nasS00iV206jW0T
Organization: Freshman, MCS general, Carnegie Mellon, Pittsburgh, PA

Hello there, Linh T. Tran!

I'm glad to have someone share similar opinion about Placing marks
stuff.  Following is the copy of my message concerning Placing marks
posted earlier in SCV.  I repost here so that one might find it's
helpful.  Exception? One was found: "ue^", i.g Hue^' and thue^', but
even though so, it still complies to point #6 of my "tip" points. It
turns out that in my "tip" points has higher priority compared to my #5
"tip" points.

>Date: Fri, 13 Nov 1992 04:07:38 -0500 (EST)
>From: Canh Hoang Tran <ct2r+@andrew.cmu.edu>
>To: Outbound News
>    <outnews+netnews.soc.culture.vietnamese@andrew.cmu.edu>,
>    JFT%NCCIBM1.BITNET@forsythe.stanford.edu
>Subject: Re: ** Rules for placing accent marks? **
>Cc: Canh Hoang Tran <ct2r+@andrew.cmu.edu>
> 
>Hi,
> 
>Tua^~n wrote:
> 
>>From: JFT%NCCIBM1.BITNET@forsythe.stanford.edu (JFT@NCCIBM1.BITNET)
>>Subject: ** Rules for placing accent marks? **
>>Date: 12 Nov 92 20:29:42 GMT
>> 
>>Hi,
>>  I am curious, what are the rules for placing accent
>>marks in the following situations:
>>   1) the word is made of two vowels, does the accent
>>      mark go above the 1st or 2nd, or does it depend?
>>      Ex.  a'o= coat, dress, shirt.... the accent is
>>           above the first vowel.
>> 
>>    2) the word has two vowels in between consonants.
>> 
>>       Ex.  qua?n ly'= administrative... accent is
>>            above the second vowel (of qua?n)
>> 
>>Can anyone tell me some unique cases, or tell me all
>>the rules, or are there any?
>> 
>>Thanks,
>> 
>>Tua~'n (John).
> 
>I can~t think of any rules to use diacritical marks, and I don~t think
>there are such rules for that.  But thinking about diacritical marks in
>Vietnamese language, I found that there are some ~tip~ points, as I call
>it to use diacritical marks. 
> 
>Before I go on to lead you to confusion, let me clarify about one thing:
>~qua^`n~ is the bad example you gave, ~qua^`n~ just has one vowel
>instead of two as you said. Why? Because ~u~ goes with ~q~ to make
>compound-consonent ~qu~, it~s analogous to ~t~and ~h~ in the
>compound-consonent ~th~ in either VNese language or English, either ~th~
>has its own characteristic, differs from either ~t~ or ~h~ alone; as the
>matter of fact, we never find ~q~ without ~u~ after it in any VNese
>word, they must go together. Thus, it~s misleading if ~u~ is considered
>as a vowel.
> 
>Another point which I want to clarify: In the general keyboard, the
>following symbols are considered as diacritical marks:   ~, `, ?, ~, . ,
>and no-sign for the case none of above symbols are used for a particular
>word.  Other symbols listed here are considered as vowel-distinguisher: 
>^, * or +, (.The issue here is about diacritical marks.
> 
>Let~s consider anothing: Generally, the component of the words in VNese
>language are: --> consonent(s)-vowel(s)-consonent(s) <--.  Note that:
>	_There is at least one vowel for any particular word.
>	_For the sake of this explanation, I name the consonent before the
>vowel as ForeConsonents, and the consonent after the vowel as
>SupConsonent.
>	_ A word might have zero, one or more ForeConsonents or SupConsonent.
> 
>Now let~s consider some ~tip~ points about diacritical marks:
> 
>(1)Point#1: Diacritical marks are unaffected by the presence of
>ForeConsonents, thus regardless whether the number of ForeConsonent is
>zero, one, two, or more, diacritical marks is affected by some other
>factors.
>Example: Will be given in conjunction with other examples in other points. 
> 
>(2)Point#2: In contrast, the presence status of SupConsonent affectects
>to the location of the diacritical points.
> 
>(3)Point#3: If there is at least one SupConsonent, then the diacritical
>marks are located above the vowel preceed the SupConsonent of the word
>regardless the number of the vowels the word contains
>Ex:"bu*o*'ng":stubborn: ForeConsonent:b;
>SupConsonent:n,g;-->diacritical:above o*; "u*o*'t":wet:no ForeConsonent;
>SupConsonent:t;-->diacritical:above:o*
>(4)Point#4: The one-vowel word has its diacritical mark right above it.
>Ex: needless because this statement is straight forward.
>(5)Point#5: If there is no SupConsonent, then the diacritical marks are
>affected by the number of the vowels the word contains.
> 
>	@In the two-vowel word, the diacritical mark locates right above the
>first vowel from left to right.
>Ex: "a'o" : no ForeConsonent, no SupConsonent; diacritical:above "a"
>Ex:"ga.o":rice: one ForeConsonent:g; no SupConsonent, diacriticl:below
>"a"
>	@In the three-vowel word, the diacritical mark locates right above the
>middle vowel.
>Ex:"nhie^`u":many:2 ForeConsonent:n,h; no SupConsonent; diacritical:
>above middle vowel:"e^"; 
>Ex:"tuye^'t":snow:1 ForeConsonent:t;1 SupConsonent:t; diacritical:above
>middle vowel:"e^"
>(6)Point#6: In the multiple-vowel word, if just has one
>vowel-distinguisher, then the diacritical marks are located right above
>the vowel which has vowel-distinguisher. This ~tip~ point doesn~t work
>with multiple-vowel word which has more than one vowel-distinguisher.
>Ex: Take a look at the two examples of point #5: "nhie^`u" and
>"tuye^'t", both of them have some featurese: multiple-vowel word,  has
>one vowel-distinguisher ("^")-->diacritical is located on the top of the
>vowel which has vowel-distinguisher. 
>Ex: "ngu*o*`i": people:multiple- vowel, has 2 vowel-distinguisher: (*
>and *), and the diacritical mark is affected by other factors.  It is
>determined by using Point #5
>Ex: "ngu*?i":smell: this is multiple-vowel word, "u" has vowel
>distinguisher and thus the diacritical mark is located above it. Note
>that this word complies to point #6 as well as point #5
>Although I listed 6 ~tip~ points above, I usually don~t use it when
>using Vietnamese language since it is so familiar with me (compare to
>English is so familiar with you).  The diacritical marks and the
>vowel-distinguisher make Vietnamese language become more interesting and
>unique compared to other languages; and it's importantant too, imagine
>that without it, netters of SCV must guess and the reading process must
>be a lot slower.  I have been living in United States for about 2 and
>1/2 years and am attending Carnegie Mellon University as a freshman. 
>Please feel free to send me Email or post on the SCV bulletin board if
>you want to add more ~tip~ points or you find some exception cases. 
>Hope that this explaination helps!
> 
>Sincerely yours,
>Canh Tran

************************************************************** Canh Tran.
How to contact me? 
Please use Finger and type in:-->ct2r+@andrew.cmu.edu<--
R.W.Emerson:"Nothing great was ever achieved without enthusiasm"
**************************************************************
Newsgroups: soc.culture.vietnamese