From: ywlee@sunc6.cs.uiuc.edu (Youngwhan Lee)
Subject: Re: Super-set system
Keywords: Korea, writing system
Organization: University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Date: Fri, 10 Apr 1992 15:38:45 GMT


OK. Just one more contribution to this thread....

In <1992Apr10.020413.15113@casbah.acns.nwu.edu> phantom@casbah.acns.nwu.edu (James Choi) writes:

>All
>languages existed live and well before any kind of writing system came
>along. 

Yes. But the point is: Language system would not affected by the writing
system at all? do you think a writing system would perfectly
fit to its target language from the beginning? No, the writing system 
obviously in general should not be well fit initially. The problem is 
both languaga and writing system evolves with mutual interaction.

Say, a writing system is not perfect at the beginning and include 
incomplete set of characters including vowels and consonants for the 
language. Some characters should be created later and imployed in the the
writing system. But some characters would not newly created. Instead,
the limit in writing system will affect the language and remove the sound 
from the languaga.

IMHO, there are a couple of examples of Hangul affecting Korean language.
(Warining: followings are my personal opinion with NO scientific 
evidence.)

For example, the vowels are pretty long in Korean. This as I stated 
earlier was a result of King Se-Jong pushing the Yin-Yang theory to much. 
The philosophy requiring combination of vowel and consonant, forced
Korean to perceive vowels such as "_" (eu) or "|" (e) for the consonant
only syllables in language. This must have resulted we Koreans have
a habit trying to pronounce the vowles distinctively. The caused
the phenomena of having long vowels in Korean language.

For a second example, we Koreans have difficult time to distinguish
'r' and 'l.' According to a record, King Se-Jong knew we Koreans 
use 'r' and 'l' in different occasion. But he mistakenly decided
to use one character for the two different sounds. As a result,
Koreans don't really distingish 'r' and 'l.' 

I know this kind of arguments in danger of falling into "chickens and
eggs" argument. But the bottom line is, language and its writing system 
evolves by interacting each other. As a tool, a poor writing system 
limits its language and people's perception process.

> In
>fact, hundreds years of Chinese language (words) and writing system did not
>shake the Korean language (which did not even have writing system) at its
>root.

Did not shake? I would say it sure have been affected in many ways.
The spelling rules would have been easier, for example, because
we would've spelled 'dogil' instead of 'dok-il' in spelling Germany.

>I think any language's writing system is capable of representing all of its
>sounds.  What kind of idiotic people would adopt or invent writing sytem
>that cannot express their own language?  You can rest assured that no
>language on this earth would be made DULL by its own writing system.

If the writing system is invented just as Han-gul after years of 
scientific study, you are right. But since most writing system must have
been evolved many years and they have started with no real scientific
concept, I must say almost all the language must have been affected by 
the writing system because they mutually interact.

>Everything Mr. Hungshik Shin and Mr. Youngwhan Lee say is true.  And I
>agree on their technical merit.  The question comes down to, as Mr. Andy T.
>Kim pointed out, "do you care"?  I don't care.

Did you go thru all those discussions to simply to conclude "you don't 
care"? How convenient!


youngwhan.


-- 
ywlee@uiuc.edu, ywlee@cs.uiuc.edu           | University of Illinois
1408 W. University Ave., Urbana, IL. 61801  | Computer Science 
(217) 244-7551   			    |
Yes, I believe in science, but nothing else.| Innosys? What is it?