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From: deb5@kimbark.uchicago.edu (Daniel von Brighoff)
Subject: Re: (lang/Cantonese) Cantonese spelling scheme?
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References: <4frdrv$ebm@voyager.iii.org.tw> <Pine.SOL.3.91.960228161024.28305E-100000@rask> <Dnx3BM.2FM@midway.uchicago.edu> <mankin-0803961818000001@mankin.usc.edu>
Date: Sat, 9 Mar 1996 04:32:03 GMT
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In article <mankin-0803961818000001@mankin.usc.edu>,
Eric Mankin <mankin@bcf.usc.edu> wrote:
>
>> Jens S. Larsen <jens@cphling.dk> wrote:
>
>> >In that case, standard Mandarin _is_ biased, even if it is
>> >artificial. Just as Latin, if it had survived, would have been
>> >biased to the benefit of middle Italians.
>
>It's been suggested that the situation with Chinese characters is
>as if all of the Romance languages in Europe were still written
>as Latin -- so that a Frenchman would write "puella pulchra est"
>and read it, "La fille est belle," while a Spaniard would read
>the same characters as "La muchacha es linda." I'm sure this is
>an exaggeration -- would anyone knowledgeable care to say how much so?

It would be more accurate to compare it to the actual situation in
pre-modern Europe, in which the various authors all wrote in Latin but
with pronounced local colouring.  To get an idea of what this was like,
listen to the way choirs from various countries sing liturgical 
music.  Although more and more choirs are using reconstructed Classical
Latin pronunciation, one can still hear Englishmen sing [nouvou siid@t
ritjuwi] where Germans have [no:vo tse:dat Ritui].

So, to take your example above, a Frenchman might read [py(E)lA py(l)krA
e] and a Spaniard [pwELa pulkra es].  If they were reading aloud, perhaps
they would move up the verb or substitute a more colloquial word for
'pulchra', much as the Chinese supply additional syllables to disambiguate
homophones or otherwise modify Classical Chinese when reading it aloud.
(Not that many do this anymore, since Mandarin is now the common written
language.)


-- 
	 Daniel "Da" von Brighoff    /\          Dilettanten
	(deb5@midway.uchicago.edu)  /__\         erhebt Euch
				   /____\      gegen die Kunst!
