[Lexicog] Sort Order for Lakota language

[David Frank]

Jan Ullrich --

Is there some reason to list the following pairs in Lakota together, in 
terms of meaning or word identity?

    thoka - enemy
    tokha - something is the matter

    kiza - to squeek
    khiza - to fight

    kan - old
    khan - vein

If so, the reason would not be so obvious to an outsider. Or am I not 
understanding what you are trying to say?

As to your choices, I would think you should try to determine what is most 
satisfying to the Lakota speakers, and what would work best for them in 
looking up words. If they are already literate in English and familiar with 
English dictionaries, then I would guess that it would work best to treat 
"h" as a letter in its normal sort order.

Or since the "h" grapheme represents aspiration, if it could be written 
raised, as a diacritic, then it would be easier to ignore in the sort order. 
(I don't mean easier from a technical viewpoint, but rather from a 
psychological point of view.)

You say that some of your colleagues and co-workers prefer option C. Are 
they native speakers? Sometimes we linguists try to impose our preferences 
and justify it by saying it is what should work best for native speakers. 
And it is so easy to get heated up and disagreeable about orthography 
issues. Assuming that Lokota speakers are your primary audience, I would 
encourage you to test with them and ask their preferences to see what really 
works best for, and satisfying to, them. Speaking from experience, it can be 
very satisfying for a linguist to give up his or her own preference, knowing 
that you have settled on something that is the preference of the native 
speaker audience.

-- David Frank 



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