Same thing in Slovak and Czech where 'ch' is considered a separate letter, except in our languages, it comes after 'h'. Predictably, localization and especially sorting algorithms are a mess.<br><br>b.<br><br>
<div class="gmail_quote">On Thu, Dec 2, 2010 at 16:51, Dave Sayers <span dir="ltr"><<a href="mailto:dave.sayers@cantab.net">dave.sayers@cantab.net</a>></span> wrote:<br><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex; border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); padding-left: 1ex;">
<div text="#000000" bgcolor="#ffffff">
Reminds me of the digraphs in Welsh:<br>
<br>
<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Welsh_orthography" target="_blank">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Welsh_orthography</a><br>
<br>
Dave<br><font color="#888888">
<br>
--<br>
Dr. Dave Sayers<br>
Honorary Research Fellow<br>
School of the Environment and Society<br>
Swansea University<br>
<a href="mailto:dave.sayers@cantab.net" target="_blank">dave.sayers@cantab.net</a><br>
<a href="http://swansea.academia.edu/DaveSayers" target="_blank">http://swansea.academia.edu/DaveSayers</a></font><div><div></div><div class="h5"><br>
<br>
<br>
On 19:59, David Pardo Cossío wrote:
<blockquote type="cite">
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<td style="font: inherit;" valign="top">Dear Harold,<br>
<br>
Ch and Ll were different letters, so that before, in
dictionaries, we had words starting by Ch a part from and
after those starting with C; and we had also words
starting by Ll a part from and after those starting by L.<br>
<br>
It has been already for some years that Ch has been added
to C and Ll to L... like in English and other languages.<br>
<br>
However, ñ continues being a different letter, after n and
before o.<br>
<br>
Hope this helps.<br>
<br>
Regards from Hong Kong.<br>
<br>
David Pardo.<br>
<br>
______________________________________________<br>
<br>
Diverses són les parles i diversos els homes, <br>
i convindran molts noms a un sol amor <br>
<br>
(La pell de brau, Salvador Espriu).<br>
<br>
--- El <b>mié, 1/12/10, Harold Schiffman <i><a href="mailto:hfsclpp@gmail.com" target="_blank"><hfsclpp@gmail.com></a></i></b>
escribió:<br>
<blockquote style="border-left: 2px solid rgb(16, 16, 255); margin-left: 5px; padding-left: 5px;"><br>
De: Harold Schiffman <a href="mailto:hfsclpp@gmail.com" target="_blank"><hfsclpp@gmail.com></a><br>
Asunto: [lg policy] question about Spanish orthography
reform<br>
Para: "lp" <a href="mailto:lgpolicy-list@groups.sas.upenn.edu" target="_blank"><lgpolicy-list@groups.sas.upenn.edu></a><br>
Fecha: miércoles, 1 de diciembre, 2010 18:54<br>
<br>
<div>Hi, All:<br>
<br>
A couple of days ago I sent this message about Spanish
orthography<br>
reform to this list, but<br>
not being an expert on Spanish, I had a few
questions. In the<br>
article, it refers to<br>
'ch' and 'll' as single "letters" that are being
removed from the<br>
Spanish alphabet, which will annoy people like<br>
Hugo Chavez, whose family name begins with ch,
reducing his name to Avez.<br>
<br>
This sounds idiotic to me--even if 'ch' and 'll' are
gone, people will<br>
presumably still<br>
have a regular c, an h, and an l that they can use 2
of, to write<br>
Spanish correctly.<br>
Is this whole business just a popular misconception?
A false<br>
interprettion of what<br>
the Spanish academy has done?<br>
<br>
Help me, I'm confused!<br>
<br>
HS<br>
<br>
Rebelling Against Spain, This Time With Words<br>
By ELISABETH MALKIN<br>
MEXICO CITY — The Royal Spanish Academy is lopping two
letters off the<br>
Spanish alphabet, reducing it to 27.<br>
<br>
Out go “ch” and “ll,” along with lots of annoying
accents and hyphens.<br>
<br>
The simplified spelling from the academy, a musty
Madrid institution<br>
that is the chief arbiter of all things grammatical,
should be welcome<br>
news to the world’s 450 million Spanish-speakers, not
to mention<br>
anybody struggling to learn the language. But no.
Everyone, it seems,<br>
has a bone to pick with the academy — starting with
President Hugo<br>
Chávez of Venezuela. If the academy no longer
considers “ch” a<br>
separate letter, Mr. Chávez chortled to his cabinet,
then he would<br>
henceforth be known simply as “Ávez.” (In fact, his
name will stay the<br>
same, though his place in the alphabetic order will
change, because<br>
“ch” used to be the letter after “c.”)<br>
<br>
An editorial in the Mexican daily El Universal
declared the new rules<br>
to be an affront to the national identity: “Spelling
is not just an<br>
imposition; it serves to maintain a minimum of
coherence and sense to<br>
what is written and said. Can this be dictated from a
conference room<br>
abroad? A country that is proudly independent would
not accept this.”<br>
The editorial went on to ask, “Would the United States
accept dictates<br>
from England over the use of English?” They are just
as upset on the<br>
European side of the Atlantic. Comments have poured
forth on the Web —<br>
1,450 of them as of Thursday night — after the first
article on the<br>
changes appeared in the Spanish newspaper El País at
the beginning of<br>
the month. The word “absurdo” pops up a lot.<br>
<br>
“It’s kind of a magic realist moment. They decide that
2 of 29 letters<br>
will disappear,” said Ilan Stavans, a Mexican who is a
professor of<br>
Latin American and Latino culture at Amherst College.
“All the<br>
dictionaries will have to be remade, which is good for
selling the<br>
Royal Academy’s dictionary, which they keep producing
as though it’s<br>
the Bible.” Professor Stavans compared it to the
authority that<br>
English-speakers turn to, the Oxford English
Dictionary, which<br>
stresses common usage rather than imposing it from
above.<br>
<br>
The Spanish academy needed 800 pages to explain the
new simplified<br>
rules. Among other changes: letters with different
names in different<br>
countries get just one name (which is rather like
telling Americans<br>
that the last letter of the alphabet should be called
“zed”). Iraq<br>
becomes Irak and quásar is now written as cuásar.<br>
<br>
The spelling rules will go on sale by Christmas in
Spain. Latin<br>
Americans will have to wait a bit longer.<br>
<br>
There have long been complaints about Spanish
spelling. At the first<br>
international congress of the Spanish language in
Zacatecas, Mexico,<br>
in 1997, the Colombian writer and Nobel laureate
Gabriel García<br>
Márquez declared, “Let’s retire spelling, the terror
of all beings<br>
from the cradle.” But he admitted that his pleas were
little more than<br>
“bottles flung to the sea in the hope that they would
one day come to<br>
the god of all words.”<br>
<br>
That god remaining silent, the Royal Spanish Academy
has been filling<br>
the void since it was founded in 1713. “They have an
oracular way of<br>
presenting things, like Moses coming down from Mount
Sinai,” Professor<br>
Stavans said.<br>
<br>
“In my mind, it’s a relic of the 18th century,” he
added. “We have to<br>
wait for Spain to say how we speak.”<br>
<br>
For those who live and breathe Spanish, the academy’s
priorities seem<br>
a little off. “We are a language in debate,” said the
Mexican writer<br>
Paco Ignacio Taibo II. “Unfortunately, the academy
isn’t ahead of the<br>
debate, it’s behind.”<br>
<br>
To its credit, the academy takes pains to emphasize
that it works<br>
collaboratively with its associated academies in 21
other<br>
Spanish-speaking countries, including in the United
States. Early<br>
meetings on the new spelling rules were held in Chile;
the text was<br>
completed this month in Spain; and it will be ratified
by the academy<br>
and its sister branches at the Guadalajara Book Fair
in Mexico on<br>
Sunday.<br>
<br>
In an e-mail, Juan Villoro, a Mexican writer living in
Barcelona, was<br>
philosophical about one change that seemed to strike
at the core of<br>
Spanish speakers’ poetic souls on both sides of the
Atlantic. Under<br>
the old rules, the word “solo” takes an accent when it
means “only”<br>
and has no accent when it means “alone.”<br>
<br>
The academy rubbed out the accent, arguing that the
meaning would be<br>
clear from the context. “Sometimes, the law has
nothing to do with<br>
justice,” Mr. Villoro wrote.<br>
<br>
Luis Fernando Lara, a scholar at the Colegio de México
who coordinates<br>
the preparation of a Spanish dictionary used in
Mexico, waved off the<br>
academy’s new rules: “We’re free in this world not to
listen to them.”<br>
<br>
As for the changes in the names of letters, Mr. Lara
resorted to a<br>
line from a classic American song to describe the
spat:<br>
<br>
“I like tomato, you like tomahto,” he said.<br>
<br>
Although he did not say it, the title of that tune,
written by George<br>
and Ira Gershwin, was understood:<br>
<br>
“Let’s call the whole thing off.”<br>
<br>
<a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/26/world/europe/26spanish.html?_r=1&sq=rebelling" target="_blank">http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/26/world/europe/26spanish.html?_r=1&sq=rebelling</a><br>
against
spain&st=cse&scp=1&pagewanted=print<br>
<br>
-- <br>
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