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<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;" align="center"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-family: Arial;">===========================================<br>
L O W L A N D S - L - 15 December 2008 - Volume 06<span style="color: rgb(102, 102, 102);"><br>
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<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-family: Arial;"><br>
From: <span class="ep8xu"><span><span style="color: rgb(121, 6, 25);">Heiko Evermann</span></span></span><span class="hccdpe"> </span><span class="ldacoc"><<a href="mailto:heiko.evermann@googlemail.com">heiko.evermann@googlemail.com</a>></span><br>
Subject: <span class="hccdpe">LL-L "Orthography" 2008.12.15 (04) [E/LS]</span><br>
<br>
Dear Ron,</span></p>
<p style="margin-left: 40px; color: rgb(0, 0, 153);"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-family: Arial;">Pretty much any system will
do as long as it ...</span></p>
<ul style="margin-left: 40px; color: rgb(0, 0, 153);" type="disc"><li class="MsoNormal" style=""><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-family: Arial;">is typologically easy (i.e. not full of
"exotic" letters and diacritics,</span></li><li class="MsoNormal" style=""><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-family: Arial;">is easy to learn,</span></li><li class="MsoNormal" style=""><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-family: Arial;">does not pretend to be a phonetic writing system,</span></li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style=""><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-family: Arial;">represents <u>all</u> phonemes.</span></li></ul>
<p style="margin-left: 40px; color: rgb(0, 0, 153);" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-family: Arial;">Well, what
you also need is that it gets acceptance. Any change will probably fail due to
lack of acceptance, especially when a new system is far away from what people
already use. They would just say "Dissen neemoodschen Kraam kann ik nich
lesen." And thats it. </span></p>
<p style="margin-left: 40px;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-family: Arial;"><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 153);">Sass made quite clear that
where accuracy is required an </span><i style="color: rgb(0, 0, 153);">ogonek</i><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 153);"> be used underneath an "e"
~ "ee" ~ "eh" and "ö" ~ "ö" ~
"öh" to mark them as long monophthongs and thus distinguish them from
their unmarked equivelents that stand for diphthongs. </span></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12pt;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-family: Arial;">Well, it might have been nice to retain such a distinction.
Actually I have talked with Hein Thies (the author of the current Sass
dictionary) about that. His statement simply was: after decades of trying to
teach people to make a distinction they have finally given up. No one was
willing to use the ogoneks. The only thing they now do is to list alternative
forms in brackets like in<br>
1) Deel, Delen : Teil<br>
2) Deel (Dääl): Diele<br>
where the lack of the brackets in 1 indicates that the e is "zweitönig)<br>
or <br>
1) öwer: über<br>
2) Över (Euver): Ufer<br>
where the lack of brackets in 1 indicates that the ö is "eintönig".
And that's all. More has not been possible. Blame it on the North German
"Dickköpp", but you should better accept that or you will end up like
Don Quichotte fighting against windmills with eintönig and zweitönig wings.
Good luck.</span></p>
<p style="margin-left: 40px;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-family: Arial;"><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 153);">Non-distinction of
diphthongs and long monophthongs leads to mispronunciation among learners.
Ideally therefore, they ought to be distinguished everywhere. At a minimum,
they must be distinguished in reference and teaching material. </span></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-family: Arial;">Well, the
Sass does just that. Actually this system of indication is mentioned under
"Hinweise zur Aussprache" in the introduction. </span></p>
<p style="margin-left: 40px; color: rgb(0, 0, 153);"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-family: Arial;">The use of the German <i>Dehnungs-H</i>
is becoming less and less controversial as more and more people agree that it's
kind of silly and certainly redundant.</span></p>
<p style="margin-left: 40px;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-family: Arial;"><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 153);">Likewise redundant and
linguistically untenable is the Sass tradition of representing final devoicing
where and only where German spelling shows a final voiceless consonant; e.g.</span><br style="color: rgb(0, 0, 153);">
<br style="color: rgb(0, 0, 153);"><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 153);">
wide: </span><i style="color: rgb(0, 0, 153);">wiet</i><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 153);"> vs </span><i style="color: rgb(0, 0, 153);">wiede ...</i><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 153);"> (because of German </span><i style="color: rgb(0, 0, 153);">weit</i><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 153);"> vs </span><i style="color: rgb(0, 0, 153);">weite
...</i><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 153);">)</span><br style="color: rgb(0, 0, 153);"><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 153);">
but ...</span><br style="color: rgb(0, 0, 153);"><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 153);">
dress: </span><i style="color: rgb(0, 0, 153);">Kleed</i><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 153);"> vs </span><i style="color: rgb(0, 0, 153);">Kleder (</i><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 153);">because of German </span><i style="color: rgb(0, 0, 153);">Kleid</i><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 153);"> vs </span><i style="color: rgb(0, 0, 153);">Kleider</i><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 153);">)</span></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-family: Arial;">??? So
what? It makes words more recognizable. Given the fact that most people in North Germany know less Low Saxon than my 6-year old
daughter, this is highly neccessary. </span></p>
<p style="margin-left: 40px;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-family: Arial;"><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 153);">What bothers me about the
Sass system as it is </span><u style="color: rgb(0, 0, 153);">popularly</u><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 153);"> used (i.e. the watered-down version) is
that on the one hand it lacks necessary distinctions and on the other hand it
dictates unnecessary fluff such as the </span><i style="color: rgb(0, 0, 153);">Dehnungs-H</i><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 153);"> and selective
representation of final devoicing (which is a phonetic detail and thus doesn't
belong into a writing system other than a phonetic one). In any case, the aim
to make it look as German as possible seems to override the need for
consistency and integrity, and this seems like a shaky foundation to me, as
well as a disservice to learners, to say the least.</span></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-family: Arial;">How abowt
teeching the English e propa sistem of raiting first, one that aims for
consistency and integrity, one that is not based on a way of writing that
became obsolete with the Tudor sound shift. Mait meyke lerning English a lot
esier for all the world. And good lack for teeching that sistem in Scatland. </span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-family: Arial;"><br>
<br>
Kind regards,<br>
<span style="color: rgb(136, 136, 136);"><br>
Heiko</span><br>
<br>
----------<br>
<br>
From: R. F. Hahn <<a href="mailto:sassisch@yahoo.com" target="_blank">sassisch@yahoo.com</a>>
<br>
Subject: Orthography<br>
<br>
ßanks, Heiko.<br><br></span></p><div style="margin-left: 40px; color: rgb(0, 0, 153);"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-family: Arial;">Well, the
Sass does just that. Actually this system of indication is mentioned under
"Hinweise zur Aussprache" in the introduction. </span><br></div><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-family: Arial;">
<br>Which is what I indicated in conjunction with pointing out that people don't follow it.<br><br></span></p><div style="margin-left: 40px;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-family: Arial;">
<span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 153);">??? So what? It makes words more recognizable. Given the fact that most people
in </span>North Germany<span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 153);"> know less Low Saxon than my
6-year old daughter, this is highly neccessary. </span></span></div>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-family: Arial;"><br>
I can't believe you said "highly necessary" …<br>
<br>
ßäiing, sät Nors Dschörmäns ahr tuh damm tu diel wis a slait twieking of an existing ßistem is
ßatsch an oolt exkjus for duing nassing ebaut se garbidsch!<br>
<br>
For some reason people are not deemed too dumb to learn English, French,
Spanish, Russian or whatever, most importantly Dutch, complete with the actual
spelling of those languages. But for some reason (which may in part be authors'
and teachers' own shaky knowledge and proficiency) they are considered too dumb
to deal with a regularized version of the spelling of the original language of
their region. And they are considered too dumb to "recognize words" without
them being spelled non-phonemically to make them look German. This is
so lame and such a negative testament to the intellectual acumen of the people!
Why should they get spelling hints to recognize words from a German
perspective? Do they get such hints in Dutch, which is similarly relatively
closely related? To accommodate those supposedly learning-challenged North
Germans, should we spell <i>wijt</i> vs <i>wijder</i> in Dutch like Low Saxon <i>wiet</i>
vs <i>wieder</i> (when the proper phonemic representations are <i>wijd</i> ~ <i>wijder</i>
and <i>wied</i> ~ <i>wieder</i> respectively, versus German <i>weit</i> vs <i>weiter</i>)? This is a total oddity among languages.<br>
<br>
I strongly suspect that this double standard, this "special case" scenario
created for Low Saxon, goes back to people still not quite
believing in its status as a language in its own right. It pains me to see that even some people that profess to be its champions buy into this reduced status. For why else would people need to rely on constant reference to German in this case and not in cases of
other languages that people learn? It's a <u>different language</u>. You don't
know different languages by osmosis. You <u>learn</u> them, and in the course of it
you learn their spelling systems, whatever they may be.<br>
<br>
We are not talking about exotic new inventions here, just about slight tweaking
to regularize the existing spelling and to do the language justice.<br>
<br>
I did say that the <i>New Sass</i> people at least made an effort by providing explanatory
forms in parenthesis, and I credited them gratefully.<br><br></span></p><div style="margin-left: 40px;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-family: Arial; color: rgb(0, 0, 153);">How abowt
teeching the English e propa sistem of raiting first, one that aims for
consistency and integrity, one that is not based on a way of writing that
became obsolete with the Tudor sound shift. Mait meyke lerning English a lot
esier for all the world. And good lack for teeching that sistem in Scatland. </span><br><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-family: Arial;"></span></div><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-family: Arial;"><br>
</span><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8"><meta name="ProgId" content="Word.Document"><meta name="Generator" content="Microsoft Word 11"><meta name="Originator" content="Microsoft Word 11"><link rel="File-List" href="file:///C:%5CDOCUME%7E1%5Crhahn%5CLocal%20Settings%5CTemp%5Cmsohtml1%5C01%5Cclip_filelist.xml"><style>
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</p><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-family: Arial;">This seems like
another curve ball. It has very little to do with the price of tea in China. English orthography is another can of worms with its own history, problems and arguments. At least, everyone recognizes and respects English as a language in its own right, enough so to not want to take orthographic hints from other languages to make English more understandable.</span></p>
<span style="font-size: 11pt; font-family: Arial;"><br>
Kumpelmenten,<br>
Reinhard/Ron</span><p></p>