Why no Cyrillic?

[Susan Bauckus]

thanks for this useful information even if it is a broken record. 

I'm not sure I follow the logic of your analogy completely: isn't it usually harder for students to write in transliteration than in cyrillic? and why would we think of allowing it under any circumstances? Transliteration does have its place, though, since anyone who writes papers is required to use it in their bibliographies and in-text references. And Russians use it sometimes in emails as well. I would argue that in some settings translation is indeed a part of literacy. 


If even your Cyrillic text comes through as gibberish(note your message below)the problem is clearly on my end, and I'll figure it out eventually, unless Earthlink sabotages me. 

Susie

> [Original Message]
> From: Richard Robin <rrobin at GWU.EDU>
> To: <SEELANGS at bama.ua.edu>
> Date: 2/4/2009 1:52:22 PM
> Subject: Re: [SEELANGS] Why no Cyrillic?
>
> *Дорогие SEELANGовцы!*
>
> I'm going to play my broken record over again. Cyrillic could travel well
> over e-mail platforms if everyone obeyed the well established rules (the
> short version: UTF-8). But there's always a way to use a recalcitrant
> institutional e-mail address and still send and receive Cyrillic. See
> http://www.gwu.edu/~slavic/gw-cyrillic/cyrilize.htm#cmail<http://www.gwu.edu/%7Eslavic/gw-cyrillic/cyrilize.htm#cmail>.
> (It explains the "UTF-8" as well as what to do when you get gibberish.)
>
> I realize that I sing this song a lot. But exchange of information in
> written Russian is a part of 21st Century Russian literacy. We don't allow
> our first-year students to hand in transliterated homework. We even insist
> that they learn Cyrillic script. (I don't know any Russian teacher who buys
> the *"I never use script in English!"* excuse.) Computer literacy is
> analogous.
>
> That said, I will be the first to admit that I sometimes accompany my
> Cyrillic to this list with transliteration (на всякий пожарный случай - na
> vsiakii pozharnyi sluchai) when I need to reach the widest audience.
>
> But I would hope that as a profession, we are striving towards overcoming
> the technical difficulties of Cyrillic in e-mail, both public and private,
> precisely because for those who deal in Russian, it is part of our
> communicative sphere.
>
> Sincerely,
> Richard Robin
>
> P.S. And I'll be glad to take a look at whatever e-mail from a Russian
> company didn't arrive with Cyrillic intact. That should never have happened
> and should be fixable. Or else I'm going to end up eating a lot of crow!
>
>
> > > Hi Everyone,
> > >
> > > I just subscribed to this list and I've noticed that _most_ people do
> > > not use Cyrillic when typing Russian, is there a reason for this?
> >
>
> -- 
> Richard M. Robin, Ph.D.
> Director Russian Language Program
> The George Washington University
> Washington, DC 20052
> 202-994-7081
> ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
> Russkiy tekst v UTF-8
>
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