[Lexicog] variant words

[Allens]

Hi there,

I have only recently started subscribing to this list, and have only
recently started serious work on a bilingual dictionary. I am sure you can
help me with my question. The dictionary I am working on will be heavily
used in a literacy project. Newly literate readers will depend on the
dictionary for knowing how to spell words. So I am wondering how to handle
variants. These might be dialect variants. The dictionary is based on the
central dialect of this language (Bai, spoken in south west China), but
within that dialect there are many sub-dialects, some of which are spoken
very close to the town the writing system is based on. Should we include any
variants which are in common use, and would be recognised as 'the way they
speak in such and such a village'? On the one hand I think it would be
confusing as people would want then want to also write that way, on the
other hand, if the variant pointed to the standard spelling, maybe people
would learn the correct spelling through the cross reference.

Bryan

-----Original Message-----
From: lexicographylist at yahoogroups.com
[mailto:lexicographylist at yahoogroups.com]
Sent: 22 October 2004 03:41
To: lexicographylist at yahoogroups.com
Subject: [Lexicog] Digest Number 228



There is 1 message in this issue.

Topics in this digest:

      1. draining
           From: "Chaz and Helga Mortensen" <chaz_mortensen at sil.org>


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Message: 1
   Date: Wed, 20 Oct 2004 07:47:45 -0500
   From: "Chaz and Helga Mortensen" <chaz_mortensen at sil.org>
Subject: draining

John,

In Northern Embera an earthquake is a "house-shaking". To say "there was an
earthquake", you say "a house-shaking went". Now where it goes to and where
it comes from I don't know..........

-Chaz

----- Original Message -----
From: "John Roberts" <dr_john_roberts at sil.org>
To: <lexicographylist at yahoogroups.com>
Sent: Tuesday, October 19, 2004 1:36 PM>
> In Amele (PNG) to say 'an earthquake happened' you say *mim nen* which
means
> 'the earthquake came down (from above)'. Does anyone else have earthquakes
> coming down from the sky? The Gauls were another people that were always
> afraid of the sky falling on their heads.
>
> John Roberts




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