[lg policy] Fwd: [gbinfitt] Tamil Nukta Sign

Sat Jan 23 15:15:16 UTC 2016

 ForwardedFrom: 'K. Kalyanasundaram' kalyan.geo at yahoo.com [gbinfitt] <
gbinfitt at yahoogroups.com>
Date: Sat, Jan 23, 2016 at 3:35 AM

Re: Minority languages of India
To: "gbinfitt at yahoogroups.com" <gbinfitt at yahoogroups.com>

Dear friends:

There are many "minority" languages in use in India for decades The Indian
Constitution does recognize them by inclusion in the "non-scheduled"
languages list.
There is a very nice article by Dr. Rajeswari Pandharipande of the
University
of Illinois, Urbana, USA on "minority languages of India" worth careful
study
by all of us:
http://www.unesco.org/most/vl4n2pandhari.pdf

As per the official Govt of India Census reports, Tamilnadu has many
minority languages/dialects ((Merriam Dict: dialect is a regional variety
of language
distinguished by features of vocabulary, grammar, and pronunciation from
other
regional varieties and constituting together with them a single language).
Article 29(1) of the Indian Constitution states: “Any section of the
citizens
residing in the territory of India or any part thereof having a distinct
language,
script or culture of its own shall have the right to conserve the same.”
This
clearly guarantees the right of minorities to conserve their cultural as
well
as linguistic traditions. (Note the presence of the keyword "script")

As much as in Tamil, there is a growing interest in every minority language
group to preserve and propagate their cultural heritage through all means in
the current computer/electronic/virtual era. For dialects that do not have a
script of their own, traditional practice has been to "transliterate" using
the
script of some other language. Western scholars for centuries wrote texts
of Dravidian languages including Tamil using such transliteration schemes.
Diacritical markers are routinely used to make up for any situation where
there is no direct one-to-one correspondance and to make up for any
phonetic
deficiencies. I am not sure if such attempts of "communication" one is
trying
to "pollute" the target language used in transliteration (as long as the
text is
clearly marked as transliteration).

With regard to the recent proposal to Unicode for insertion of the
diacritical
marker Nukta to accommodate Badaga language transliteration in Tamil,
Badaga is one of the minority language spoken by ca. 170,000 population
in Niligris/Ooty region of Tamilnadu. In the past, Badaga was written in the
transliterated form using Latin/Roman or Kannada script characters. In
recent years there have been attempts by one Anandhan Raju and Yogesh
Raj Kadasoley to design a new alphabet for Badaga. They have done this by
a combination of existing scripts and diacritical markers:
see http://badaga.co/language/badaga-script/
http://badaga-script.blogspot.ch/
<http://badaga-script.blogspot.ch/>
Time has come for the Govt of Tamilnadu to constitute a "minority languages
IT Implementation Commission" that can go into various aspects of the
aspirations of the minority communities of Tamilnadu and how best
their interests be served to digitally preserve and propagate their language
content and heritage. IMHO, simply because a language does not have a
script of its own, it is not fair to condemn that user community to forgo
and
forget about their language once and for all. Transliteration is the only
choice
for them and who should decide on what that target language be?
Unicode after all, has the supplementary plane and user-defined area for
such needs. Tamil Virtual Academy, as the IT nodal agency of the Govt.
of Tamilnadu has to urgently address this basic needs/aspirations of
minority communities.

Before someone screams "Tamil language traitors", I want to emphasise that
I have great love, affection and admiration for my mother tongue Tamil.
I share the same concern as others and do not want it to be polluted or
mutilated by insertion of exotic characters or diacritical markers. Tamil
language never used any diacritical markers and this situation should
remain for ever. A minority languages protection IT commission should
explore all possible options and make formal recommendations on how
these minority communicate should write down what they have been
talking and calling something as their "mother tongue". We all have our
mother and mother tongue comes with it. Financial or other situations
does not take away these fundamental notion of mother tongue ;-)

I do have some very good friends here who speak Badaga (a couple from
Ooty) and Thuli (a couple from KGF region of Karnataka). They are highly
qualified IT professionals (one with Ph.D in computer science) and they
are anxious to preserve their cultural heritage too, very much like us.

anbudan
Kalyan

On Friday, January 22, 2016 10:27 PM, "'N. Ganesan' naa.ganesan at gmail.com
[gbinfitt]" <gbinfitt at yahoogroups.com> wrote:

There is a proposal to add Tamil Nukta sign in BMP. I think diacritics like
these have
to be carefully evaluated and proposed.

Here is a document from members of INFITT,
http://www.unicode.org/L2/L2016/16030-response-to-tamil-nukda.pdf

I think for now, until a comprehensive review by experts, linguists, we
don't have to add
any new diacritics. This nukta will interact with Tamil PuLLi.

N. Ganesan

__._,_.___
------------------------------
Posted by: "K. Kalyanasundaram" <kalyan.geo at yahoo.com>
------------------------------
Reply via web post
<https://groups.yahoo.com/neo/groups/gbinfitt/conversations/messages/15702;_ylc=X3oDMTJxOXVpZmlwBF9TAzk3MzU5NzE0BGdycElkAzIyMzUzOTUEZ3Jwc3BJZAMxNzA1Mzc1NjE4BG1zZ0lkAzE1NzAyBHNlYwNmdHIEc2xrA3JwbHkEc3RpbWUDMTQ1MzUzODMxNw--?act=reply&messageNum=15702>
• Reply to sender
<kalyan.geo at yahoo.com?subject=Re%3A%20%5Bgbinfitt%5D%20Tamil%20Nukta%20Sign>
• Reply to group
<gbinfitt at yahoogroups.com?subject=Re%3A%20%5Bgbinfitt%5D%20Tamil%20Nukta%20Sign>
• Start a New Topic
<https://groups.yahoo.com/neo/groups/gbinfitt/conversations/newtopic;_ylc=X3oDMTJlNmRzdW9jBF9TAzk3MzU5NzE0BGdycElkAzIyMzUzOTUEZ3Jwc3BJZAMxNzA1Mzc1NjE4BHNlYwNmdHIEc2xrA250cGMEc3RpbWUDMTQ1MzUzODMxNw-->
• Messages in this topic
<https://groups.yahoo.com/neo/groups/gbinfitt/conversations/topics/15700;_ylc=X3oDMTM2Mmt0dGE5BF9TAzk3MzU5NzE0BGdycElkAzIyMzUzOTUEZ3Jwc3BJZAMxNzA1Mzc1NjE4BG1zZ0lkAzE1NzAyBHNlYwNmdHIEc2xrA3Z0cGMEc3RpbWUDMTQ1MzUzODMxNwR0cGNJZAMxNTcwMA-->
(2)
CONFIDENTIALITY NOTICE: This message (including any attachments) is
intended only for the use of the individual or INFITT Members and Mailing
list to whom it is addressed and contains information that is privileged
and confidential. As INFITT member you should not disclose, disseminate,
distribute, copy or use any of the information contained in this
transmission . Thank you.

WARNING:  Unauthorised dissemination, distribution, copying or reliance on
this communication is prohibited and may attract  liabilities
Visit Your Group
<https://groups.yahoo.com/neo/groups/gbinfitt/info;_ylc=X3oDMTJlZ2lhanMzBF9TAzk3MzU5NzE0BGdycElkAzIyMzUzOTUEZ3Jwc3BJZAMxNzA1Mzc1NjE4BHNlYwN2dGwEc2xrA3ZnaHAEc3RpbWUDMTQ1MzUzODMxNw-->

[image: Yahoo! Groups]
<https://groups.yahoo.com/neo;_ylc=X3oDMTJkamM1YzcxBF9TAzk3NDc2NTkwBGdycElkAzIyMzUzOTUEZ3Jwc3BJZAMxNzA1Mzc1NjE4BHNlYwNmdHIEc2xrA2dmcARzdGltZQMxNDUzNTM4MzE3>
• Privacy <https://info.yahoo.com/privacy/us/yahoo/groups/details.html> •
Unsubscribe <gbinfitt-unsubscribe at yahoogroups.com?subject=Unsubscribe> • Terms
of Use <https://info.yahoo.com/legal/us/yahoo/utos/terms/>

.

__,_._,___

-- 
=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+

 Harold F. Schiffman

Professor Emeritus of
 Dravidian Linguistics and Culture
Dept. of South Asia Studies
University of Pennsylvania
Philadelphia, PA 19104-6305

Phone:  (215) 898-7475
Fax:  (215) 573-2138

Email:  haroldfs at gmail.com
http://ccat.sas.upenn.edu/~haroldfs/

-------------------------------------------------
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://listserv.linguistlist.org/pipermail/lgpolicy-list/attachments/20160123/24eaa93e/attachment.htm>
-------------- next part --------------
_______________________________________________
This message came to you by way of the lgpolicy-list mailing list
lgpolicy-list at groups.sas.upenn.edu
To manage your subscription unsubscribe, or arrange digest format: https://groups.sas.upenn.edu/mailman/listinfo/lgpolicy-list