LL-L: "Scripts" (was "Orthography") LOWLANDS-L, 15.MAY.2000 (03) [E]

Tue May 16 04:38:24 UTC 2000

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From: Mike Adams [abrigon at yahoo.com]
Subject: Fraktur

I used to have a set of flash cards for German, that were in Fraktur, I
believe they dated from atleast after 1950 or 1960s, but lost them
someplace in the process of moving..

Mike

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From: Ludger Kaczmarek [L.Kaczmarek at t-online.de]
Subject: Orthography: 'Fraktur'

A minor addition to Ron's posting:
The Nazi government opposed to writing "Fraktur". In a
"Rundschreiben des Stabsleiters des Stellvertreters des Führers"
of 3.1.1941 Martin Bormann decreed that "Normalschrift"
(=Antiqua) had to be used instead of "gotische Schrift" (=Fraktur).
On all this see Herbert E. Brekle, "Schriftschicksale -
Schicksalsschriften", in: Beitraege zur Geschichte der
Sprachwissenschaft 9,1 (1999), pp.181-184. (Review of Silvia
Hartmann: Fraktur oder Antiqua. Der Schriftstreit von 1881 bis
1941, Frankfurt a.M.: Lang 1998, 438 S. (Theorie und Vermittlung
der Sprache, 28), ISBN 3-631-33050-2.

Regards,
Ludger

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From: john feather [johnfeather at sceptic1.freeserve.co.uk]
Subject: Orthography

Ron

You wrote:

> In the post-war era, Fraktur was only taught in some schools, and then
only for a short period and for reading purposes (rarely for writing
purposes).  I was taught it, and I am glad it was, because I can read it
without any problem, although my primary type was Roman.  Later this was
discontinued in many schools with the result that most younger
people cannot read old books.<

I find it hard to understand why the printed and handwriting versions of
"Fraktur" are being lumped together, because they are so different, and I
find it difficult to believe that "younger people cannot read old books".
The style is still used in newspaper mastheads, inn-signs and suchlike so
it's not totally unfamiliar, but I agree that the dense printing of older
books (perhaps produced when paper was expensive) can be rather
off-putting.
If you said "most young people will use any excuse not to read" I would
find
it easier to agree.

I started to learn German in 1951. The textbooks were from the "Deutsches
Leben" series which as far as I remember used Fraktur for the German right
from Vol 1. They originated, I think, in the 1930s. Later editions switched

to Roman. The handwriting (in a previous communication I called it
"deutsche
Handschrift" but the proper name may be "deutsche Schrift") was only
introduced in an appendix to Vol 5 or 6, and I think there was an example
of
a letter written in it. I learned it for fun and can still rather
laboriously write it. On the other hand I can read the printed form without

any difficulty. For Lowlanders who may not have seen this handwriting it is

(in my opinion) more different from printing than hand-written Russian is
from printed Russian.

Perhaps I could raise a point about American handwriting. American schools
teach a hand which is much "rounder" than any normally used in England.
From
my observation, American women generally retain this style much more
closely
than men do. I don't think I can detect that handwriting is a woman's if
she
was educated in England, though I might make a guess that an almost
illegible piece was written by a man, but I would bet small sums of money
on
the sex of an American writer, even if there weren't any little hearts
instead of dots over the I's. Has any other Lowlander made similar
observations about English or any other of the Lowland languages?

PS. "Orthography" really means "spelling".

John Feather johnfeather at sceptic1.freeserve.co.uk

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From: R. F. Hahn [sassisch at yahoo.com]
Subject: Scripts

John wrote:

> I find it hard to understand why the printed and handwriting versions of
> "Fraktur" are being lumped together, because they are so different, and I

> find it difficult to believe that "younger people cannot read old books".

I don't think it is all that much more different from the printed version
than Roman-based handwriting is from printed Roman scripts.  It's only that
you are so used to the latter that you don't question it as much.

Sure, laziness and unwillingness, perhaps also a rejection of the old, may
be contributing factors in the problems children have in learning Fraktur.
However, the script *is* quite different from Roman type, and not everyone
has the gift and motivation to learn this sort of thing as easily as you
and I do, John (and any script seems easy after having learned the Chinese
one).  I think many people these days mostly consider Fraktur a bother.  I
imagine it is much harder than learning to read and write Irish with
semi-uncial type.   It does not exactly help matters that there are a final
and a non-final version of the "s" in "Gothic" (including "Fraktur") and
that the non-final version looks much like an "f".

Regards,

Reinhard/Ron

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