questioning allograph
DESCRIPTION
Be going to present at a private group, 12 Dec, 2012. Subjected to change without prior notice until read.TRANSCRIPT
Questioning AllographEvidence from Old Hiragana
Kazuhiro OkadaHokkaido University
TwiFULL SLiM #
Agenda
• Reviewing a theory of grapheme–allograph structure in detail
• Examining the theory with the character structure of Old Hiragana
• Introducing grapheme class to clarify the responsibilities for grapheme and allograph
2
On Some Terms (Rogers )
• An is a member of a grapheme, which is not contrastive to the other allographs
• A is a contrastive unit in a writing system
3
On Some Terms (Rogers )
• A is a system for graphically representing the utterances of a language
• A is a general term for a writing system without regard for its structural nature
4
What is Allograph?
• A and a are allographs of the grapheme A in that replacing them does not alter the meaning of the word, as calm and cAlm, except oddness
• Note: Studies of Chinese characters treat allograph as relation of graphemes which descend from the same origin, despite a description found in Rogers ()
5
Allograph Class
• Allographs constitute classes over grapheme (Rogers, )
• CAPITAL and minuscule
• Sans-serif and serif
• Roman, Bold and Italic
• Gill Sans and Avenir and so on…
6
Grapheme and Phoneme
• Grapheme, as the name suggests, is defined parallel to phoneme, and allograph to allophone
• It is also referred to morpheme/allomorph, hereafter omitted
• Note that Rogers () does not insist that writing system is completely parallel to phonology
7
Grapheme and Phoneme
• Minimal pair plays a central role in determining a phoneme, but similarity is also convincing
• Conversely grapheme is solely determined by usage, not by graphical likeness
• No outsiders would understand that γ and Γ are of the same grapheme
8
A HoTEL Experiment
• To a certain extent, to know a writing system is to know allograph relations
• In the brain we process a written word without regard to allograph variation
• Consequently nonetheless HoTEL and hotel are visually different we can read
both /həʊˈtɛl/ (Dehaene, )
9
A HoTEL Experiment
• ‘Wait! Can we assume that both HoTEL and hotel suffer same process?’
• That both HoTEL and hotel go the same process has little implication to the structure of grapheme
• For instance it is not obvious that either H and h are unified then processed or separately processed
10
A HoTEL Experiment
• No one will argue against allograph itself
• Still there is room for an argument against grapheme–allograph structure
• In other words, there is some doubt that linguistic contrast can fully capture a structure of a writing system
11
Contrastiveness Criterion
• Whether instances make a contrast is not so straightforward in the case of writing system
• colour and color
• beber and vivir (Spanish, b and v are not distinguished)
• Once contrast happened, it will guarantee the other contrastiveness in writing system
12
Contrastiveness Criterion
• Degree of difference made with each allograph class is not slight
• In Latin script, the case class seems the most differentiated class
• No other classes make a variation like Q and q, R and r
13
Contrastiveness Criterion
• Supposed that both the case distinction and stylistic differences make up equally allograph classes, how to illustrate the speciality of the case class?
• They do, actually, make a contrast, don’t they?
• There seems a need to elaborate the criterion
14
Contrastiveness in Modern Latin
• Contemporary Latin writing system, which is not authorised one, some distinguish vowel i, u from consonantal j /j/, v /w/, the others not (partial application is also found)
• Originally the writing system of Latin lacks these vowel/consonant distinction whose distributions are purely complimentary (Marotta, )
15
Contrastiveness in Modern Latin
• In the older writing system we neutralise the distinction in writing and decode in reading
• Practically those subtle differences ease distinctions over i, u and j, v, and let them be one time distinct graphemes, the other time allographs
16
A Question
• What’s the contrastiveness in a writing system anyway?
17
Old Hiragana
• Used from around to
• Has over kanas for core morae (adopted from Sproat, )
• later fused into , but maintained ancient ‘category’ (Frellesvig, )
18
Old Hiragana
• Cursivised from Kanji, which was borrowed from Chinese writing system to represent Japanese morae
• Not closed system
• Hereafter ‘Kana’ refers to ‘Old Hiragana’
19
Kanji to Kana
• When Kanji (hàn zì in Chinese) was utilised to represent Japanese, there were mainly two ways:
• Borrowing its sound
• Utilising the first sound of correspondence Japanese word
• Both ways ignore what the word means
20
Kanji to Kana
• Most kana borrowed the sound
• In borrowing some simplification took place as Middle Chinese syllable structure is more complex than Old Japanese
• As a result large amount of homophonous application occurred
• /ka/ in Kojiki (): 迦加可珂賀何訶
21
Kanji to Kana
• In developing Kana the use by public servant give a direction
• Nearly ignored so-called seidaku distinction
• Consulted few Kanji for a core mora
• Tended to write cursively
22
Contrast of Kana
• Two level contrast shall be distinguished
• Mora level contrast (kana category)
• あ, い, う, え, お…
• Sub-mora level contrast
• /ha/: は, は, は, は…
23
Contrast of Kana
• Mora level contrast is no doubt contrastive
• Sub-mora level contrast is said to make no contrast
• Whether one writes かは or かは does not contribute to the representation of a word
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Contrast of Kana
• Non-contrastiveness does not immediately lead to the conclusion that they are allographs
• There is a possibility of distinction as they are mostly derived from different Kanji and also a degree of cursiveness differentiate the shape largely
25
Seidaku and Grapheme
• Sub-mora level contrast is not contrastive on core morae
• However Seidaku contrast is not mentioned
26
Seidaku and Grapheme
• As noted, Kana lacks distinction for seidaku
• Seidaku, which nowadays is a voiced/unvoiced contrast, was formerly contrast with prenasalisation (supposed to have changed gradually within Middle Japanese period)
27
Seidaku and Grapheme
• If mora level contrast is grapheme distinction in Kana, allographs, namely, sub-mora level contrast will be used freely over Seidaku
• If sub-mora level contrast make a contrast in usage of Seidaku even slightly, it shall include grapheme distinction, or even question grapheme/allograph structure
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A Case of f/b/p Distinction
• In Late Middle Japanese (–) current
/h/ was /ɸ/
• By a convention later transcribed as f
• /ɸ/ descended from /p/ in the environment of word-initial
• /w/ was for word-medial and final
29
A Case of f/b/p Distinction
• Dakuon for /p/ can be reconstructed as
/ᵐb/, which fused into /b/ no later than Late Middle Japanese
• After losing its place, however, [p] seemed to have remained as an allophone for the environment of such as geminate consonant and onomatopœia
30
A Case of f/b/p Distinction
• f/b/p share characters in writing
• By moraic nature they are combined with vowel
• は, ひ, ふ, へ, and ほ correspond to /fa/,
/fi/, /fu/, /fe/ and /fo/, respectively
• Do they, in fact, make no contrast?
31
Jesuit Mission Press in Japan
• Jesuit Province of Japan printed Japanese textbooks with movable type (–)
• Their publication includes in Latin script and in Japanese script
• Originally made by European hand, from they renewed their movable type on their own
32
Jesuit Mission Press in Japan
• They had used metal movable type, not wooden type, in order to recast same character again and again
• It is important that in which character it is written is very clearer than hand-written materials
33
f/b/p Distinction in Missionary Press
• Early Japanese script publication (EJ)
• Late Japanese script publication (LJ)
• EJ lacks a digraph for p; both have a digraph for b, but often omitted
• Examining more than two characters per a core mora
34
f/b/p Distinction in Missionary Press
• EJ (Okada, , modified)
• は(者, 波, 者゛, 八, 和/wa/)
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/fa/ /ba/ part. ba /pa/ /wa/ part. wa /Cw-/ Total
22 18 3 43
1 2 3
49 49 98
1 96 172 23 292
10 10
f/b/p Distinction in Missionary Press
• EJ (Okada, , modified)
• へ(部, 遍, 部゛, 衣/e/, 恵/e/)
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/fe/ /be/ /pe/ /e/ part. e total
79 9 88
9 6 9 6 30
130 1 131
4 4
28 28
f/b/p Distinction in Missionary Press
• LJ (Shirai, , modified)
• は(者, 八, 盤, 和/wa/, 王/wa/)
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/fa/ /ba/ part. ba /pa/ /wa/ part. wa Total
者
八
盤
和
王
13 10 60 21 8 112
26 45 137 208
1 1
17 17
1 1
f/b/p Distinction in Missionary Press
• Mora level distribution does not relate simply to phoneme
• Rather each character has their own relation
• 八 goes mostly to /ba/, or /wa/
• 者 goes to /fa/, /ba/, or /pa/
• 部 to /e/, 遍 to /fe/, /be/, or /pe/
38
Allograph in Missionary Press
• There was some unification before, both look alike:
• /fa/: 八 A B
• /fe/: 部 A B
39
Allograph in Missionary Press
• Attestation of 部B is too scarce ( times)
• Both 八A () and 八B () relate to
/wa/ in the environment of word-medial and final
40
Allograph in Missionary Press
• Attestation of 八 confirms that they did not
receive distinction
• 部 implies that the difference was so subtle
as hardly to work independently
• Allograph in Kana has such a difficulty in distinguishing them in shape and usage
41
Theoretical Implication
• What we called mora level contrast so far is rather weak category regarding core morae
• The fact that some sub-mora level contrasts have unique relation to phoneme shows their independency in the writing system and may name them graphemes
42
Theoretical Implication
• In sub-mora level contrast, shape unlikeness is a source of distinction
• Unique sound relation in some of them shows every shape unlikeness has a potence to have it
• Therefore sub-mora level contrast is a graphemic level difference
43
Theoretical Implication
• Mora level contrast is more abstract than grapheme
• To generalise it can be named as grapheme class
44
Theoretical Implication
• Graphemes of Kana also gives a ground for dividing capital and minuscule into separate graphemes
• Introducing grapheme class makes contrastiveness criterion weaken than Rogers ()
• This alternate intends to limit allograph to stylistic one
45
Conclusion
• By introducing grapheme class responsibilities for grapheme and allograph become lighter
• Old Hiragana is a good example to present a grapheme class–grapheme–allograph structure
46
Conclusion
• A is a weak category which comprises similar sound graphemes
• A is a unit which has independence in identification and sound correspondence
• An is what is subjected to parent grapheme
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Literature
• Dehaene, S. (). Reading in the brain: The science and evolution of a human invention. New York: Viking
• Frellesvig, B. (). A history of the Japanese language. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
• Marotta, G. (). The Latin syllable. Hulst, H. & Ritter, N. (eds.) The syllable: Views and facts. Berlin & New York: Mouton de Gruyter
• Okada, K. (). A development of Kana movable type by Jesuit mission press in
Japan: With special reference to On Baptism and Preparation for Death (日本イエズス会版における日本語活字の開発: 『病者を扶くる心得』の仮名活字組版から). Unpublished ms. [in Japanese]
• Rogers, H. (). Writing systems: A linguistic approach. Malden, MA: Blackwell
• Shirai, J. (). Kana glyph usage in Jesuit Mission Press (キリシタン版の仮名文字遣). Kuntengo to Kunten-shiryō [in Japanese]
• Sproat, R. (). A computational theory of writing systems. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
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