seriously.' (Florian Coulmas, Writing Systems, CUP 2003, p.16.) 'written language
is a product of linguistic awareness, the objectification of spoken language.
LI2252 Writing Systems
Writing Systems — Dismissals and Definitions ‘Writing is not language, but merely a way of recording language by means of visible marks.’ (Leonard Bloomfield: Language, Allen & Unwin 1935, p.20 [first published 1933].) ‘The written forms are secondary symbols of the spoken ones — symbols of symbols’. (Edward Sapir, Language, Hart-Davis 1963, p.20 [first published 1921].) ‘the traditional grammarian tended to assume that the spoken language is inferior to and in some sense dependent upon the standard written language. In conscious opposition to this view, the contemporary linguist maintains (though with certain important qualifications which we shall introduce presently) that the spoken language is primary and that writing is essentially a means of representing speech in another medium.’ (John Lyons: Introduction to Theoretical Linguistics, CUP 1968, pp. 38 & 40.) ‘there are alternatives to the received opinion that writing is but an imperfect, distorted and hence misleading representation of speech, which deserve to be taken seriously.’ (Florian Coulmas, Writing Systems, CUP 2003, p.16.) ‘written language is a product of linguistic awareness, the objectification of spoken language. Any orthography must therefore involve a linguistic theory.’ (Mark Aronoff, in Language 61, 1985, p. 28) *** ‘Writing is clearly a system of human intercommunication by means of conventional visible marks’. (I.J. Gelb, A Study of Writing, University of Chicago Press, 2nd edn, 1963, p.12.) writing = ‘the use of graphic marks to represent specific linguistic utterances.’ (Henry Rogers: Writing Systems, Blackwell 2005, p.2) ‘I shall use the terms script, writing-system, or orthography to refer to a given set of written marks together with a particular set of conventions for their use.’ (Geoffrey Sampson: Writing Systems, Hutchinson 1985, p.19.)
LI2252 Writing Systems
‘A “script” is just a set of distinct marks used to represent the written form of one or more languages. Crucially, one can speak of a script without implying its use for a given language.… A writing system however is a script used to represent a particular language. Thus “writing system” implies ‘writing system for a given language.” We will use the terms “orthography” and “writing system” interchangeably.’ (Richard Sproat: A Computational Theory of Writing Systems, CUP 2000, p. 25) ‘Scripts are…graphical instantiations of writing systems. The alphabetic writing system is instantiated by several different scripts, such as the Roman alphabet, the Greek alphabet or the Russian alphabet.… we have a British English orthography and an American English orthography.’ (Florian Coulmas, The Writing Systems of the World, Blackwell 1989, p.37.) writing system = ‘the writing system of an individual language and … an abstract type of writing system.’ script = ‘the graphic form of the units of a writing system.’ orthography/spelling = ‘the standardized variety of a given, language-specific writing system.’ sign = basic functional unit of a writing system. signary = inventory of basic signs of a writing system. (Florian Coulmas, Writing Systems, CUP 2003, pp.35–6.) ‘grapheme. A contrastive unit in a writing system … The English alphabet has 26 graphemes’. (Henry Rogers: Writing Systems, Blackwell 2005, p. 292) ‘Writing systems are conventionalized techniques of segmenting linguistic utterances in such a way that the resulting units can be interpreted as linguistic constructs such as words, morphemes, syllables, phonemes, as well as higher-level units such as clauses and sentences. In contrast, transcription, ideally, focusses on sound alone disregarding grammar.’ (Florian Coulmas, Writing Systems, CUP 2003, p.31.)
