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From: biep@cs.vu.nl (J. A. "Biep" Durieux)
Newsgroups: comp.std.internat,sci.lang
Subject: Re: Computers and human languages (was Re: What is a byte)
Message-ID: <864@klipper.cs.vu.nl>
Date: Wed, 31-Dec-69 18:59:59 EDT
Article-I.D.: klipper.864
Posted: Wed Dec 31 18:59:59 1969
Date-Received: Sat, 22-Aug-87 10:20:13 EDT
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Reply-To: biep@cs.vu.nl (J. A. "Biep" Durieux)
Organization: VU Informatica, Amsterdam
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Xref: mnetor comp.std.internat:135 sci.lang:1180

In article <8708171253.AA21033@ephemeral.ai.toronto.edu> lamy@ai.toronto.edu (Jean-Francois Lamy) writes:
>Just by curiosity, a quick scan of my brain seems to indicate that English
>would be the only European language not to use diacritical marks, digraphs,
>or extra letters. (? - I mean something like the Dutch "ij").

I do not completely understand what you mean by "extra letters", but the "ij"
is just the long "i" (not the way any of you foreigners pronounce it :-)).
The long "a" is written "aa", the long "e" "ee", "o" -> "oo", "u" -> "uu",
and "i" -> "ii". Now "ii" looks ugly, so the second "i" is drawn as to curl
under the first, and you have "ij" (Dutch typewriters have one key to print
it - is that what you mean by "extra letters"?

There having been a vowel shift in several parts of the Netherlands (some
people still pronounce "ij" as in "see" (but short)), most people pronounce
it what I think to be a unique way (I think there is no other language
with this sound): something between the sounds in "red" "wine". The sound
is clearly sliding (becoming a "y"-consonant, like "I"). Virtually the
same sound (in most of the Netherlands) as "ei".

But then, we have a lot of funny sounds in our language. Anybody knows a
language where the sound of "ui" exists? (Somewhat higher than the shifted
form of the vowel in "luck", and not to mix with the also present sound
"eu", which is like the sound in the German "schoen")
Kom kijken, er staat een kuiken in de keuken te koken!

P.S.: About extra letters: is the "$"-sign really the writing in one space
of "U" and "S"? So: "U.S. dollar" --> "$ dollar"
-- 
						Biep.  (biep@cs.vu.nl via mcvax)
			Hot girls like cool boys