moyogo
commented
1 year ago In short, the capital-Σ form is more historical as it was used in orthographies that now use the digraph sh. More recent reference documents of other orthographies using the letter use the large-ʃ form. The rationale for large-ʃ form is that is is used in reference documents of languages using the letter, whereas the capital-Σ form was used in reference documents of languages that do not use the letter anymore. Additionaly the large-ʃ form is recognizable.
The Σ capital form is used in:
- the 1927 Africa Alphabet
- the Ga orthography from the 1930s until 1975 when ʃ was replaced by the digraph sh
- Mali’s Alphabets et règles d’orthographes des langues nationales [Mali national languages alphabets and orthography] used the letter for Bambara from 1982 until it was replaced by the digraph sh in the 1991 revision.
The large-ʃ capital form is used in:
- the 1978 edition of the African Reference Alphabet; note the alphabet was initially lowercase-only and capitals were added before publication; 1982 revision by Mann and Dalby has only lowercase letters.
- the Alphabet scientifique des langues du Gabon [Scientific Alphabet of Gabon languages] published in 1989 has both uppercase and lowercase.
- in the 2015 edition of the Alphabet national guinéen [Guinean National Alphabet] for the Bassari [bsc] orthography; the 1989 edition does not seem to have used capitals.
For the Gabonese languages, the ASG is mostly intended for and used in scholarly works. Linguistic journal articles and some dictionaries do use it. Out of the languages described in the document the letter may be used in Bekwel [bkw], Fang Ntumu and Fang Nzaman [fan], Lembaama [mbm], Omenye Mpoŋwɛ and Omenye Ŋkomi [mye], Ʃake [sak], Ʃiwa [N/A], Yinzɛbi [nzb]. In practice, alphabets of some of those language use by some authors do not seem to use ʃ, for example the orthography used in the Yinzɛbi Bible translation does not use ʃ. There is also the alphabet of the Orthographe des langues du Gabon [Gabon language orthography] from 1999 which uses digraphs and underlined letters instead of Latin extended letters.
For Guinean languages, it’s difficult to assess to what extent the national alphabet or in particular this letter is used. A few documents I was able to verify do use the alphabet. But it doesn’t look that it has been used to the same extent as national alphabet in other countries.
NeilSureshPatel
EbenSorkin
Hi Amit & Denis!
In the new website, you say that we should use a different shape for the default capital Esh than Denis settled on with me earlier.
I was wondering if this is a soft recommendation ( maybe because the localization offered is itself at least very clear ) or if it has become very clear recently that this is the way to go. As far as I understand it, this is what happened with capital Eng form changing and the old form being turned into a localized version. If that's the case, did that clarity come from population size like it did with Eng?