Korean kugyol

From: Thomas Chan (thomas@atlas.datexx.com)
Date: Tue Nov 28 2000 - 01:34:02 EST


Hi all,

I'd like to ask what the rationale is for including Korean kugyol as a
subset of CJK Ideographs in Unicode, while Chinese bopomofo and Japanese
katakana are treated as distinct from their CJK Ideograph origins and
look-alikes.

Some Korean kugyol are marked in the UNIHAN.TXT file in the kDefinition
field by the word "kwukyel"--which is not a comprehensive list--some
others may be seen on pp. 127-128 of Ho-Min Sohn's _The Korean Language_
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999), in chapter six, "Writing
systems" (pp. 121-150).

  persephone:~> grep kwukyel unihan.txt

  U+4E06 kDefinition kwukyel
  U+4E37 kDefinition kwukyel
  U+4E4A kDefinition kwukyel
  U+4E5B kDefinition kwukyel
  U+4E65 kDefinition kwukyel
  U+4E87 kDefinition kwukyel hammer
  U+4EAA kDefinition kwukyel
  U+4EBD kDefinition kwukyel
  U+4ED2 kDefinition kwukyel
  U+516F kDefinition kwukyel
  U+536A kDefinition kwukyel
  U+53BC kDefinition kwukyel
  U+58ED kDefinition kwukyel
  U+6729 kDefinition kwukyel: rank, grade; wait; equal; "etc."
  U+6730 kDefinition kwukyel
  U+7F56 kDefinition kwukyel

Korean kugyol are derived in a similar manner as Chinese bopomofo and
Japanese katakana (and even some "simplified Chinese" characters), by
taking CJK Ideographs in part or whole, and perhaps modifying some strokes.

e.g., U+3105 BOPOMOFO LETTER B is a portion of bao1 U+5305 (and identical
to U+52F9); U+310C BOPOMOFO LETTER L is li4 U+529B with an extra "tick"
added, as is U+3116 BOPOMOFO LETTER R, which is ri4 U+65E5 with the
center stroke stylized; U+30A2 KATAKANA LETTER A is a portion (and
modification) of U+963F; U+30BF KATAKANA LETTER TA is a portion of
U+591A; U+30CC KATAKANA LETTER NU is a portion of U+5974.

A hypothetical "KUGYOL LETTER YA" would look like U+4E5B (listed above),
which is a portion of U+4E5F; a "KUGYOL LETTER HO" would look like U+4E37
(listed above), which is a portion (and modification) of U+7232; a
"KUGYOL LETTER NUN" would look like U+536A (listed above), which is a
portion (and modification) of U+96B1.

I can think of a few possible reasons why Chinese bopomofo and Japanese
katakana have been treated as distinct from CJK Ideographs, such as 1)
distinguished in source legacy CJK character sets: 2) not included in
Chinese and Japanese character dictionaries; 3) technically capable of
being used in the absence of CJK Ideographs as a complete script; 4) used
solely for phonetic value; 5) in widespread contemporary use, so
regular people care for the distincton.

#1 would seem to explain why Bopomofo and Katakana are distinguished in
Unicode, but not why Kugyol are not--has there ever been a legacy CJK
character set that included Kugyol, whether unified with CJK Ideographs
or not? #2 may be an argument for treating Kugyol as a subset of CJK
Ideographs--are kugyol considered "characters" in Korean dictionaries? #3
seems to also explain why Bopomofo and Katakana are distinguished as
separate scripts, but not why Kugyol were treated as a subset of CJK
Ideographs. #4 also would explain why Bopomofo and Katakana are
distinguished from CJK Ideographs, since Kugyol have non-phonetic
functions, but this doesn't explain why they aren't treated separately
like the Kanbun block, which are no more than minaturized CJK Ideographs
used for non-phonetic annotation (and which have no legacy source
separation rationale, either--as stated on p. 267 of TUS 3.0). #5 would
also seem to explain so, since Kugyol are not used today.

So, what exactly is Unicode's reason?

Incidently, if #4 is a valid reason, would it be possible for
Unicode to have hypothetical "MANYOOGANA LETTER KOORUI KI", "MANYOOGANA
LETTER KOORUI GI", "MANYOOGANA LETTER OTURUI KI", etc. that look exactly
like CJK Ideographs U+652F, U+4F0E, and U+5947, respectively, but are used
solely for phonetic value--just like katakana? Or do scholars of Old
Japanese not care for the distinction? (or are not politically
motivated to ask for it?)--see my #5 above. See p. 1529 of OONO Susumu,
et al., eds., _Iwanami Kogo Jiten_ (Tokyo: Iwanami, 1974) for more
examples (there are a few hundred).

Thomas Chan
tc31@cornell.edu



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