From: Frank Yung-Fong Tang (franktang@gmail.com)
Date: Wed Mar 23 2005 - 22:00:13 CST
On Tue, 22 Mar 2005 12:54:44 +1100, Alec Coupe <A.Coupe@latrobe.edu.au> wrote:
>
> Dear list members,
>
> I would like to know why 'lower case a' is converted to 'script a' when it
> is italicized in unicode.
I would like to know HOW do you "italicize" such characters in Unicode?
I don't remember Unicode define any method to 'italicize' any
character? or maybe my knowlege about Unicode is incomplete.
> This is a considerable hindrance in linguistic
> transcription because 'lower case a' represents Cardinal Vowel 4, while
> 'script a' represents Cardinal Vowel 5. For non-linguists, the difference is
> demonstrated by the Australian English versus the southern British English
> pronunciation of 'a' in 'father'.
> Since the majority of publishers require
> language examples to be differentiated from text by italic face, this
> potentially makes unicode a less than adequate font for linguistic
> description.
Unicode is for sure 'less than adequate font' for any text, because
Unicode itself is NOT A FONT. You may find some font (actually most of
the Window based TTF fonts) use Unicode based CMAP and some of them
support more characters than others. But in general, Unicode itself is
not a font. Maybe you are confused about some font have the string
'unicode' in it's name and the Unicode itself.
If that is the case, then the (italic) issue belong to the font, not Unicode.
>
> Dr Alec Coupe
> ARC Postdoctoral Fellow
> Linguistics Program
> La Trobe University
> Bundoora, Melbourne 3086
> Australia
>
> Tel. +61 3 9479-3297
> Fax +61 3 9479-1520
>
-- Frank Yung-Fong Tang 譚永鋒 Šýšţém Årçĥîţéçţ
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