Re: Dotless J with stroke.

From: John Hudson (john@tiro.ca)
Date: Fri Dec 07 2007 - 11:15:03 CST

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    Andreas Stötzner wrote:

    > 2. 025F is admittedly the basis for 0284, its top part being defined as
    > a “hook” but NOT as an “ascender”. “Hook” is a certain element which
    > occurs a couple of times in this range. So we are entitled to suppose
    > that all IPA’s hooks (blue cells, see att.) should match each other for
    > coherence. If than 0260, 029B and 02A0 feature hooks definitely
    > different from full-height crooked ascenders (e.g. 0253) than there is
    > no reason for dealing differently with 0284 in that respect.

    But you are presuming that the names define the forms, but the IPA names were developed
    after the fact, to describe forms already in use. The character encoded as U+0284 has
    always had the form of a barred esh, originally made by inverting a hooked f. As far as
    I'm concerned, the name is irrelevant.

    Further, the problem I find with your proposed form is that it defies a natural stroke
    construction. Even given the artificial nature of many IPA inventions, the basic test of
    writing is whether it can be written, and how it is most naturally written. I think you
    have misanalysed the construction of the 'hooktop barred dotless j' and other hook
    letters, because the distinction between hook forms is not between ascending and
    non-ascending letters but between hooks flowing into or out of main vertical stems (as in
    b-hook, d-hook, but also p-hook and, yes, this dotless j-hook) and hooks attached to other
    features of the letter (as in c-hook). In the dotless j, you have a main vertical stem,
    and any treatment of the hook other than flowing into that stem breaks the natural stroke
    pattern of the written form.

    John Hudson

    -- 
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