L2/04-187 Source: Rick McGowan Title: Phoenician Recommendation Date: June 7, 2004 There is a proposal before UTC for the encoding of the Phoenician script, L2/04-141R2. Deborah Anderson has discussed the encoding issues with a number of scholars and received feedback summarized in L2/04-177. I have read that paper, and the proposal, and much of the extended Phoenician discussion on the Unicode mail list. Like the encoding of Sumero-Akkadian Cuneiform, Phoenician encoding is perceived by some scholars as a useful pedagogical tool. Phoenician encoding has been construed by some to be harmful to Semitic studies, but the technical consequences of a separate encoding for those claiming significant impact are not at all severe: they can easily circumvent or avoid such problems merely by continuing to do exactly as they are currently doing, with square Hebrew and/or Latin transcriptions of their texts. An encoding of Phoenician useful for pedagogical purposes in one field does not significantly impact people working in other fields. While it is, in some fields, considered virtually identical to the Hebrew script in semantic content and thus redundant, it is also considered by others a clearly separate historically valid script. Objections to encoding frequently amount to failure to see particular usefulness of the encoding for their purposes, but often indicate that no particular harm would result. This is similar to the reactions of some Cuneiform scholars to the encoding of Cuneiform: essentially harmless and not necessarily useful in serious scholarship. Given four relevant scholars cited by Dr Anderson as being in favor of the proposal for pedagogical use, and no evidence being presented to bolster some claims of its harmfulness to Semitic studies, it is my view that the UTC should favor encoding of the Phoenician script.