Changes

:::::: The larger language (in terms of usage) of Chinese is not phonetic.  Also, I'm surprised to hear you claim that Hebrew is phonetic.  It traditionally lacked vowels!--[[User:Aschlafly|Andy Schlafly]] 15:47, 17 March 2009 (EDT)

:::::: The larger language (in terms of usage) of Chinese is not phonetic.  Also, I'm surprised to hear you claim that Hebrew is phonetic.  It traditionally lacked vowels!--[[User:Aschlafly|Andy Schlafly]] 15:47, 17 March 2009 (EDT)

(outdent) Denise, "sound-based written elements" = phonetic, rather than character representing ideas (as they do in Chinese)? In this sense English is phonetic - although I think there is a specific linguistic word for this; phonograms as opposed to ideograms ?  :) .  Even though a character (or sequence) may represent ultiple sounds depending on context (and which language it was adapted from), it still stands for sounds.  A phonetic written language is not the same as a phonetically consistent lexicon.  In this sense any language not written in ideograms is phonetic.[[User:LowKey|LowKey]] 19:58, 17 March 2009 (EDT)

(outdent) Denise, "sound-based written elements" = phonetic, rather than characters representing ideas (as they do in Chinese). In this sense English is phonetic - although I think there is a specific linguistic word for this; phonograms as opposed to ideograms ?  :) .  Even though a character (or sequence) may represent ultiple sounds depending on context (and which language it was adapted from), it still stands for sounds.  A phonetic written language is not the same as a phonetically consistent lexicon.  In this sense any language not written in ideograms is phonetic.  If I read it correctly, Andy was simply saying that as a phonetic (characters = sounds) language, English has advantages over ideogrammatic languages. [[User:LowKey|LowKey]] 19:58, 17 March 2009 (EDT)