At 11:32 AM 10/17/03, John.Howell wrote: >The whole point--which nobody has actually stated, I think--is that >every language has its own rules for hyphenation, and applying rules >from English, or Latin, or any other language simply isn't valid. >And of course all rules have exceptions. Do not dictionaries in >other languages than English give syllable breaks for specific words?
I think most do not. I have Petit Robert in French and Zingarelli in Italian, and neither of these show word divisions. I've never felt any need for them in Italian, since spelling is so logical and the rules are so easy to apply. Personally, I find Italian much easier to hyphenate than English (my native language), where I sometimes have to puzzle a bit over a break for a short syllable at either end of a word. Even in English, most dictionaries only show breaks that would be used for hyphenation in ordinary text, so it won't tell you what to do with a word like, say, "very". The Chicago Manual of Style offers guidelines for word division in several languages (French, German, Italian, Spanish, Latin, classical Greek, transliterated Russian, and Polish). Most of them, however, are sketchy and only useful as a general guideline rather than a comprehensive rule. Another point not yet mentioned is that there are differences between American and British standards for word division in English. The British tradition tends to favor derivation over pronunciation (eg, "astro-nomy" vs "astron-omy"), though my sense is that the American style is slowly gaining ground over the British. There are also certain words where differences in pronunciation justify differences in hyphenation (eg, "pro-gress" vs "prog-ress"). mdl _______________________________________________ Finale mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
