Bill Poser, Wed, 5 Sep 2012 15:15:37 -0700: > It is also at least logically possible for there to be transliterations > from Semitic writing systems to non-Roman writing systems. I'm not aware of > such a thing, but one can imagine, for example, Russian work using a > Cyrillic-based transliteration. Even if such things are not in scholarly > use, I bet they are used in phrase books for travelers and that sort of > thing. I have used Japanese tourist guides and phrase books that > transliterate foreign languages into kana.
<light-rant> Fact is that, here around it is often not in "scholarly use" to use computer books in the native language. However, for Russia, then bookstores were thick of translated computer books last I visited one. So apparently the situation there is much better. It is also true that, thanks to "scholarly use", lots of English/American concepts and what not makes its way into Russian academia, including even in Russian philology. At least, so I hear from my "in-house" expert on the latter field (who prefers to teach her students Russian, Cyrillic "IPA" rather than the using IPA. But I don't think that former prime-minster Primakov studied Arabic using only "scholarly" Romanization - I imagine that he predominantly was helped with Cyrillification - also known as Russification. </light-rant> -- Leif H Silli
