Pinyin news

High-ranking Kyrgyz officials are now reportedly saying that having Kyrgyzstan switch from the Cyrillic to the Roman alphabet would cost more money than the country can afford for the project at present. A later switch has not been ruled out.

sources:

• Kyrgyzstan will not shift to Latin alphabet, Kazakhstan Today, April 3, 2008
• В Кыргызстане пока не будут переходить на латиницу, Казахстан Сегодня (Kazakhstan Today), April 3, 2008
• Kyrgyzstan may join trend, adopt the Roman alphabet, Pinyin News, February 15, 2008

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Asel translates and summarizes remarks by Tashboo Jumagulov (Ташбоо Жумагулов), chairman of Kyrgyzstan’s state language commission, and Kyrgyz legislator Zainidin Kurmanov (Зайнидин Курманов) on the possibility of Kyrgyzstan switching from the Cyrillic to the Roman alphabet, which was recently discussed in the Kyrgyz parliament.

Both Jumagulov and Kurmanov seem to regard the switch as inevitable, though the latter voiced concern that the switch is done carefully and not rushed.

Kyrgyzstan is not to be confused with its neighbor, Kazakhstan, which has been seesawing on its own proposed switch to the Roman alphabet.

sources:

• Cyrillic vs Roman?, New Eurasia, February 14, 2008
• Зайнидин Курманов: «Если у других стран для перехода на латиницу есть необходимые условия: газ, нефть и свободные средства, то у нас ничего этого нет», Bishkek Press Club, February 14, 2008

On Kazakhstan’s proposed switch:

• Kazakhstan backtracks on move from Cyrillic to Roman alphabet?, Pinyin News, December 14, 2007
• Kazakhstan plans switch to Latin alphabet, Pinyin News, November 18, 2007

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Since earlier this month when I wrote a post on Dungan-language radio, I’ve discovered that Olli Salmi has some great Dungan material on his website, including a paper he wrote and a couple of stories in Dungan, including one he has translated into English.

• Central Asian Dungan as a Chinese Dialect
• Laohu Dai Dacaidi (”Tiger and the Woodchopper”): in English translation, and in Dungan in the Cyrillic alphabet and Dungan in the Roman alphabet
• Lixin: in Dungan in the Cyrillic alphabet and the Roman alphabet

And for lagniappe he offers “An Unofficial Practical Orthography for the Kiowa Language.”

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The state radio station of Kyrgyzstan offers a weekly broadcast in Dungan, which is basically a spin-off of northwestern Mandarin with lots of loan words from Persian, Arabic, and Russian. Of particular interest is that the language — which, permit me to note again, is basically Mandarin — is written with an alphabet (at present, one based on the Cyrillic alphabet). Chinese characters are of course not necessary and are not used. For details of the language, script, and people, see Implications of the Soviet Dungan Script for Chinese Language Reform, by Victor H. Mair, and Ethnolinguistic Notes on the Dungan, by Lisa E. Husmann and William S-Y. Wang (available online in Schriftfestschrift: Essays in Honor of John DeFrancis on His Eightieth Birthday, pp. 71-84).

The Dungan radio show is broadcast on Mondays between 6:35 and 7:05 p.m., Taipei time (4:35-5:05 a.m. U.S. central standard time). The show usually starts closer to 6:40 and ends about 7:03.

I made a recording of the latest broadcast (Dec. 31, 2007): Dungan radio broadcast (23 MB mp3).

[Here's another: Dungan radio broadcast, January 14, 2008 (23 MB mp3).]

I mainly understand words, not entire sentences, though my comprehension improves a little with repeated listenings.

This Kyrgyz radio station (Кыргызское радио) is available through at least three different Internet links:

1. www.radio.kg/RadioKTR.asx
2. www.radio.kg/RadioKTR.ram
3. mms://212.42.102.212:8554/RadioKTR, which is what you get by using the “Kyrgyz radio” link on the Web site for the State Broadcast Company of the Kyrgyz Republic

I have had the best luck with link no. 1.

I made the recording with Total Recorder for Windows and edited it in Audacity.

I’ve heard that Mac users can get good results with Audio Hijack.

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The president of Kazakhstan has announced that his country won’t “advance the transformation of the Kazakh alphabet from the Cyrillic to Latin one.”

That he did so in a meeting with the president of Turkey is puzzling, as this is not something likely to please the Turks.

On the other hand, not advancing is not necessarily the same thing as cancelling.

Here’s the full release from Kazakhstan’s news agency:

Kazakhstan’s President Nursultan Nazarbayev offered not to advance the transformation of the Kazakh alphabet from the Cyrillic to Latin one. The Head of the State announced about it upon the results of his talks with President of Turkey Abdullah Gul.

“For 70 years the Kazakhstanis read and wrote in Cyrillic. More than 100 nationalities live in our state. Thus we need stability and peace. We should be in no hurry in the issue of alphabet transformation”, Mr. Nazarbayev noted.

source: Kazakhstan should be in no hurry in Kazakh alphabet transformation to Latin: Nazarbayev, Kazinform, December 13, 2007

See earlier: Kazakhstan plans switch to Latin alphabet, Pinyin News, November 18, 2007

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Kazakhstan’s Ministry of Education and Science has followed up on suggestions from President Nursultan Nazarbayev by proposing a six-step plan to switch the country from the Cyrillic alphabet to the Latin one. The plan is based on a similar one used in Uzbekistan.

The plan for switching to Latin will have a five-year preparatory stage, during which the practicalities will be worked out. The next step will see publications being printed using the new alphabet, alongside the existing one for the initial changeover period, and the working-age population will be trained in using the new script. Teaching materials using Latin will be introduced into the country’s school system. The final phase will be the consolidation of Latin as the Kazakh language in Cyrillic fades from public use.

The switch is projected to cost US$300 million, though some expect the cost to be higher.

With the country awash with petrodollars from its booming energy sector, financing the switch should not be a problem. It remains to be seen, however, whether officials will retain the political will to press ahead, given that the measure could cause disruption at home, and seems likely to vex one of Kazakhstan’s key allies, Russia.

Along with the usual arguments for alphabet change, in particular promoting the country’s integration into the global economy, officials have argued that a Latin alphabet could help Kazakhstan forge a more cohesive national identity, moving it out from under Russia’s shadow.

“Switching the Kazakh alphabet to Latin means for Kazakhs changing the Soviet (colonial) identity, which still largely dominates the national consciousness, to a sovereign (Kazakh) identity,” the report stated. “Among the many arguments in favor of switching the Kazakh alphabet to Latin, boosting the national identity of the Kazakh people is the main and decisive one.”

This explicit statement marks a break with Kazakhstan’s earlier, low-key approach to discussing the switch to Latin. While Azerbaijan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan acted quickly after the 1991 Soviet collapse to embrace Latin script, Kazakhstan took a more cautious route: it did not want to alienate its large Russian-speaking population. In addition, officials felt that with the country in the grip of economic crisis in the early 1990s, changing the alphabet at that time was not a fiscally justifiable move.

The report pulls no punches in identifying the Cyrillic alphabet as being a major barrier to developing a Kazakh national identity: “It [Cyrillic] facilitated and facilitates the orientation of the Kazakh national consciousness towards the Russian language and Russian culture. As a result, Kazakh identity as such remains largely undefined. On this level, moving to Latin will make it possible to form a clearer national identity for Kazakhs.”

Another reason for the switch is linked to the representation of the sounds of the Kazakh language. “In many cases the phonetic nature of Kazakh is not shown according to Cyrillic script,” Professor Kobey Khusayn, director of the Academy of Sciences’ Institute of Linguistics, told EurasiaNet in an interview. As a result, he said, certain Kazakh sounds are not properly represented and this leads to difficulties with correct pronunciation. The introduction of Cyrillic in 1940 was “imposed from above” for ideological reasons, he added, with no consideration of how this alphabet suited the Kazakh language.

Kazinform, the state news agency, already issues news in both the Cyrillic and Latin scripts.

sources:

• Kazakhstan: moving forward with plan to replace Cyrillic with Latin alphabet, Eurasia, September 4, 2007
• Kazakhstan changing from Cyrillic to Latin alphabet, Kazinform, September 17, 2007
• Government adopting Latin Alphabet, American Chamber of Commerce in Kazakhstan, November 6, 2006
• About advantages of the Latin alphabet, academician Abduali Khaidari, Kazinform, April 16, 2004

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An article in the New York Times on the increasing popularity of English in Mongolia has the following interesting line:

Within a decade, Mongolia is expected to convert its written language to the Roman alphabet from Cyrillic characters.

another copy found here

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