On beyond alphabets

Abstract

Scripts are often borrowed or adapted for writing new languages, and the borrowing language usually includes sounds not found in the source language. Mechanisms for accommodating new sounds or phonotactics have not been studied as a group before, and a wide variety of cases is considered here. The techniques are found to fall into a limited number of categories: inventory reduction, inventory expansion, character combination, character alteration, character borrowing, systematic additions to characters, diacritics, and character simplification. Examples are presented from a range of script typologies.