[KS] Romanization issues followup

Brother Anthony ansonjae at sogang.ac.kr
Sun May 31 22:16:29 EDT 2009


I am very grateful to the scholars who have written to me in response to my question. I would be grateful for still more help, especially in dealing with the following 2 topics.
1. Many who accept the fundamentals of the new Government System recognize the confusion caused by -eo- and -eu- but it would be very helpful to know if anyone has proposed a convincing alternative way of representing those two vowels within the basic requirements of the new system (no diacritics)?
2. The main source of Korean dissatisfaction with MR was not the diacritics but the difficulty for Korean-speakers of understanding the differing uses of k / g, p / b, t / d, j / ch, r / l in initial / intervocalic / postconsonantal / final positions when the sounds are not only written using the same Korean sign, but are generally perceived by Koreans as being pronounced in the same way. Has this aspect of MR ever been challenged or reviewed?

It will be good for everyone if replies to these questions are addressed to me privately, not on-list.

In addition, I have been told that the Korea Foundation now requires publications it supports to use the current Korean Government system, and no other. Is this in fact the case and are there other official bodies which have adopted the same rule internationally? Since this is a matter of general concern, replies on-list might be helpful.

Brother Anthony
Sogang University, Seoul
http://hompi.sogang.ac.kr/anthony/








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