Subject: Re: Hebrew writing system
Date: Fri, 10 May 2002 18:20:44 +0200
From: Tal Cohen <tal@forum2.org>
Organization: Forum 2
To: "M. Avinor" <avinor@hotmail.com>

[Avinor:] My point was that in a Hebrew enabled computer English is the only foreign language you can use. If you want to use your computer to also write French, German etc. you'll have Hebrew letters popping in. Thus, unobtrusively, you are guided to use only English as a second language.

[TC:] This was a technical limitation of older operating systems. It is incorrect for Windows 2000 and newer versions (i.e., for over 2 years for Windows systems) and for most GUI systems for Linux (Gnome, KDE, etc.) – in both cases you can have an arbitrary number of languages supported on your system. In both cases this is done with the help of the Unicode standard.

If you were interested in multiple-language support more than 2 years ago, solutions did exist. This is true for most desktop publishing systems of old, on the Macintosh as well as (I believe) on the PC; and for personal use, I can name:

* Dagesh, an a Israeli word-processor that supported any number of languages simultaneously since the days of Windows 3.1 (and it worked with any version of Windows 3.1, not just the Hebrew-supporting one);

* MultiWord, an American product very similar in features to Dagesh, also from about the same time (~10 years ago); and

* Nota Bene, an ancient word processor (I believe it was in use as far back as 20 years ago) that worked under DOS. It was a variant of the XyWrite word processor, very popular among scriptwriters; and it supported any number of languages.

I am sure there were other solutions that I am not aware of.

The point here is the general theme of my claims against the Karmeli writing:

::: Computing systems should be adapted to meet the needs of their human
::: users. Not the other way around.

This is a general rule that I believe in, not only in the context of Hebrew support, and as available computing power increases, it becomes more and more applicable. See how modern interfaces are much easier to use (at the price of more CPU power demands) than user interfaces of old; how voice recognition slowly becomes a standard part of computing, until it will be as mundane as any current graphical interface; how increased computing power is used to make computers more and more accessible to people with limitations (blind, deaf, and crippled people, for example); and so on.

The main problem of Hebrew text support is the requirement for bi-directional text support. Compared to other problems, this is a trivial one; and it was effectively solved, even if there are still places where the common solution can be further improved and polished. Moving to a whole new writing system (like the Karmeli system, or Prof. Ornan's system), just to make programmers' life easier, is an absurd notion.

It is true that not all systems support Hebrew perfectly. In particular, the software system in which I write this message (which is 3 years old) does not support Hebrew – but neither would it support the Karmeli system, so the purposed change is of little help here. I use this particular system for strange personal reasons; most Israelis long since use systems (such as Microsoft Outlook) that support any number of simultaneous languages, Hebrew included.

[Avinor:] I suspect that over the long range Israel will become a country which speaks mangled English in its own patois. I consider such a state quite sad. It's better to convert fully into English, as Forum 2 does as a matter of fact. Well then, why do it in Israel? The English on this Forum is excellent, why put up with the problems of Hebrew? What about a clean break and crossover?

[TC:] You mix two completely unrelated things. One point is Forum 2's web site. The other is the language spoken in Israel.

Forum 2's web-site is not intended for Israeli audiences only (for example, my personal homepage draws comments from people all over the world, ranging from Arabic speakers with English as their 2nd language to Swedish speakers with English as their 2nd language). Hence the use of English, which is the de-facto international language for the past few decades. The point is that people worldwide, who want to address the international crowd, do it in English – be it people from Arab countries, or people from Sweden. Does this imply that the Arab language, or Swedish, are at peril?

Few of us (like Dubi Kanengisser) include, in their Forum 2 homepages, Hebrew pages intended for Hebrew-speaking readers. When some of us wanted to address Israeli (or rather, Hebrew-speaking) audiences, rather than international ones, we have set up sites that use Hebrew – common, regular Hebrew using the common, regular Hebrew writing system, and there were no big technical problems with that. Two examples are the Ayal web site, created by Dubi and myself, and the Ben-Yehuda project, created by Asaf Bartov (also a Forum 2 member).

As for the language spoken in Israel: English being the de-facto international language, the powers-that-be in Israel decided that it would be wise to teach young Israeli pupils English as their 2nd language (and Arabic or French as their third, in many cases). Hence, a large portion of the Israeli population speaks English to some extent. Add to this the undeniable cultural influence of English-speaking nations (TV shows, movies, popular music etc.) and the fact that scientific and technical terms are often first introduced (worldwide) in English, and you'll find that many Israelis can, if they wish, and sometimes have to (even if they don't wish to) use English when they speak – either English alone (such as when quoting from a favorite movie - most people I know would quote the original English text rather than the Hebrew translation; this is not true when quoting, e.g., from French movies), or English terms to 'pepper' an otherwise Hebrew text (e.g., in technical discussions, when Hebrew terms are not yet commonly available).

Is the fact that modern Hebrew speech is peppered with English terms and phrases a sign of the impending demise of the Hebrew language, as you seem to imply? Hardly. The Russian spoken by aristocratic Russians a century ago was peppered with French (and, to a lesser extend, English). And they had less reason to do so than modern Hebrew speakers do (no movies to quote from...). Most of the well-known Russian authors spoke at the very least French, in addition to Russian. Did this signal the demise of the Russian language, or its associated culture? Not at all.

As a side note, you have probably noticed that most technical terms are, over time, replaced with Hebrew equivalents. As someone who teaches cutting-edge computing technologies, I am often surprised at how quickly and effectively the Hebrew terms take root. This includes both terms artificially created by the Hebrew Language Academy, and terms suggested (sometimes half-jokingly) by journalists and writers.

[Avinor:] Your English is very good, do you know to point Hebrew just as well? Israeli spoken Hebrew has already changed from Biblical Hebrew into Israeli Hebrew, which has some changes and simplifications that are quite distinct. For example: The definite article in Israeli spoken Hebrew is always "ha" and never "he", can such a high frequency difference be indicated in unpointed text? On the radio they try to keep the strict, old pronunciation, and it grates the modern ear; etc.

[TC:] The Hebrew language has, unquestionably, gone through major changes since it was re-introduced into daily use (by the original Ben-Yehuda project...). Your he/ha example is relatively minor. A few other examples I can name:

* The 'order' tense is slowly disappearing. Many people will ask their friend to sit down using 'teshev' rather than 'shev', for example.
* The defenite article, when added to compound phrases, is often added "incorrectly" – 'habeit-sefer' rather than 'beit-hasefer'.
* The single first-person future tense is getting lost: 'ani yeshev' rather than 'ani eshev'.
* And a new trend I've noticed recently, and I'm not sure if it is a temporary problem or a change that will slowly take over the language: The pronunciation of the letter 'heh' is disappearing, and it is now commonly pronounced just like 'alef'. This is not unlike what happened to the letter 'ain', but 'ain' was originally a guttural sound, which was alien to Israelis of European origin; the 'heh' sound is common to most languages.

Does this mean the impending doom of the Hebrew language? Hardly so. It should be noted that I'm not a linguist, but as linguists go, I side with the descriptivists, not the prescriptivists. Languages change. It is a perfectly natural trend. The English language changed just as well. I'm not talking about Beowulf here, which most English speakers cannot comprehend (compare this to the Bible, which can be understood – if sometimes with difficulty – by Hebrew speakers). I'm talking about much shorter-range changes. Shakespearean English, or the English of King James's Bible, are still English, and will be understood by modern English speakers, but they are radically different from modern English. Did these changes in the English language imply any disaster? And the language keeps on changing; splitting infinitives was only recently "accepted" by the editors of the Oxford English Dictionary as "proper" English. Other languages change, too; in fact, *only languages that are not used do not change*. I would guess that the spoken Latin of today, for example, is practically identical to that of a century ago...

The author Adam Baruch (who publishes the weekly column 'Shishi' in Ma'ariv) claims that, in fact, there are currently two spoken variants of Hebrew: regular Hebrew ('ivrit') and Jewish ('yehudit'), the language spoken by religious crowds in Israel. True, the languages are very similar, and speakers of one can clearly understand speakers of the other, except in occasional minor nuances; but nonetheless they represent, Baruch claims, two different dialects. This is not unlike the difference you speak of between modern Hebrew and Biblical one. Now, pray tell, how is this different from British English vs. American English – two dialects of the same language? They say that the UK and the USA are "two countries separated by a common language".

[Avinor:] Well, I am not satisfied with the present state of things, and I sense dark forebodings for the future. You seem to be rather comfortable with the present development.

[TC:] I can understand how some of the changes in the language bother you. The changes I've listed above in modern Hebrew bother me, too. But they are natural trends, and there is little sense in fighting them – or fearing them, as you seem to do.

And still, I do not understand how ANY of this has to do with your suggested writing system. If the Karmeli system (or any Latinized system) was accepted as a standard a hundred years ago, would that mean that these changes would not have occurred? Would Hebrew be less affected by English terms and phrases in such cases? Quite the contrary, I believe! The lack of clear visual distinction between Hebrew text and English one would have made the 'leakage' of English into Hebrew much easier, and in particular, your fears about a "clean break and crossover" would have been much more realistic.

[Avinor:] Well, to each his own,

Michael.

[TC:]
--
Regards, [etc.]

The Karmeli alphabet has ten vowels, five regular letters (a,e,u,i,o) and five short letters(á, é, ú, í, ó)
Which are short (hátufot)
So I write: lé tmissa
You can write :lí tmissa - too, if you like. This is still a fluid matter. Is it best to use only a single form of these letters, or not. In spoken Hebrew I hear the tendency to use only one form (é)and not: bé,bí,bó (bó óniya)

It is still a moot point.

Eyla'th.

Yes, I understood that; I asked about you way of speaking Arabic.