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Kazakhstan Is Changing Its Alphabet From Cyrillic To Latin-Based Style Favored By the West (bbc.com)
An anonymous reader quotes a report from the BBC: The Central Asian nation of Kazakhstan is changing its alphabet from Cyrillic script to the Latin-based style favored by the West. The change, announced on a blustery Tuesday morning in mid-February, was small but significant -- and it elicited a big response. The government signed off on a new alphabet, based on a Latin script instead of Kazakhstan's current use of Cyrillic, in October. But it has faced vocal criticism from the population -- a rare occurrence in this nominally democratic country ruled by Nazarbayev's iron fist for almost three decades. In this first version of the new alphabet, apostrophes were used to depict sounds specific to the Kazakh tongue, prompting critics to call it "ugly." The second variation, which Kaipiyev liked better, makes use of acute accents above the extra letters. So, for example, the Republic of Kazakhstan, which would in the first version have been Qazaqstan Respy'bli'kasy, is now Qazaqstan Respyblikasy, removing the apostrophes.
The BBC article goes on to explain the economics of such a change, citing a restuarant owner that marketed his business using the first version of the alphabet. "All his marketing materials, the labelling on napkin holders and menus, and even the massive sign outside the building will have to be replaced," reports the BBC. "In his attempt to get ahead by launching in the new alphabet, [the owner] had not predicted that the government would revise it. He thinks it will cost about $3,000 to change the spelling of the name on everything to the new version, Sabiz." The full transition to the Latin-based script is expected to be completed by 2025, impacting this owner and many other small business owners.
Only thing I can think of that comes close is simplification of written Chinese under Mao, but even that wasn't as radical as this. (During the Cultural Revolution, the leftists wanted to switch to a Latin alphabet, but even Mao couldn't make that happen.)
Il n'y a pas de Planet B.
Such a switch could result in a loss of various folklore in Kazakhstan centering on the shapes and percieved symbology of the Cryllic alphabet. Also such a change seems unecessisary and wasteful of resources, it's not like those books and letters will rewrite themselves.
It seems like they plan on enforcing it on everyone somehow, as opposed to having it affect only the government or public signage (a la bilingual signs), otherwise why would that businessman bother with the change at all?
Huh? Spanish and English both employ the Latin alphabet.
The Kazakhs are a Turkic people who traditionally used the Arabic writing system. Cyrillic writing was imposed on their very non-Slavic language only relatively recently (ca 1940 IIRC).
Il n'y a pas de Planet B.
By your reasoning, Kazakhstan should also revert to Arabic script.
And your complaint about Turkish letters having diacritics and/or different sounds than they do in other languages is just silly. Exactly the same things are true of any other language using the Latin alphabet.
Il n'y a pas de Planet B.
The whole idea is to leave the past behind. Turkey before Ataturk was a static, backwards culture. Ataturk brought Turkey into the modern age, with women's rights, mandatory public schools, suppression of religion, and all that good stuff. If the people had still been able to read the old texts, there would have been more resistance to feminism and other progressive ideologies.
Ataturk was a tremendously positive secular influence on Turkey, which lasted almost a century until Western powers insisted on elections, which to nobody's surprise (except the Western powers) elected an Islamist government. Now Turkey is looking to the past instead of progressing to the future.
Shutting down free speech with violence isn't fighting fascism. It IS fascism!
As a Slavic person (not from Poland) I can say that you are wrong. I can presume that you are coming from a country which has some kind of Germanic type language as primary (probably English). Because the problem of heteronyms like "tear (in the eye)" and "tear (rip)" doesn't exist in most Slavic languages. Use of additional phonemes makes them easier to read aloud, and it enlarges the western alphabet by just a bit. In my country W, X an Y are not even used in a standard language.
And we shouldn't forget the umlauts of the Germans, diacritics of the French. What are they if not new letters?
yes you should ban non metric sign posting, measurements in purchased products etc. sadly the only way to get out of archaic habits is to ban it, similiar to witch burning, dueling, slavery etc. expecting people to change just because what they are doing is stupid is never enough to create change. The part I find so amusing is for a country that trumpets its independence movement and forward thinking and yet clings tightly to a relic of the british empire.
Even the first compendium of Turkic languages, Kashgari's Diwan Lughat Al Turk, completed in 1074 C.E., cannot be read today by a learned Turk. Only academics versed in the Osmanli script can.
Same could be said of Old English from the same period despite using largely the same alphabet (eth and thorn not withstanding).
SJW n. One who posts facts.
This sounds like a huge undertaking, and seems to be a smart move but it is daunting to think of the effort involved in changing a national alphabet. I am not sure I've ever heard of such an effort before, anyone else ??
Meh. Sounds much easier than switching the US to metric!