03.06.10: Language : : Writing Chinese in Devanagari
It has been six weeks in Hangzhou, China. This has given me enough time to decipher the Mandarin language. Mainland China uses Simplified Chinese. Chinese cannot be transliterated but only transcribed. What makes Chinese so different are the following facts:
- There is no concept of vowels (a,e,i,o,u) or consontants. It's all about initials, finals and tones.
- The same character can correspond to two (or more) different sounds. For example, 言 can be transcribed as yán or yín or yàn
- The same sound can correspond to two (or more) different characters. For example, tā can be written as 他 or 她 or 踏
Here, I have come up with a scheme to pronounce Chinese as closely as possible by the Indian tongue. It's easy because Indian languages (say Hindi or Kannada) are "phonetic" -- we pronounce the way we write. One letter, one sound.
The rest of the article assumes that you have some knowledge of Pinyin, Devanagari, International Phonetic Alphabet, Vedic Accent, Sanskrit phonology and Mandarin phonology. Read on full article here !
Category: Languages Posted by: bdsatish
31.01.10: Language :: Catch up with News in Sanskrit
In this post, I'll introduce you to web resources that help you to catch up with the news in Sanskrit, free of cost, everyday.
1. All India Radio (AIR)
Since the 1980s, Indians are addicted to two things - the television and the radio, or more precisely, Doordarshan and Akashavani, as they were then called.If you think you are missing those good old times, here's some solace.The AIR has been broadcasting news in several languages everyday. You can subscribe to the RSS feed of Sanskrit news through this link:
http://sanskritdocuments.org/news/air_news.xml
I use Google Reader which neatly streams the MP3 right inside the browser. If youchoose to listen regularly, just register your name on this link. Of course, I am the 18-th on the list !You can find all previous archives and the news transcripts at Sanskrit Documents
2. Sudharma -- World's only Sanskrit Newspaper
Sudharma was started in 1970 by a Mysorean, Varadaraja Iyengar. As such, you'll find a lot of local news, in and around Bangalore.This newspaper is struggling for its existence. The least you can do is to spread awareness aboutthis to your friends. You can subscribe to its RSS feeds here:
http://feeds.feedburner.com/sanskritnews
Category: Languages Posted by: bdsatish
