Talk:

From Wiktionary, the free dictionary
Latest comment: 1 year ago by Exarchus in topic phonetic value?
Jump to navigation Jump to search

phonetic value?

[edit]

@Kirank567 According to the table at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ISO_15919, ऴ corresponds to Tamil ழ /ɻ/, and the dotless ळ corresponds to Tamil ள /ɭ/

My impression is that ळ is used for both retroflex lateral approximant and retroflex lateral flap. Exarchus (talk) 16:25, 4 June 2023 (UTC)Reply

I think I'll change the pronunciation back to /ɻ/ and correct the letters to ழ and ഴ, as there really is no other letter for transcribing these to Devanagari (they have corresponding locations in the Unicode table).
I'll also add /ɭ/ as pronunciation to the 'ळ'-page. It's not that uncommon to have more than one possible pronunciation: व can be /ʋ/, /w/ or /v/, and र can be different kinds of 'r' Exarchus (talk) 21:14, 4 June 2023 (UTC)Reply
The devnagari letter ष़ is used to transcribe the letter ഴ in Malayalam and Tamil. It's used by the southern railways to transcribe places like ambalapuzha(अंबलप्पुष़). Zelib143 (talk) 02:07, 5 June 2023 (UTC)Reply
the user(currently non-existing) who added that the transcription of 'ള' is 'ळ' didn't list any trustable source or reference.
These nuqta consonants are substituted in place unique Dravidian constants on the basis of the postion of the letter in the scrip, not on the basis of their phonetic value. The nuqta page you refered says that the devnagari न is pronounced as a dental-nasal and the ऩ as an alveolar nasal, since when ?!! It was simply assumed that र and ര are pronounced the same just because of their position in script is same, when in contrary റ and र are pronounced the same not र and ര. In the case of transliteration for 'ഴ', ष़ has been in use way before ऴ was introduced.
Since the proper ipa consonant for retroflex lateral flap doesn't exist many indo-aryan languages use the voiced retroflex approximant in its phonetic table for ळ (still) mistakenly due to the similar apperance the flap. And when ऴ was introduced, presumably their phonetic values were swaped and ळ became /ɭ/ and ऴ was considered /ɻ/. If not, then why would a new consonant for ɻ be introduced when a transcription already exists? Kirank567 (talk) 15:51, 6 June 2023 (UTC)Reply
Well, if ष़ is used for ഴ, then a lot of documentation and wikipages are wrong. Exarchus (talk) 20:50, 6 June 2023 (UTC)Reply
The academic romanization of ഴ is 'ḻ', but in practice people use 'zh'. Maybe this is similar to usage of ऴ and ष़ Exarchus (talk) 21:07, 6 June 2023 (UTC)Reply
Probably. Kirank567 (talk) 02:55, 7 June 2023 (UTC)Reply
You say റ and र are pronounced the same, but that just depends on how you tend to pronounce र, there is no fixed rule that र is [r] and not [ɾ]. You can think of it like र being the symbol for the phoneme /r/, which can be realised (depending on language and context) as [r], [ɾ] or even [ɽ] in Classical Sanskrit. (र can be [ɾ] in Hindi intervocally.) When you want to make a distinction between trill and flap (but this mostly doesn't happen in Devanagari), the nuqta letter ऱ is used for [r], and र for [ɾ], however confusing this may be if you normally pronounce र as [r] (which is most common in Hindi). Unicode says about ऱ: "for transcribing Dravidian alveolar r", so definitely not for dental flap [ɾ̪].
Unless you can give an example of the nuqta letter being used as transcription of ര. Exarchus (talk) 10:03, 7 June 2023 (UTC)Reply
neither does റ, depending on the word റ can either be released as a [r] or [ɾ].
Well the same unicode also says that ऩ is an alveolar nasal and न as an dental nasal.[1]
Please don't make me repeat this again and again.
The Devanagari-Dravidian transcriptions are purely based on the position not on the basis of their phonetic value. Kirank567 (talk) 12:19, 7 June 2023 (UTC)Reply
In any case, what we should be able to agree on is: is ऱ used (in the rare cases where it is used) for transcribing റ/ற or for transcribing ര/ர ? I think it's used for റ and then the current page for ऱ is wrong.
I managed to find an example where ऱ is used for Tamil ற: at the Marathi page for Tamil numerals, நாற்பது (nāṟpatu, 'forty') is transcribed as नाऱप्पदु. And further, நிகற்புதம் is transcribed निकऱपुदम. Exarchus (talk) 15:25, 7 June 2023 (UTC)Reply
what is the point of using nuqta if their is no difference b/w nuqta consonant and it's non nuqta correspondent?
also the Devanagari transcription is wrong, it isn't /näːrɐpɐd̪u/ (नाऱप्पदु/ऩाऱप्पदु by unicode standard) it's /näːr̩pɐtɨ/ (नार्पतॖ), it's pretty clear that the user who transcribed doesn't have any sence about the Tamil language or about the phonetic values of these nuqta consonants.
To me it seems pretty dumb to use the nuqta consonant just to indicate that the language is a Dravidian language.
  1. why mind to use ऱ when there is no distinction between the ற் and र्?
  2. Why isn't it ऩ insted of न in नाऱप्पदु, since ऩ is the alveolar one?
P.S. निकऱपुदम is also wrong Kirank567 (talk) 16:04, 7 June 2023 (UTC)Reply
"what is the point of using nuqta if their is no difference b/w nuqta consonant and it's non nuqta correspondent?"
The point is that there is a difference: இரண்டு is transcribed इरण्डू without nuqta, so [ɾ].
"it isn't /näːrɐpɐd̪u/ (नाऱप्पदु/ऩाऱप्पदु by unicode standard) it's /näːr̩pɐtɨ/ (नार्पतॖ)"
The transcription clearly isn't perfect (but I found better examples, see below) as there is no double प, the main point was that ऱ is used for ற, not ர. But transcribing intervocal த as द is common practice (as that is how it is pronounced): புதுக்கோட்டை (Pudukkottai) is पुदुकोट्टई on the Hindi page, and மதுரை (Madurai) becomes मदुरई. Regarding the final vowel, Tamil also uses the same symbol as for standard 'u', I know Malayalam uses another symbol, but transcribing this with ॖ is in any case a new development as this symbol was originally added for Kashmiri, with no mention of Dravidian transcription (see https://www.unicode.org/L2/L2008/08250-n3480-kashmiri.pdf: "the Kashmiri signs are innovations, based on the Devanagari candra").
"Why isn't it ऩ insted of न in नाऱप्पदु, since ऩ is the alveolar one?"
The Marathi page doesn't seem to differentiate between ந and ன (both transcribed न), but in this case it should be न anyway, as ந is dental.
But I found a better example at the Hindi page for Tamil, as here the short vowels (ऒ for short 'o') and the difference between dental and alveolar 'n' are clearly indicated (without the original Tamil script, but ok). So மூன்று (mūṉṟu, 'three') is transcribed मूऩ्ऱु with two nuqta letters (not perfectly clear in small font, but they are there), first for alveolar [n] (ன), then for [r] (ற). Note இரண்டு (iraṇṭu, 'two'), transcribed as इरंडू, without nuqta (the dot is an anusvara) to indicate ர [ɾ]. Also note நான்கு (nāṉku, 'four') transcribed as नाऩ्गु, the first न without nuqta for ந, the second one with nuqta for ன.
So "why mind to use ऱ when there is no distinction between the ற் and र्?"
You have to remember that way back in the days of Classical Sanskrit, र् was definitely not [r]/ற். From what I have read it was [ɾ] or [ɾ̪] or [ɽ]. I don't know when this pronunciation changed to (in a lot of cases) [r], but it's entirely possible that at some point some Northern Indians wanted to transcribe these Dravidian letters and decided to use र for ர/ര (because that was how it was pronounced) and create a nuqta letter ऱ for ற/റ. I'm not sure if that's how it went, but it would make sense, as now र is mostly [r] and you would expect the reverse. Exarchus (talk) 18:40, 7 June 2023 (UTC)Reply
If you want an example of a professional publication using र for ர and ऱ for ற, see https://archive.org/details/dli.language.1352/page/n7/mode/2up?view=theater. It also gives ऴ for ழ. It does use न for both ந and ன, and this is not a problem as these sounds are in complementary distribution in Tamil: "[n̪] word initially and before /t̪/ and [n] elsewhere".
Here is another one from 1991.
This book for Malayalam from 1987 uses र for ര and र̱ (with macron below) for റ. It also uses ऴ for ഴ. This one (from 1985) does use ष़ for ഴ (and also uses र̱ for റ). I also note that the first one uses candra above and 'u'-sign below to denote the short-u at the end of Malayalam words, so for example ഇരുട്ട് = इरुट्टु̆. This is like it used to be in Kashmiri too. The two Malayalam books also sometimes put a macron below न and sometimes don't, it looks like न is for dental 'n', and न̱ for alveolar: അധീനത is transcribed अधीन॒त (/ɐd̪ʱiːnɐd̪ɐ/ according to wiktionary), and നിരീശ്വരവാദി /n̪iɾiːʃʋɐɾɐʋaːd̪i/ becomes निरीश्वरवादि.
So whatever the historical reasons for doing the transcription like this, that is how it is used (when precision is needed) and the pages for ऱ and ऩ will need to be changed as the original pronunciations were correct all along. Exarchus (talk) 10:57, 8 June 2023 (UTC)Reply
Now one more thing about your point that these transcriptions are such because of the position in the script and not because of phonetic value.
These positions are not accidents, they were chosen because at one time they made sense. In the Grantha script (the origin of Tamil and Malayalam scripts), there was only one letter for 'r': 𑌰. I assume that this was used for both [ɾ] and [r]. This letter developed into Malayalam ര and Tamil ர. But Malayalam and Tamil each created an extra letter (clearly an adaptation of the other letter): റ and ற respectively. So why was ര chosen to be [ɾ] and the extra letter റ became [r]? (because originally the Grantha letter was used for both, if my assumption is correct) My suggestion is that it was because र (or equivalents in earlier scripts) was generally pronounced as a tap [ɾ], and to specifically mark the trill [r], an extra letter had to be created. (By the way, according to Pāṇini, it should be pronounced as retroflex [ɽ]. This doesn't mean it was the most common pronunciation in his days, but that is literally what he says.)
I'm not sure it all went like this, but this is what seems most plausible to me.
(Note that I also suggested to use phonological brackets // instead of phonetical brackets [] on the Devanagari page, as even just for Hindi this is not accurate.)
(Correction: Tamil script came from Pallava, which was also the 'mother' system of Grantha, but Pallava also had just one letter for 'r', so my point remains the same.) Exarchus (talk) 11:40, 8 June 2023 (UTC)Reply
I think I'm starting to understand your argument for using ऱ् to transcript ற்.
ற் - /r/ since it's a trill use ऱ
ர் - /ɾ/ similar to र
I think this convention should be considered as a Tamil-Devanagari transcriptional convention rather than a Dravidian-Devanagari transcriptional convention since it's not aptable in the same way in other Dravidian languages.
In the case of Malayalam both /r/ and /ɾ/ are denoted with the same consonant 'റ' and /ɾ̪/ is denoted by 'ര'.
However I'm not on the same page with you to consider
ன்/ഩ - /n/ be ऩ
ந்/ന - /n̪/ be न
As far as my knowledge goes no Indo- Aryan languages pronounce न as a dental nasal.
No one is gonna change the way they say or write न (alveolar n) for the sake of using it to trascript some other scripts. न‌ is alveolar and nothing is gonna change it.
ന in അധീനത is alveolar just like the न in अधीन. Changing it to a ऩ might make people think they are saying it wrong.
About ऴ
No Indo-Aryan language pronounce ळ as an appointment it's only pronounced as a flap. Though in the past these two sounds were considered the same and people still continue to believe that.
I personally believe ळ should be left with it's original phonetic value i.e. /ɭ̆/.
And ष़ be used to transcribe voiced retroflex approximant since it's been in use way before ऴ and has been used by southern railways to transcribe station names.
And ऴ be put to better use by using it to transcribe lateral retroflex approximant since it sound way closer to ळ and makes more sense as most of the nuqta consonants sounds a bit similar to their non-nuqta correspondent. Kirank567 (talk) 14:18, 8 June 2023 (UTC)Reply

"In the case of Malayalam both /r/ and /ɾ/ are denoted with the same consonant 'റ' and /ɾ̪/ is denoted by 'ര'."

That's interesting, but that's not what the Malayalam page says. So maybe it should be changed, I found this site here and it shows some disagreement (in the section 'Comparison of IPA representation of Malayalam consonants with other sources') about what these sounds really are. This paper seems to be a very thorough study of ര, റ, ല, ള and ഴ. But if Malayalam itself denotes both [r] and [ɾ] by 'റ', it is naive to expect that a Devanagari transcription will use a different symbol for Tamil ற் and Malayalam റ. Here is another Hindi-Malayalam dictionary, clearly using ऱ for റ, so whatever you think of it, that's how it's used. And you should keep in mind that in normal practice (not in dictionaries), people will transcribe all of ര, റ, ற் and ர் as Devanagari र, as they can't be bothered about making distinctions between [r], [ɾ] or [ɾ̪] that they are not making in their native language.

Now about न/ऩ: "As far as my knowledge goes no Indo- Aryan languages pronounce न as a dental nasal."

In that case the IPA transcriptions for Hindi given on Wiktionary are wrong: नाव [n̪äːʋ] (you can try to discuss this at https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Module_talk:hi-IPA). It is simply traditional usage to call त,थ,द,ध,न 'dentals', so according to this point of view, it's perfectly logical to use न for ந and ऩ for ன. In practice, again, people will transcribe all of ன்/ഩ and ந்/ന as न and will not be bothered about making distinctions between dental and alveolar (as languages very rarely do this anyway). The nuqta letter ऩ is strictly for scholarly use as Malayalam also doesn't use ഩ in practice (Tamil does use two different letters, but writing them with one wouldn't cause confusion). The Malayalam dictionary I gave above doesn't differentiate between /n̪/ and /n/ either.

"No Indo-Aryan language pronounce ळ as an appointment it's only pronounced as a flap."

That could be correct, but notation is often /ɭ/. A lot of pages will need to be changed then, I changed the Odia page as the source gives it as a flap. I don't think you can expect people to use different letters for [ɭ] and [ɭ̆] as no Indian language makes a phonemic distinction between them. And that is what a script is used for: distinguishing different phonemes, not making a detailed phonetic analysis, for which you use IPA. From a European point of view, it's just weird that Indian scripts don't distinguish between [v] and [w] (except very rarely according to the nuqta page, with व़ as [w]). But for Indian languages, that's just fine because they are allophones. Do you think Dravidian retroflex consonants and Hindi retroflex consonants are the same? When you look at the details, they are not, but of course people will not use different symbols when transcribing (and if they really want to pronounce it perfectly correct, then they just have to know which language it is).

When I look at the page for voiced retroflex approximant, I see that in Tamil this sound 'may be merged with [ɭ] for some modern speakers' and in Telugu it is 'almost always merged with [ɭ], in both written and spoken forms'. Looking at it this way, transcribing ழ/ഴ as a modified ळ does not seem far-fetched. Exarchus (talk) 10:42, 9 June 2023 (UTC)Reply

"The need to change Malayalam page"
Well It's very reasonable to use ambiguous phonetical representation of a character in Wikipedia Language Phonology pages. The Hindustani Phonology pages defines र as /r/ when it's also /ɾ/ and /ɾ̪/ in some cases. There is nothing wrong with the Malayalam page saying ര is a /ɾ/, since it's a tap however it's not alveolar tap.
Well the Kavya Manohar page you refered clearly says that Keralapaniniyam does not adhere to the modern Malayalam phonological studies. And please do note that these studies are from a time when there weren't better ways to precisely describe a phoneme.
The Malayalam ര isn't a pure alveolar tap nor a pure dental tap. it's phonemically a laminal denti-alveolar tap, and this value is pretty hard to describe in character. Most of the time denti-alveolar consonants are denoted with the alveolar consonant or with a ̪ below (less common). The Malayalam Wiktionary page describes it as a dental so that people wouldn't confuse it with /ɾ/ . If it's pronounced as /ɾ/, then the meaning of words can change
Eg മറം /mɐɾɐm̩/ - 'consentless'
മരം /mɐɾ̪ɐm̩/ - 'tree'
There are many YouTube videos where you can hear it for yourself. Some even define ര as tap against the teeth. I'm not saying that the studies you refered are wrong especially the The Renu Ponnuse one, it's not wrong to indicate a denti-alveolar without any diacritical marks. These pages are often written in computers which makes it harder for studies to use articulationary marks.
However this doesn't seems to be the case in tamil. In tamil it does seem that they distinguish b/w alveolar tap and trill from the voice notes and videos I referred.
I never said that we need a new consonant to transliterate ര, the Devanagari र does represent the phonemes of both റ /ɾ/(र),/r/(ऱ) and ര
/ɾ̪/ (र).
नाव, I personally pronounce this as /näːʋ/ and the voice note [[2]] of the native Marathi and Hindi speaker also seem to pronounce it as /näːʋ/ and /näː.ɔw/.
Well it seems like that /n̪äːʋ/ was transcripted on the assumption that न is dental.
The ट, ठ, ड, ढ, ण and ട ഠ ഡ ഢ ണ aren't the same but they are atleast articulatory distinction of the same phoneme i.e /ʈ/, /ɖ/ and /ɳ/.
No, Indian languages don't distinguish between /ʋ/ and /w/ but there exist a convention to do distinguish /ʋ/ and /w/. While it seems very inefficient to distinguish between /ɭ/ and /ɭ̆/, which belongs to different manners of articulation and present in different language groups, at the same time it's fine to use multiple transcription for a single phoneme /ɻ/. Really efficient, logical and non at all abominal.
Just because some Tamil speakers and Telegu speakers (which only use it in Malayalam and Tamil nouns) merges ɻ with ɭ doesn't lead to the conclusion that all Dravidian languages do it. In Malayalam /kɐɻi/ (to eat/finish) can't be pronounced as /kɐɭi/ (to play) as both mean different actions. Kirank567 (talk) 03:20, 10 June 2023 (UTC)Reply
The nuqta page clearly says that nuqta is a diacritic mark that was introduced in Devanagari and some other Indic scripts to represent sounds not present in the original scripts (Transcription).
What you are saying transliteration, which is not what nuqta is for. If we start using nuqta consonants for transliteration, then there will a lot of pointless Consonants. Kirank567 (talk) 04:54, 10 June 2023 (UTC)Reply
A few comments:
- In Malayalam, ള /ɭ/ can apparently also be a flap for some, see https://www.academia.edu/download/79100601/malayalam_20liquids_202013.pdf (page 120). (And apparently in Tamil too, see https://ccat.sas.upenn.edu/~haroldfs/public/TamilLiquidsRevisited.pdf (page 6).) So if variability allows it to be also like Indo-Aryan ळ, I wouldn't count on anyone doing the effort of making the distinction in writing (except in IPA). It is simply very normal nowadays (because of language evolution) for Devanagari letters to be pronounced differently in different languages. ऋ is 'ri' in Hindi, 'ru' in Marathi, and originally it was syllabic 'r'. ए is long /e:/ in Hindi (and original Sanskrit), short /e/ in Marathi (they could use ऎ for this, but they don't as they have no distinction between /e/ and /e:/). च is /t͡ʃ/ in Hindi, but /t͡s/ in Nepali. Hindi does not pronounce the inherent vowel at the end of a word, but a word like अधिक is written the same as in Sanskrit. Punjabi ਧ (transcribed ध) does not mean /dʱ/ but depending on position indicates /t/ followed by a high-falling tone, or /d/ preceded by a low-rising tone.
Compared to all this, having a rule that ळ is /ɭ̆ / in Indo-Aryan and /ɭ/ in Dravidian languages looks very easy (and Hindi speakers, among others, will have trouble pronouncing them correctly anyway). By the way, I'll be very interested if you can find a language contrasting /ɭ / and /ɭ̆ / (or otherwise /l/ and /ɺ/), I don't think there is one.
(As an addition, I'll mention that this paper says: "The retroflexion of lateral in the NIA languages is also due to the areal spread i.e., from dravidian source." And here: "A retroflex lateral approximant /ɭ/ is a prominent feature of Marathi" Or here: "/ l, ɭ / are two lateral approximants in Gujarati Phonology." I looked at Gujarati words derived from Sanskrit with a ળ /ɭ/ sound, and it always corresponded to Sanskrit ल /l/, not to Vedic Sanskrit ळ /ɭ̆ /. So it was a later development and I'd like to see clear evidence that it really is a flap and not an approximant. And of course, it could be both, as allophones.)
- By saying that some speakers merge /ɻ/ with /ɭ/, my point was of course not that all Dravidians do this, but that apparently they feel (consciously or not) that /ɻ/ is closest to /ɭ/ in their language. And that is actually a good criterion to decide to use ऴ as /ɻ/, and not ष़. Because why is /z/ transcribed as ज़ (even though it is not that close to ज phonetically)? Because /z/ is often replaced by ज /d͡ʒ/.
One reason why academic notation in dictionaries has shifted (apparently in the 1980's) from ष़ to ऴ could be that it was proposed to use ष़ as /ʐ/, for example in the Shina language (see page 65). In any case, having two different transcriptions historically is not that uncommon, as there has been ॹ (with three dots) and झ़ (with nuqta) for /ʒ/. Exarchus (talk) 16:58, 10 June 2023 (UTC)Reply
One thing I do consider a problem in Devanagari transcription is that there is no good solution to write /d͡z/. Not so many Indian languages have this sound, but there's Telugu where all of చ /t͡ʃ/, జ /d͡ʒ/, ౘ /t͡s/ and ౙ /d͡z/ exist. Now in practice, if I'm understanding this right, both /t͡ʃ/ and /t͡s/ are written చ and /d͡ʒ/ and /d͡z/ written జ. But at least Telugu has a way to distinguish them if needed, Devanagari not really: there is no transcription listed in ISO 15919 for ౘ /t͡s/, and ౙ /d͡z/ is listed under ज़ /z/. Now in Kashmiri च़ (ca-nukta) is used for /t͡s/, so that can be used, and then you can make a rule that ज़ in Telugu is pronounced /d͡z/ (as there is no /z/ phoneme, although [z] is an allophone of /d͡z/ intervocally) and that's it. But in for example Nepali it is ज that's pronounced /d͡z/, so this would be a rather shaky solution.
But this also falls apart if you have a language that has /d͡ʒ/, /d͡z/ and /z/ phonemes, like the above mentioned Shina language. And if you pay close attention to the link I gave, it mentions /d͡z/ as phoneme, and clearly distinguishes phonemes from allophones, but in the proposal for Devanagari alphabet, there is no /d͡z/ to be seen. The most logical phonetically would be to use ज़, but that's already used for /z/. So I have not seen a solution for this anywhere, only thing I could come up with would be ज with two dots, for lack of something better. Exarchus (talk) 20:33, 10 June 2023 (UTC)Reply
I
I've heard Hindi speaker some times pronounce ड़ as ड, which doesn't imply that can start writing it as ड instead Kirank567 (talk) 09:16, 11 June 2023 (UTC)Reply
@Exarchus had some typing issue, don't no what happened. Only part of the reply got posted. Kirank567 (talk) 09:39, 11 June 2023 (UTC)Reply
1 Never have I ever heard any one pronounce ള as ळ in Malayalam in my life, I don't know on whose toung these study were based on. Even if someone rarely do pronounces it as ळ, it's probably during fast colloquial speech, doesn't imply that it's ള's phonetic value is /ɭ̆/. I've heard Hindi speaker sometimes pronounce ड़ as ड, which doesn't imply that can start writing it as ड instead of ड़.
2 About the /rɪ/ /ru/ /e/ /eː/ /t͡s/ /t͡ʃ/ situation, just because they use the same script doesn't mean that they are the same language! There is no need for them to alter their speech or writing to conform to Hindustani phonology or writing. Devanagari , however, have a generally acknowledged phonetic value that in someway's deviates from the phonology of most Indo-Aryan language.
3 ज and ज़ argument. Some native Hindi speakers are still unable to tell the difference between /g/ and /z/ since to their ears both sounds are similar. Some even say and write ज़रा as जरा, which doesn't alter it's meaning. This phenomenon is pretty common in many languages, In Malayalam there is no way to write /z/, instead we use /s/ as it sound similar to /z/ for us. Same for /ʒ/ too.
4 As a native Malayalam speaker I never confused ള with ഴ or wise verse, Though I know some people who still remain to believe that ഴ's phonetic value is /ʐ/ (voiced form of ष़). Some of the page you referred earlier also states that too. P.S I 've friends who'd pronounce ഴ as something like /ʐ/ or like /zʰ/ in mockery way.
5 /ɭ/ in Gujarati and Marathi, I wonder why you didn't referred to the Marathi Phonology page as you did for Gujarati. Well they aren't pronounced as ɭ. For Marathi it's clearly ɭ̆, it's stated in the Marathi Phonology page and if you still believe it's wrong then please do check YouTube for the pronunciation and it's pretty clear that they are saying ɭ̆ə. For the Gujarati ળ they probably loaned the sound from Sanskrit from what I've read, however they don't pronounce it as ɭ nor as ɭ̆ but as ɽ, they even call the letter as 'ada', that's also on YouTube.
6 ष़ in Shina, I'm glad they get to choose what they found the suitable counterpart in Devanagari for ڙ. Its pretty common for Synchronic digraphaic languages in India to use transcriptionary nuqta consonants in their language to denote other sounds, e.g konkani use ऱ for ɽ and Gamale Kham use व़ for ɥ, it also use झ़ for zə.
7 About Nepali and Telugu lacking nuqta representation, I don't know what this have to do with this talk. I hope they get to choose the Devanagari correspondent for the unique sounds that exists in their language.
  1. Well the ॹ is a transcription of the avestani 𐬲 from Gujarati જ with similar dot of ॹ. I don't know why they felt the need to introduce ॹ when झ़ already exists in Devanagari. The lesson here is to listen and understand sounds before transcribing. And I'm wasting my time by attempting to convince you to make this thing comprehensive to the regular people.
8 Nuqta consonants are created by placing a dot beneath the closest existing corresponding sound in the native script that wouldn't modify its meaning if uttered incorrectly, the few exceptions that exists are probably in hindustani itself eg क़मर and कमर, however exceptions are almost completely absent in transcription.
9 Now imagine a Marathi speaker who's come across the word കിഴി transcripted as किऴि he/she'd probably read it as /kiɭ̆i/, similar to കിളി in Malayalam which is a bird while കിഴി means pit or a pot, it's not just കിളി & കിഴി
മുഴ മുള (bump/Bamboo),
കളി/കഴി (play/eat),
താള്/താഴ് (leg/lock),
അള/അഴ (burrows/clothes line),
കുഴി/കുളി (to dig/to bath),
പുഴു/പുളു (caterpillar/lie),
മിഴി/മിളി (eyes/fields) and the list goes on.
Now imagine a Marathi speaker who's come across the word കിഴി transcripted as किऴि he/she'd probably read it as kiɭ̆i, similar to കിളി in Malayalam which is a bird while കിഴി means pit or a pot, it's not just കിളി & കിഴി മുഴ മുള (bump/Bamboo), കളി കഴി (play/eat), താള് താഴ് (leg/lock), അള അഴ (burrows/clothes line), കുഴി കുളി (to dig/to bath), പഴു പളു (caterpillar/lie), മിഴി മിളി (eyes/fields) and the list goes on.
10 I've had a fair share of (presumably) Northerners ask me for directions to आलप्पुज़ beach and आलप्पुष beach, which sounds OK, but if someone asked me for directions to आलप्पुळ beach, I'd definitely burst out laughing for the reason that it sounds horrendous and Alappula means something like writhing sea?!!
11 To my knowledge, there isn't a word in Malayalam or in Tamil where changing /ɻ/ to /ʂ/ would change its meaning. Although native speakers who find it difficult to use /ɻ/ in informal speech typically tend to replace it with /j/. Kirank567 (talk) 09:35, 11 June 2023 (UTC)Reply
"About the /rɪ/ /ru/ /e/ /eː/ /t͡s/ /t͡ʃ/ situation, just because they use the same script doesn't mean that they are the same language!"
Well, that was my point: if you transcribe Malayalam ള as ळ, it does not mean it is suddenly the same language (with exactly the same sound) as Marathi. For perfect pronunciation, you still have to know the rules of the relevant language. This is like र having different phonetic realisations in different languages, its practical meaning is: 'whatever the (non-retroflex) rhotic sound in your language/dialect is (taking into account possible contextual allophones)'. Only when a language has more than one such rhotic pnoneme is it considered to use separate symbols (and yes, these symbols, like र and ऱ, will then be slightly arbitrary).
"About Nepali and Telugu lacking nuqta representation, I don't know what this have to do with this talk."
My point was that if Devanagari has no good way of distinguishing different phonemes (/d͡z/ and /d͡ʒ/ in Telugu, or in any case /z/, /d͡z/ and /d͡ʒ/ in Shina), I consider that a problem. If it has no way of differentiating between two sounds that are not phonemically distinct in any Indian language ([ɭ] and [ɭ̆]), I don't consider that a problem. Now you can say that there is व़ for [w], which is not phonemically distinct from /ʋ/. Well, I'm actually curious as to where and by whom this nuqta consonant is used. Is it to indicate to native English speakers where they have to say [w] and where not? (But then we would be back to phonemic contrasts, in English.)
You have a point that if switching Malayalam /ɻ/ to /ɭ/ causes more confusion than switching to /ʂ/, then writing ष़‍ instead of ऴ makes more practical sense. It is also consistent with romanization 〈zh〉. All I'm saying is that academics decided to use ऴ and that they may have perfectly logical reasons for doing so. And of course, for consistency academics will use the same symbol for Malayalam ഴ and Tamil ழ, so if many Tamil speakers themselves tend to merge ழ and ள, then it makes some sense (at least for Tamil) to use ऴ. It was also a historical evolution (some centuries ago) in Kannada to merge ೞ /ɻ/ with ಳ /ɭ/. In Telugu, it historically merged with /ɖ/.
"I don't know why they felt the need to introduce ॹ when झ़ already exists in Devanagari."
I think it's exactly the reverse: ॹ already existed and then झ़ was introduced.
"I've heard Hindi speaker sometimes pronounce ड़ as ड, which doesn't imply that can start writing it as ड instead of ड़."
From what I understand, ड़ /ɽ/ developed originally as allophone of ड /ɖ/, and it often still is an allophone, apparently (page 97) in Eastern Hindi. Exarchus (talk) 19:53, 11 June 2023 (UTC)Reply
1) There is a difference between using a script to represent a certain language and using a script for transcription (particularly if the script modifies its consonants for transcription).
that ɻ mereged into ɽ or ɖ.
5)"From what I understɻ and,ɭ ड़ /ɽ/ developed originally as allophone of ड /ɖ/"- still nobody is gonna start writing ड for ड़. Kirank567 (talk) 12:03, 12 June 2023 (UTC)Reply
dont know still facing typing error Kirank567 (talk) 12:05, 12 June 2023 (UTC)Reply
Sorry for the inconveniences [3] Kirank567 (talk) 13:25, 12 June 2023 (UTC)Reply
p.s this have a doc attached if you haven't checked Kirank567 (talk) 16:29, 12 June 2023 (UTC)Reply
I have seen it, I'll probably reply later. Exarchus (talk) 16:34, 12 June 2023 (UTC)Reply
There is a difference between using a script to represent a particular language and using a script to transcript other languages especially when the script has developed modified consonants to transcript. Kirank567 (talk) 13:15, 12 June 2023 (UTC)Reply
Kirank567 (talk) 13:16, 12 June 2023 (UTC)Reply
"There is a difference between using a script to represent a particular language and using a script for transcription"
Yes, and when you want to do really accurate transcription, I don't think Devanagari is suitable, that's what IPA is for. Exarchus (talk) 13:38, 12 June 2023 (UTC)Reply
By the way, my edit on the Oriya page (turning ɭ into ɭ̆) got reverted because someone thinks it's wrong. Some sources say 'approximant' and others say 'flapped'. A youtube video is not a detailed phonetic study. If you say Gujarati ળ is [ɽ], then according to theory that is definitely wrong and must be something dialectical or a new development. Exarchus (talk) 15:34, 12 June 2023 (UTC)Reply
you could probably add note & citation below.
Well Kavya Manohar page classified ച, ഛ, ജ, ഝ as /c/ /cʰ/ /ɟ/ /ɟʰ/ when in reality either/tɕ/ /tɕʰ/ /dʑ/ /dʑʰ/ or /tʃ/ /tʃʰ/ /dʒ/ /dʒʰ/. Kirank567 (talk) 16:22, 12 June 2023 (UTC)Reply
I've noticed that many Wikipedia language phonology pages are written using the conventional phonetic order rather than the actual pronunciation. I hope the current ऴ page works for you. Kirank567 (talk) 16:28, 12 June 2023 (UTC)Reply
The discussion on the Oriya page is here. So if you really think ळ in Indo-Aryan languages is generally /ɭ̆/ and not /ɭ/ (and I don't exclude at all that you are correct, I simply don't know), then that's where to discuss this. Exarchus (talk) 16:29, 12 June 2023 (UTC)Reply
If you really would want to use Devanagari for phonetic transcription, I think that would be an interesting exercice, but then a lot more symbols are needed: /θ/, /ð/, differentiation between /r/, /ɾ/ and /ɹ/, indication for Arabic emphatic consonants, indication for voiceless nasals (like in Burmese, which uses a Brahmi-derived abugida, so not that far-fetched) or voiceless /ɬ/ (present in Indo-Aryan Sawi language), differentiation between /ɣ/ and /ʁ/, distinguishing between palatal affricates (/tʃ/ /dʒ/) and plosives (/c/ /ɟ/), and so on... If someone would design such a system, I'd be very interested, but I don't think it would be widely used. Exarchus (talk) 16:42, 12 June 2023 (UTC)Reply
Now I think you probably got confused a bit by the term 'transcription', I know it has a very specific meaning, but in a broad meaning it can also mean transliteration. And in practice transcription and transliteration can be mixed. Now the Indic scripts tend to have a fairly close relation between letter and sound, so ideally transcription and transliteration can overlap perfectly there. But in practice this is different, and also when someone would like to do transcription (sound-to-sound), it often becomes transliteration (letter-to-letter). And for a lot of sounds, Devanagari and Indic scripts in general are not very well suited (because they didn't exist originally in Sanskrit/Prakrits) and then they have to improvise. Exarchus (talk) 18:48, 12 June 2023 (UTC)Reply
But Indic scripts definitely don't always do transliteration: different Perso-Arabic letters are often transcribed (loosely used) the same, ظ ض ز ذ all become ज़ because the sound is the same (in Persian and in Hindi/Urdu). Persian on the other hand has closely transliterated these letters from Arabic. Now it is of course possible to also do strict transliteration in Devanagari, this is an example of this for Urdu to Hindi (and Gurmukhi), you'll see a lot of extra dots are used. And this can be useful if you want to know how a Hindi word is written in Urdu (some words are written the same in Hindi, but differently in Urdu, for example अर्ज़ी for both عرضی and ارضی‎‎). The most recent dictionaries for Hindi-Tamil that I've seen also don't use strict transliteration, but transcribe ப as both प and ब, depending on the pronunciation in Tamil. And both ந and ன are transcribed न. Exarchus (talk) 19:12, 12 June 2023 (UTC)Reply