cyrilic alphabet - logic!?

[ruriktochkase.livejournal.com]

Ok. I have to admit, that learning cyrilic alphabet was for me somewhat of a puzzle.
A puzzle that I have not been able to solve for past 24 years.
And the more other languages I understand (especially other slavic lang. that use cyrilics),
the more odd the Russian cyrilic system seems to me.

I will try to explain what I mean the best I can.
But Im not sure that my knowledge of phonetics is good enough,
but Im sure that there are some other people around here (f.ex. thouse who have czech or polish as mother tounge),
who will see what I mean, and plz .  do not be shy in transforming my question into more internationally understandible.

Look, in Russian there is a letter "е"  and it is actionly a combination of й+э, or in some cases just plane э. (whith softer consonant)
Than there is ю which is a combination of й+у. or just y (w.softer consonant)
Than there is я which is й+а
Than there is ё which is й+o

So? so 2 questions:

1st: WHY? why choose 1 consonant "й", and separate into separate letters the combination of it w. vowel ? ? ? 

I mean one could say that its some necesity of cyrilic alphabet, but its not. I can not see any situation were the letters "е ё ю я" would be impossible to replace by combination of other letters.
F.ex. in serbian (where they use in cyrilic same "j" as in English), they spell "Ja" instead of "я".
and if one would wanna make the consonant softer there is always "ь", right ???
Ok, fine, lets say one wants to make a language w. as few symbols in every word as possible. thus one would need more letters.
Seems logical. but why isn't there letters like "Ka", "Ko", and all the other combinations of consonant + vowel, with its own separate letter ?

So, I still can't get the logic. Does anyone get it ?

2nd: Whats the story? what was the historic background?
what was the reason for making "й" this very special letter,
with all the own letters for combination with vowels?
was it Cyrill that fell in love w. it?
or prehaps some of thouse letters came up after Lenins reform of Russian?
 

 

Comments

[wolk-off.livejournal.com]

Obviously you dislike the existing tradition, but then dude, you have to give up: it's here to stay. Russian alphabet suits Russian phonetics very well -- and it's not because the alphabet is phonetic as you may think: it's not phonetic, it's phonematic. I understand that you are having a lot of fun trolling this community, but I think you have heard enough good arguments already, and there is no further necessity to ask for more of them. If you do not like them, that's just your personal problem, not this community's. First warning, second means ban, no reconsideration, so would you please stop trolling.

[archaicos.livejournal.com]

While I agree with you, I too very often try to understand things that are unfortunately less logical and more historical. Please don't be too judgmental (unless, of course, this is deserved as I haven't read the last two thirds of this enormous thread).

[wolk-off.livejournal.com]

Any living language with more than two hundred years of existence and a wide literature (which is obviously the case with modern Russian) is illogical in its otrthography and grammar, let's have no illusions about that. Especially in a situation when a modern language is deeply rooted in the literary tradition of an older language (which is again the case with modern Russian, which is mightily influenced by Church Slavonic.) Trolling an educational linguistic community by offering to get rid of the existing "illogical" traditions in favor of pure logic (while, by the way, being a person very underiformed in the subject -- the dude obviously mixes up phonetic and phonematic concepts, phonetic alphabet and the usage of the actual alphabet, etc.) may be fun, but it's pointless.

[archaicos.livejournal.com]

You're right about old things being notoriously illogical and all. But not everyone knows enough even about their own language, not to mention general linguistics. Unless things go out of control, I'd just let the person question things and get their fair share of "education" from others. I mean, we often reach acceptance only after having been in denial for a while. :)

[wolk-off.livejournal.com]

Well, to me letting the dude get his share of education by allowing 145+ comments before setting warning (not yet a ban!) still looks quite liberal :)

[archaicos.livejournal.com]

OK :)

[ruriktochkase.livejournal.com]

Obviously you dislike the existing tradition, but then dude, you have to give up: it's here to stay.
I understand that you are having a lot of fun trolling this community,
but I think you have heard enough good arguments already,
and there is no further necessity to ask for more of them
- - -
I'm affraid I will have to disagree w. you on this one.
Language is a living organism, and rules of spelling in Russian have been constantly changing troughout history if one is to belive the links and facts presented in this post by other contributors in the comments.
I see that you choose to call me a troll, and thus probably will not take my word for it.
May be the input of other commentators to this post,
with links to scientific articles and very good historic heritage explanation,
will be a good enough source for you?


I understand that you have rubber stamped my enquiries some form of trolling
(fine your comunity your rules),
but I asure you that on my part this is nothing to do w. trolling.
On contrary, it has to do w. a subject that I'm intrested in.
And I would be VERY suprised if the wealth of information provided here in comments, on Russian language and its history
were 100% common knowledge to all the users of this comunity.

So? So were one chooses to see troling, the other one sees an oportunity to learn about Russian language.
(the one w. oportunity to learn that would be f.ex. me)
But yes, its your comunity, your rules, and you have the authority here.
All I want to show, is that there might exist a posibility for a diffrent perspective. not troling, but learning.


I think you have heard enough good arguments already, and there is no further necessity to ask for more of them.
- - -
Ok. Sure. It's your call. It is you who is the maintainer, so you decided whats alowed to be writen here whats not.
But as far as my humble opinion goes, I would love to recieve some more information on the subject, especially on the development of the Russian version of Cyrilic, and the underlining historic development of it.

So prehaps if the subject of Russian phonetics and alphabet has no more room in this thread as stipulated by the maintainers,
may be I can ask people to write to me to my private mail ? ? ?

Is that something that is acceptible for this comunity, or does it violate some rules/codes ?


If you do not like them, that's just your personal problem, not this community's.
- - -
I have never emplyed that the wast diffrence between phonetics and script, that has historicly developed is somehow "problem" of this entire LJ-comunity or a problem created by this comunity. On the other hand, if you read through all the comments in this thread, you will find that there are quite a few people who had obviously thought about that aspect of Russian language. And as far as I could see many were quite happy to share their knowledge and thoughts on the subject.

So I would like to say to a HUGE THANK YOU !
to all the people that have emproved my knowledge of Russian, via this thread.

[wolk-off.livejournal.com]

OK, good to see there's some reasoning behind what looks like some ill-informed trolling. Maybe if you would be less concerned with defending your opinions, however strong you might feel they were, and more interested in what more informed people were telling you (even if it was contrary to your opinions,) you would look less trollish. Believe me, the field was ploughed for decades, so there's something to learn from others without calling for rebellion (even if you just found out that the field existed.)

[ruriktochkase.livejournal.com]

Believe me, the field was ploughed for decades, so there's something to learn from others without calling for rebellion (even if you just found out that the field existed.)
- - -
ok, point taken .