[INDOLOGY] Question on Diacritical Marks

[Jeffery Long]

Dear Colleagues,
I thank all of you who have responded, both privately and on the listserv, to my query.  The range of opinion has varied from "Why stop at diacritics?  Why not देवनागरी?" to "Diacritics not really needed in non-specialist contexts."  The weight of the opinion, though, has been quite clearly and strongly in the direction of "Diacritics needed in a PhD dissertation that engages extensively with Indic materials, even if the primary thesis and audience are not specifically Indological."  This is now my inclination as well.
You have all helped me with a question with which I was struggling, for which you have my gratitude.
All the best,Jeff Dr. Jeffery D. Long
Professor of Religion and Asian Studies
Elizabethtown CollegeElizabethtown, PA
https://etown.academia.edu/JefferyLong
Series Editor, Explorations in Indic Traditions: Theological, Ethical, and PhilosophicalLexington Books
Consulting Editor, Sutra Journalhttp://www.sutrajournal.com

"One who makes a habit of prayer and meditation will easily overcome all difficulties and remain calm and unruffled in the midst of the trials of life."  (Holy Mother Sarada Devi)
 

    On Tuesday, September 6, 2016 1:46 PM, Robert Goldman <rpg at berkeley.edu> wrote:
 

 One might also keep in mind the large number of academic scholars in a number of areas such as Religious Studies, Comparative Literature, Anthropology, Philosophy, History of Science and many more who depend on the monographs, articles and translations of Indologists. Although they may well want to read translations of and  studies on the Upaniṣads, the Gītā, Kālidāsa, the Rāmāyaṇa etc., most would probably not want to have to learn devanāgarī  or any other Indic script to do so.
Dr. R. P.  Goldman
Catherine and William L. Magistretti Distinguished Professor in South and Southeast Asian Studies
Department of South and Southeast Asian Studies MC # 2540
The University of California at Berkeley
Berkeley, CA 94720-2540
Tel: 510-642-4089
Fax: 510-642-2409



On Sep 6, 2016, at 4:30 AM, Olivelle, J P <jpo at austin.utexas.edu> wrote:

Like Jonathan, I also thought I would keep out of this issue, because I did not have anything new to contribute. However, Dominik’s message made me change my mind. We may think today that Devanāgarī is the “script” of Sanskrit, but historically it never was, unlike Latin, Greek, Chinese, or Japanese. As anyone who has worked on Sanskrit manuscripts knows, Sanskrit texts were written in regional scripts: Grantha, Telugu, Malayalam, Newari, Śāradā, etc. So there is no exact parallel between Sanskrit and other languages. 
Given that Latin script with diacritics parallels exactly the Sanskrit alphabet, the issues raised with regard to Chinese do not arise. My own rule of thumb is that if it is simply a word or sentence within an English article or book, then I use the Latin script, but for texts in Sanskrit (as now the rule with the Murthy Library) I use Devanāgarī. Murthy also has come up with a possible middle ground: putting names of people and places without diacritics, while using them for other Sanskrit terms. But I guess we will never come up with a solution that will satisfy all. 
Patrick



On Sep 5, 2016, at 8:33 PM, Dominik Wujastyk <wujastyk at gmail.com> wrote:
I don't have any solid evidence for this, but I assume that transliteration was invented for Sanskrit because printing Devanagari was difficult.  It isn't difficult any more.  All modern computers can make a decent fist of Devanagari.  So why are we routinely using transliteration at all, any more?  People writing scholarship on Greek or Russian or Armenian don't use Latin script.  Why should we?
And if you know any other windmills, I'd be glad to tilt at them too. :-)
Best,Dominik​_______________________________________________
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