Talk:Roman Urdu

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Contents 1 Standardized Roman Urdu Alphabet Table 2 Sample texts 3 Transcription system - 3 or 1? 4 Alternative Romanization system (Discussions) 4.1 Alternative for ں न (Retroflex Nasal)

[edit] Standardized Roman Urdu Alphabet Table

A standardized roman urdu alphabet would be nice. Someone add a table of that stuff. Fine, I will.

Fayyazabbas and Kitabparast are taking care of the job. Thanks guys! Anupam 21:00, 28 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Sample texts

Can a Perso-Arabic and/or Devanagari version of the texts be given? And can a description of the text and the romanisation used in the texts be given too? Thanks, Khuda hafiz, --Basawala 18:38, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

Looks like Kitabparast has taken care of the job. Thanks Kitabparast! Anupam 20:22, 28 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Transcription system - 3 or 1?

We have three transcription systems on this page. Is this intentional? If so, we should feature each system in its own section. If not, we may want to agree on one system to be promoted - one that is simple yet adequate. Kitabparast 16:53, 27 August 2006 (UTC)

I think it would be useful to have all of the transcriptions documented in the article, in their own sections. We might also want to think about renaming the article to Romanization of Urdu or Urdu romanization, to follow all other parallel articles found in Category:Romanization. –jonsafari 00:04, 28 August 2006 (UTC)

The third one was just IPA that I changed to Roman Urdu. There are only two systems used in the article. The additions I made in the article use the standard system I have seen in the Kita'b I Muqaddas and Roman Urdu hymnals. I would oppose the renaming of the article to Romanization of Urdu or Urdu romanization because the system is today known more popularly as Roman Urdu. This name came into use after the British came to India and used the Roman script for Hindustani (Hindi/Urdu). It was and still is used by speakers who know the Roman script but only know one of the two scripts for writing Hindustani: Devanagari or Perseo-Arabic. Today, most South Asians still refer to the system as Roman Urdu and it has widespread usage. The second system on the page which Fayyazabbas incorporated into the article comes from his proposed system of writing Roman Urdu (see his talkpage). He has done an excellent job of creating the table and writing a sample text. I am not sure if we should leave both of the page or just one. I think it might be best if we give alternate methods in the table. Anupam 20:35, 28 August 2006 (UTC)

I agree with Kitabparast that we should agree on one system to be promoted, a simple yet adequate system. We can have a discussion on each and every character used as the alternative for Urdu/Hindi alphabets, and analyse it in terms of its pros & cons for future use. If we fail to settle on one alternative, we will list more than one alternatives, as I have already done in my proposed table. I had known other alternatives but didn't include them in my table for one reason or the other. Let's talk about them all... Fayyaz Abbas 30.08.06

[edit] Alternative Romanization system (Discussions)

[edit] Alternative for ں न (Retroflex Nasal)

Some people render Urdū into Roman characters using capitals and small letters. With vowels, a capital letter would indicate a long vowel while with consonants it would indicate retroflex consonants. As an example: "maiN kitAbparast hUN" for maiⁿ kitābparast hūⁿ / मैं किताबपरस्त हूं / میں کتابپرست ہوں. I do not know if Urdū-speaking Christians use such a system. Should such a system also be put into a table and put on this page? I can do it if it is deemed appropriate. Kitabparast 17:51, 26 August 2006 (UTC)

In the way I am have seen Roman Urdu written, the capital n (N) and the superscipted n (ⁿ) are usually rendered as n. I have used this system in my additions. So I would write: main anupam hun. However, you bring up a good point with the capital N as I have also seen it written in this way. I think you should incorporate "N" into the table as an alternate method for "n". From my understanding, Urdu speaking Christians would generally use "n" as I have seen this in the Kita'b I Muqaddas and Roman Urdu hymnals. Thanks for your concern and entusiasm! Anupam 20:21, 28 August 2006 (UTC)

Dears, I think the retroflex nasal be better represented by ŋ (meŋ kitäbparast hüŋ) as it is the IPA symbol, and a single-stroke character. Characters like N, ⁿ or n require two key strokes. Further if we select N for this purpose, there surely will arise some problems when capitalizing a word (at the sentence-beginning or for proper nouns). Maybe we do have Roman Urdu keyboards in the future having a separate ŋ key; it's easy for hand-writing as well. Awaiting your valuable responses, Kitabparast & Anupam ...

Fayyaz Abbas 30.08.06

You bring up a good point with the capitalization issue. However, if N is used frequently among the South Asian populace, it might be advisable to include it as a third alternate method. We'll see what Kitabparast has to say for this issue. I'm sure his comments will be very useful. I know for a fact that n for the retroflex nasal ں न is standard in many places. As a result, I still think we should include it as an alternate method in the Alphabet table. However, I think the ŋ is important as well. We should also include this in the Alphabet table. This is the symbol for the retroflex nasal in IPA, correct? For the sample texts and examples table in the article, I think we should only implement one of the letters for the retroflex nasal ں, either nor ŋ. (this is just to make the article standard and avoid confusion) Let me know which one you would like to use. I am okay with either one. Thanks! Anupam 04:37, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

The [ɳ] is the symbol for a retroflex nasal (eg. ण), while [ŋ] is the symbol for a velar nasal (ङ), and a tilde over a vowel [ã] is the symbol for nasalized vowels (अं). Thus ŋ is not a retroflex nasal. –jonsafari 06:03, 30 August 2006 (UTC).