Romanian Braille | |
---|---|
Script type | alphabet |
Print basis | Romanian alphabet |
Languages | Romanian |
Related scripts | |
Parent systems | Braille
|
Romanian Braille is the braille alphabet of the Romanian language. It has the 25 letters of basic French Braille (no w) plus the following additional letters:
ă | î | ș | ț | â |
Much of the punctuation and formatting (caps, italics) is like old French Braille:
as seen in the chart at right. In addition, the dash and ellipsis are both
values which were also reported by UNESCO (1990) but could not be confirmed by UNESCO (2013).
UNESCO (1990) reports inner quotation marks ⠠⠀⠠ ‘...’, while the chart at right appears to show a highly unusual double point, ⠄⠄, for the apostrophe. Other sources, however, have the normal single point, ⠄. [1]
Vietnamese Braille is the braille alphabet used for the Vietnamese language. It is very close to French Braille, but with the addition of tone letters. Vietnamese Braille is known in Vietnamese as chữ nổi, literally "raised letters", while electronic braille displays are called màn hình chữ nổi.
Russian Braille is the braille alphabet of the Russian language. With suitable extensions, it is used for languages of neighboring countries that are written in Cyrillic in print, such as Ukrainian and Mongolian. It is based on the Latin transliteration of Cyrillic, with additional letters assigned idiosyncratically. In Russian, it is known as Шрифт Брайля.
Bharati braille, or Bharatiya Braille, is a largely unified braille script for writing the languages of India. When India gained independence, eleven braille scripts were in use, in different parts of the country and for different languages. By 1951, a single national standard had been settled on, Bharati braille, which has since been adopted by Sri Lanka, Nepal, and Bangladesh. There are slight differences in the orthographies for Nepali in India and Nepal, and for Tamil in India and Sri Lanka. There are significant differences in Bengali Braille between India and Bangladesh, with several letters differing. Pakistan has not adopted Bharati braille, so the Urdu Braille of Pakistan is an entirely different alphabet than the Urdu Braille of India, with their commonalities largely due to their common inheritance from English or International Braille. Sinhala Braille largely conforms to other Bharati, but differs significantly toward the end of the alphabet, and is covered in its own article.
The Esperanto language has a dedicated braille alphabet. One Esperanto braille magazine, Esperanta Ligilo, has been published since 1904, and another, Aŭroro, since 1920.
The goal of braille uniformity is to unify the braille alphabets of the world as much as possible, so that literacy in one braille alphabet readily transfers to another. Unification was first achieved by a convention of the International Congress on Work for the Blind in 1878, where it was decided to replace the mutually incompatible national conventions of the time with the French values of the basic Latin alphabet, both for languages that use Latin-based alphabets and, through their Latin equivalents, for languages that use other scripts. However, the unification did not address letters beyond these 26, leaving French and German Braille partially incompatible and as braille spread to new languages with new needs, national conventions again became disparate. A second round of unification was undertaken under the auspices of UNESCO in 1951, setting the foundation for international braille usage today.
Armenian Braille is either of two braille alphabets used for writing the Armenian language. The assignments of the Armenian alphabet to braille patterns is largely consistent with unified international braille, with the same punctuation, except for the comma. However, Eastern and Western Armenian are assigned braille letters based on different criteria. The conventions for Western Armenian were developed in Lebanon.
Luxembourgish Braille is the braille alphabet of the Luxembourgish language. It is very close to French Braille, but uses eight-dot cells, with the extra pair of dots at the bottom of each cell to indicate capitalization and accent marks. It is the only eight-dot alphabet listed in UNESCO (2013). Children start off with the older six-dot script, then switch to eight-dot cells when they start primary school and learn the numbers.
Italian Braille is the braille alphabet of the Italian language, both in Italy and in Switzerland. It is very close to French Braille, with some differences in punctuation.
Portuguese Braille is the braille alphabet of the Portuguese language, both in Portugal and in Brazil. It is very close to French Braille, with slight modification of the accented letters and some differences in punctuation.
Turkish Braille is the braille alphabet of the Turkish language.
According to UNESCO (2013), there are different braille alphabets for Urdu in India and in Pakistan. The Indian alphabet is based on national Bharati Braille, while the Pakistani alphabet is based on Persian Braille.
Similar braille conventions are used for three languages of India and Nepal that in print are written in Devanagari script: Hindi, Marathi, and Nepali. These are part of a family of related braille alphabets known as Bharati Braille. There are apparently some differences between the Nepali braille alphabet of India and that of Nepal.
Ukrainian Braille is the braille alphabet of the Ukrainian language. It is based on Russian Braille, with a few additional letters found in the print Ukrainian alphabet.
Spanish Braille is the braille alphabet of Spanish and Galician. It is very close to French Braille, with the addition of a letter for ñ, slight modification of the accented letters and some differences in punctuation. Further conventions have been unified by the Latin American Blind Union, but differences with Spain remain.
Burmese Braille is the braille alphabet of languages of Burma written in the Burmese script, including Burmese and Karen. Letters that may not seem at first glance to correspond to international norms are more recognizable when traditional romanization is considered. For example, သ s is rendered ⠹th, which is how it was romanized when Burmese Braille was developed ; similarly စ c and ဇ j as ⠎s and ⠵z.
Several braille alphabets are used in Ghana. For English, Unified English Braille has been adopted. Four other languages have been written in braille: Akan (Twi), Ga, Ewe, and Dagaare. All three alphabets are based on the basic braille letter values of basic Latin alphabet:
The braille alphabet used for the Kyrgyz language is based on Russian Braille, with a few additional letters found in the print Kyrgyz alphabet.
The braille alphabet used for the Kazakh language is based on Russian Braille, with several additional letters found in the print Kazakh alphabet.
Philippine Braille or Filipino Braille is the braille alphabet of the Philippines. Besides Filipino (Tagalog), essentially the same alphabet is used for Ilocano, Cebuano, Hiligaynon and Bicol.
Catalan Braille is the braille alphabet of the Catalan language. It is very close to French Braille: it uses the 26 letters of the basic braille alphabet, plus several additional letters for ç and what are, in print, vowel letters with diacritics; these differ from their French values only in the need to accommodate the Catalan acute accent: ú, ó, í for what are in French Braille ù, œ, ì :