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Date: Sun, 7 Jan 2001 14:11:28 -0500 (EST)
From: Alfred M Kriman <akriman@darwin.helios.nd.edu>
Message-Id: <200101071911.f07JBSW17738@darwin.helios.nd.edu>
To: classics@u.washington.edu
Subject: Re: Not in the latest Explorator

James Butrica, on the statement issued by members of the Athens Academy
(not the high school in Georgia):
> It sounds as though they may be protesting a phenomenon comparable to one
> that we sometimes see in English, only with Greek letters as the
> interlopers (upper-case sigma often passes for E, for example; ...

The car company KIA uses a stylized _A_ in its logo.  It's basically a
lambda, and I can't help thinking KIL whenever I'm behind one of their
products.

> list-members might remember an album cover from -- I think -- Loreena
> McKennet a few years ago that was all in fake Greek characters, and I'm
> sure I've seen other examples in advertisements).

I haven't seen the cover so I'm not sure what "fake Greek characters"
are.  I think of Anthony Quinn as Zorba.  In January 1999 I pointed out
> The February issue of _Lingua Franca_ has an article ``Greek to me:
> how the Elgin Marbles ruined England'' pp. 52-59, by Lawrence Osborne.
>
> Perhaps to validate the double meaning of the title, p. 52 is decorated
> with characters that are Greek to the layout artist, including the
> section mark (§) and i-diaeresis (ï).

I think the study of fake foo characters has the potential to yield
quick little insights.  It's easiest to provide a phonological example
of what I mean:  Once an American colleague and I, thinking of how
Chinese sounds about like "ching chung chang," asked a Chinese student
what English sounded like to his ear, in the same essentiallized
nonsense-syllable way.  He came up with something like "sih-sa-suh."
Two-second Jabberwocky.

As long as I'm doing archives, and to atone for self-quoting earlier,
I'll recall that yesterday David Lupher noted earlier list discussion
of the rosy-fingered dawn scene in _Thin Red Line_.  A compact search
for the relevant postings is (mind the wrap)
http://omega.cohums.ohio-state.edu/cgi-bin/udmsearch.cgi?ps=20&o=0&m=all&ul=%2Fhyper-lists%2Fclassics-l%2F99-03&q=Thin+Red+Line

I don't know if it's still so, but fifteen years ago in Japan, in
addition to romaji, kanji, and the two kana syllabaries, Greek was also
in use:  "+[l.c. alpha]" meant `plus bonus' in job ads.  Of course, the
plus sign qualifies as Latin, since it, like the ampersand, is an
abbreviated form of _et_ (although in that sense kana qualifies as kanji,
runes and Latin characters as Greek and Semitic, etc., and as JB noted,
French is Latin).

.