Серия «Тибетский язык», курс 1: Тибетский алфавит, занятие 7

[Speaker 1]
So this will be a class continuing and concluding the three head letters, or superjoined letters in the Tibetan orthography, or spelling, okay? So just to review what we had in the last video, we have three possible head letters, ra, la, and sa. And we discussed superjoining, or connecting the first one to other letters, and the effects that it had on pronunciation.

And again, we cut the letter in half, and we use this little T on the top. We don't...except there's one exception, I'll talk about it some other day. But in general, you'll see this little T on top, and that's a superjoined, or a head letter, ra, okay?

So now today, our goal will be to finish the la and sa as a head letter, and discuss its effects on pronunciation. So let's go to a new piece of paper. And today we're talking about la and sa as superjoined letters, okay?

So if we go back to our mother letter of the Tibetan alphabet, the first letter of the alphabet, and you know, when they're talking about somebody who's stupid in Tibetan, they'll say they can't even pronounce ka. So what we would say A, we start from A to Z, they'll say go from ka. It means, the ka is the mother and the beginning of all things.

So...this is a full-size ka. When you superjoin a la, you would go something like this, okay? So, notice that the la is shrunk in half, and the ka is shrunk in half, to accommodate the same vertical spacing, okay?

So, say la, ka, tak, ka, okay? The last thing you say when you jorlok or spell out loud is what the whole thing is together, C, A, T, cat. La, ka, tak, makes ka.

La ka ta ka, la ka ta ka, okay? Again, because you've learned the columns, you have a huge head start on everyone else in the universe who tries to learn Tibetan, because you know the first column is already high tone, and you know it's already unaspirated. It's as high as it can be, and it cannot be more active.

Aspiration indicates activity in Tibetan. For example, bap means to drop something, pap means to fall. You see what I mean?

So, it's already as active, and it's already as assertive as it can be as far as tone. So, there's no effect when you add a head letter, okay? We can just knock off the sa at the same time.

The sa shrinks, the ka shrinks, and they become one stack. Say sa, ka tak, ka. Read this one.

Jorlok. Jorlok means please read it out loud for me. La, you pause slightly, you say la, ka tak, ka.

It means la plus ka makes ka. Say la, ka tak, ka. Sa, ka tak, ka.

Okay, you pause slightly between, and it means c-a-t-kat. You don't say c-a-t-kat. You say ra, ka tak, ka.

There's two pauses there, right? Okay, here we go. Is there anything else to say?

Oh, first column, right? You can't change the sound, nothing's going to change. Second column, what?

Don't take head letters. Second column doesn't take head letters. When I say column, of course I'm referring to the first five letters of the column.

After that it breaks down, okay? Here we go on a third column, which would be what? Ka.

Use those eyebrows. Ka. You want to go on a date?

Ka. Okay, ka. Got it?

Ka. Okay, add one of these other two head letters. We already discussed ra.

And we'll do the sa at the same time, okay? Say la. La.

Ka tak. Ka tak. Ga.

Ga. I'm afraid that normally when you jor lok, you already indicate the effect halfway through. I believe you don't say ka tak.

You're already saying ka tak, okay? It shouldn't logically be that way, but I think it is. Say la.

La. Ka tak. Ka tak.

Ga. Ga. Sa.

Sa. Ka tak. Ka tak.

Ga. Ga. Do we have this sound in English?

Ka. No, unless you're on a date or something. Okay, and then this do we have in English?

Yeah, we do. God, job, got you, golly, okay, gone. Okay, we have ga.

We don't have ka, okay? Okay, that finished the third column. Where we got left?

Let's talk about the fourth column, which is the? Nasal column. Okay, good.

Let's take a na, which is a little easier to work with. And we'll—I don't think there's an L on top of an N ever. Yeah, never.

But that's just another point, okay? I don't think that exists. Let's go to here.

Okay, there is a rare word, but I'm not going to talk about it. Say sa.

[Speaker 2]
Sa. Na.

[Speaker 1]
Na. Na tak. Na tak.

Na. Na. Sa.

Sa. Na tak. Na tak.

Na. Na. Okay, got it?

So we finished the three head letters. Just since we have a few minutes extra, let's see how the vowel symbols do— what kind of effect do they have? How about this?

This would be what? Ki. Ki.

What would this be, if it existed? Ki. Ki.

Same, no change. High tone, unaspirated, but now it has an E vowel. Jorlock this for me.

Sa. Ka tak. Ka tak.

Gi ku. Gi ku. Ki.

So you don't say the... You don't say the...it's not a cumulative. You add all the parts and then...sa ka ta ka gi ku...

No, you're right, I'm sorry. That's not correct. Say sa.

Sa. Ka. Ka.

Tak. Tak. Ka so far.

Ka so far. Gi ku. Gi ku.

Ki. Ki. So here's the whole jorlock, C-A-T-K-A-T, for this stack.

Sa. Sa. Ka tak.

Ka tak. Ka. Ka.

Gi ku.

[Speaker 2]
Gi ku. Ki. Ki.

[Speaker 1]
Got it? Okay. Let's try the next vowel, which is what?

Symbol. Shab kyu. Shab kyu.

Okay. By the way, just for an example, shab is honorific. High honorific for leg.

An attendant in Tibetan is called shab chi. Chi means they wipe. Feet wiper.

I mean, it's kind of... To an American it sounds bad, but in Tibetan it's considered very respect. It's like Jesus washing someone's feet.

Like, the word for an attendant is a very high word. They are a feet washer. Meaning, you are really cool.

You see, it's not an insult in Tibetan. Okay, so... Ka.

Shab kyu. Right? You're not gonna do this, okay?

Please never draw it like this. You're always gonna make two strokes, because that's what you would do with a bamboo pen. You see the difference in the shape?

This looks more attractive to a Tibetan. This looks a little weird. You know, if you're dying to do some time, you can get into how people write English, and you can tell if they're from Russia or Spain, just by how they write.

Because they don't quite make the characters the way they would make it if they grew up in America or Britain or something. Okay, so say ka. Shab kyu.

Ku. Not ku. Ku.

Retain it. Now this one would be, if it existed, which I don't think it does, well, it does in some combinations, but... Sa.

Gatak. Ga. Shab kyu.

[Speaker 2]
Gu.

[Speaker 1]
Okay? That's a cumulative spelling. C-A-T, cat.

But in Tibetan it would be, C-A-K-T, cat. Got it? You say what you've got at each point, cumulatively, okay?

Next one. Let's try another vowel just to get used to the vowels on here. Here's an easy one.

Sorry for the slurping. Sa.

[Speaker 2]
Sa.

[Speaker 1]
Natak. Na. Na.

Na.

[Speaker 2]
Naro.

[Speaker 1]
Naro. No.

[Speaker 2]
No.

[Speaker 1]
Okay, no. No means sharp. No means period.

So you have to keep the quality of the high tone or low tone. You can't lose it or lose the meaning, okay? No means period.

No means sharp. Or something else. That's a different head letter.

Anyway. Say Sa. Sa.

Natak.

[Speaker 2]
Natak.

[Speaker 1]
Na. Na. Naro.

Naro. No. No.

Okay, no. Good. Okay, so we've seen the effect of the vowel symbols on the three possible head letters that we've had so far.

That's all the head letters that there are in Tibetan. And next we'll be going to sub-join letters. So there are letters that can be joined at the bottom, okay?

How would you... So what's the difference? If you see a letter stacked on another one, how do you know if it's a letter with a head letter, or a letter with a sub-join letter?

Is this a la with a ka joined below it? Or is this a ka with a la stuck on top of it? And that needs some training.

Okay, for that you need some training. And there's a few ambiguities. So we'll have to get into that later.

You know, how can you tell if this is a la with a ka joined under it, or if this is a ka with a la joined over it? Why that matters is that when you look it up in a dictionary, you have to know what's the main letter. This will be alphabetized under the case, and not under the else.

You see what I mean? So you have to know which is the head letter, and which is the main letter, and which is the sub-join letter. Okay, and we'll get into that in the next Tibetan Alphabet video.

Thank you.