Dear All,
A new SIG proposal. Sounds interesting. Any thoughts?
---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Patrick McAllister
Subject: Proposal for creation of a TEI SIG “Indic Texts”
Dear Hugh Cayless,
I'm writing to you, the director of the TEI technical council, because
Andrew Ollett (see CC) and I would like to start a TEI Special Interest
Group focused on Indic texts.
Our plan for this SIG is as follows:
##########
The proposed SIG “Indic Texts” aims to coordinate scholars engaged in
the study of Indic texts so as to establish a consensus on best
practices for using the TEI’s Guidelines to analyze these kinds of
texts.
There are several respects in which the applicability of the TEI guidelines
to these texts is less than obvious. These relate to distinctive features
of Indic textuality, including: the use of syllabic scripts, and the
non-coincidence of grapheme- (syllable-) and word-boundaries; the
application of phonotactic rules (sandhi) that further obscures the
boundaries between words; extensive compounding; the use of distinctive
media and writing supports (such as birch bark, palm leaves, and copper
plates); distinctive metrical patterns with different types of caesuras;
the prominence of the commentary as a genre, and the depth of intertextual
relations this implies; the frequent reuse of texts in other texts, which
requires careful and deliberate application of the "quoteLike" module.
The expected outcome of the SIG’s work is a practical guide, which could
perhaps be added to the TEI Guidelines, that analyzes common cases in
the markup of Indic texts and proposes ways in which the analytical
tools provided by the TEI Guidelines might best be used in these cases,
discussing benefits and drawbacks of the solutions possible.
##########
The SIG coordinators should be Andrew Ollett and I.
We would like to add that we have already spoken to quite a few
colleagues specialized in various areas of our field who are eager to
join this group and would welcome its creation. We hope that the
proposal, though quite general, will be accepted. Please let us know if
you need anything more to decide on this.
With best wishes,
--
Patrick McAllister
Email: patrick.mcallister@oeaw.ac.at
Phone: + 43 1 51581 6423
Institute for the Cultural and Intellectual History of Asia (IKGA)
Austrian Academy of Sciences
Hollandstraße 11-13, 2nd floor
1020 Vienna, Austria
http://www.ikga.oeaw.ac.at/
