Recently in Glyph Du Jour Category
It's been a few weeks since a post, so I thought I would celebrate the Northern Hemisphere winter solstice with some snowflake symbols from the Unicode list.
| Character Name | Character | Hex Entity Code | Decimal Entity Code |
|---|---|---|---|
| SNOWFLAKE | ❄ | &x2744; | ❄ |
| TIGHT TRIFOLIATE SNOWFLAKE | ❅ | &x2745; | ❅ |
| HEAVY CHEVRON SNOWFLAKE | ❆ | &x2746; | ❆ |
Why the Snowflake Symbols?
I am stumped on this one. These symbols come from the "Dingbats" block of Unicode which normally includes other 'images' like the pointy finger and the leaf bullet. I had thought that these snowflakes may represent some meteorological concept, but I'm not finding any references to them. Doesn't mean one won't turn up in the future though.
Snowflake Font support
You usually need a font with a large set of math symbols to also get the extra "science" symbols. Some good bets are:
- Arial Univode MS (bundled with Windows)
- Apple Symbol, Hiragino Mincho Pro W3 (Japanese), Hiragino Mincho Pro W6 (Japanese ), Lucida Sans (bundled with Mac OS X)
- Unicode Symbols
- Hindsight Unicode
- CERG Chinese Font
- Chrysanthi (Chryʃsanþi)
If you actually want to enter these symbols into a document, then your best bet is usually the Windows Character Map, the Macintosh Character Palette or the Macintosh Unicode Hex Input Keyboard.
This is a phonetic symbol I have seen before, but did not understand...until this semester. This is the vowel found in the standard RP British pronunciation of bird /bɜd/ (U.K.) or /br̩d/ in U.S. English.
Many accents in English, including UK English, have generally lost the /r/ after a vowel while standard American has maintained this /r/. What's interesting is that even though the /r/ is theoretically gone, there are still subtle changes in pronunciation where the /r/ used to be...which is why English speakers can still "hear" an /r/ even though it may not really be there any more.
Script standards seems like a relatively innocent topic, but you do encounter the strangest questions. For instance, a few weeks the Unicode list is discussing how to encode Swastika variants. Before you faint with shock, consider
1) The swastika is encoded as a symbol used in historical documents, so we’re stuck with it. It’s actually encoded in the Unihan (East Asian) block at point at U+534D.
2) The swastika is actually a positive sign in the East (India/East Asia). It was even used in a non-political manner in the West...before the rise of the Nazi party. I even found a 1920’s handkerchief from a great aunt with a charming cross stick swastika motif (in blue).
The actual discussion is whether you need swastika variants (e.g. rotated or with different arms). But it also brings up an interesting cultural question - How long should we let the atrocities of the Nazi party hold a symbol hostage?
Right now the display of the swastika is banned in Germany...which has a logic to it. But has some odd consequences in that you can’t sell any WWII comics in Germany, even if they’re from the Allied point of view! You also can’t even sell any manga comics which may have a Buddhist non-violet swastika displayed.
Similarly, someone in the discussion section of the Swastika Wikipedia page did NOT want this page to ever be a "Featured" page, even though the goal was to discuss the positive Eastern uses of the symbol. It can head into censorship territory.
I reject using the symbol in a Neo-Nazi context, but in the spirit of trying to undo a crime of culture, I made some Swastika symbol samples from various Asian fonts. These aren't nearly as toxic.
A combination of question mark and exclamation point described in the Wikipedia as "rarely used, nonstandard English-language punctuation mark" (21 Mar 2007).
Here is a sample of it in different fonts
So what's doing in the Unicode specification? Here are some likely reasons:
- There may be historical documents using it - This was invented by Martin K. Speckter in 1962 to make advertisments using "?!" look "cleaner" (compare WTH?I with WTH‽). Ads from that era may include the "interrobang"
Note: Historic usage is also why Unicode includes provisions for Tolkein scripts. - Because it's there - The interrobang may arise again some day if fonts include it
Interrobang Now
A few fonts designed for Unicode include the Interrobang character. The interrobang is also in the new Microsoft Clear Type fonts, but it not widespread. On the other hand, most graphic designers could probably use super compressed character spacing to create one on the fly if it's really needed.But...if you really want one on your Web site, just use code ‽ and it should appear on most modern browsers. In other documents, you can use the Windows Character Map or the Mac Character Palette.
You never know when you might say "Unicode has a separate interrobang character‽"
Additional Reading
If there's one phonetic symbol Americans are mostly likely to know it's the "schwa" /ə/ or "upside down e" for the "uh" sound. I personally remember from elementary school. Here it is in multiple fonts
Sound
In phonetics this is the sound similar to "uh" in American English. In many dialects of English, vowels of unstressed syllables are commonly pronounced as schwa and is one reason for spelling difficulties (e.g. is it -ible or -able both of which are really [əbəl]) It's a common "neutral" or "resting" vowel found in many languages including French, Welsh, Irish and others.Origin of Glyph
Schwa is close to Spanish "e" (and closer to French "e" of le), so that's why the Letter E got flipped in this case.Origin of Name
The word "schwa" is from the Hebrew word שְׁוָא (šěwā’, /ʃəˈwa/), meaning "nought"—it originally referred to one of the niqqud vowel points used with the Hebrew alphabet, which looks like a vertical pair of dots under a letter. This sign has two uses: one to indicate the schwa vowel-sound–http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schwa#The_term (19 Feb 2007)
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