Registered sgn-* tags

[Peter Constable]

> From: ietf-languages-bounces at alvestrand.no [mailto:ietf-languages-
> bounces at alvestrand.no] On Behalf Of Doug Ewell


> > These are cases in which it cannot simply be assumed that the
> > semantics of the whole can be derived by merely registering the
> > semantics of the subtag.


> What about sgn-US?  This can be generated, not only under the new RFC
> 3066bis mechanism, but even under the old RFC 3066 language-country
> mechanism.  In either case, the generative meaning of sgn-US would
> logically be "Sign Languages as used in the United States."  That's
what
> you get when you concatenate the meaning of "sgn" and the meaning of
> "US".

But that is not the registered semantics for "sgn-US", and considering
that there are at least three distinct signed languages associated with
the US, there is no choice but to grandfather the registered tag
"sgn-US". We could deprecate it and register an atomic subtag for ASL
(which is what I argued for three years ago, obviously unsuccessfully),
but the registered semantics of "sgn-US" would still have to be
documented.


Peter Constable