Xiao'erjing is written from right to left, like other writing systems using the Perso-Arabic script. The Xiao'erjing writing system is unusual among Arabic script-based writing systems in that all vowels, long and short, are explicitly marked at all times with Arabic diacritics; this means that Xiao'erjing is technically an abugida, in contrast to the abjad classification of most Perso-Arabic script varieties. This is also in contrast to some other Arabic-based writing systems in China, such as the Uyghur Arabic alphabet, which uses full letters and not diacritics to mark short vowels.
^ abSobieroj, Florian. (2019) "Standardisation in Manuscripts written in Sino-Arabic Scripts and xiaojing". Creating Standards: Interactions with Arabic script in 12 manuscript cultures, edited by Dmitry Bondarev, Alessandro Gori and Lameen Souag, Berlin, Boston: De Gruyter, pp. 177–216. https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110639063-008
^Centre for the Study of Religion and Communism (2003). Religion in communist lands, Volume 31. Centre for the Study of Religion and Communism. p. 13. Retrieved 2010-11-30.
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