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AN
EXPLANATION OF SOUNDSPEL NOTATION
The roots of SoundSpel reach back to 1910. Today’s refinement of this notation is a studied balance between the ideal and the practical. SoundSpel is a 4% shorter than traditional spelling. It uses the traditional 26-letters and achieves a spelling close enough to the sound of carefully spoken words to be learned by children as readily as is i.t.a. Yet, it is close enough to current spelling to be read with reasonable fluency by present readers after a few lines of practice. Achieving that goal has required a compromise with Utopia, to wit: SoundSpel retains a few short, high frequency, illogically spelled words: of, the, as, to, was, do, etc. These have to be learned as logograms or sight words rather than as phonograms. This, for present readers, does much to preserve the normal, overall appearance of the page. In certain cases the position of a phoneme determines its spelling: how/out, saw/auto, etc. The current spellings of th for both thy and thigh and x for ks/gs are retained. Schwas have been retained as in traditional writing system where any vowel letter can be used to spell this unstressed mid lax sound. Retaining schwa encourages distinct pronunciation and aids foreign students in determining syllable breaks correctly. Today’s SoundSpel is intended to put English spelling in the same class as languages whose spellings are learned without significant difficulty. The fact that anything typed on keyboard by those who are now literate will be able to be transliterated into SoundSpel automatically by computer should remove some of the resistance to change. [on line converter] [stand alone converter is more robust and available at ALC] SoundSpel, then, is close enough to the sound of words to be learned easily by children, yet close enough to traditional spelling to be read by present readers after a few lines of practice. The term ‘SoundSpel’ is essentially correct, but should not be taken too literally. It should be understood as bringing enough order and logic to our present chaotic spelling to meet the need of those at the bottom of the literacy ladder, while inconveniencing those at the top as little as possible. This is certainly an eloquent explanation of what we are all attempting to do: Come up with a notation that will help those at the bottom of the literacy ladder while inconveniencing and annoying those at the top as little as possible. Our concern should not be for those at the top of the ladder since they can readily adjust to any code - even inconsistent ones. The problem may be that in order to help those at the bottom, the notation may need to be highly phonemic and systematic. A fully phonemic notation must respell at least 60% of the words in the dictionary. All of the phonemic proposals to date respell more than 75%. The amount of inconvenience tolerated by those at the top may be extremely low - The maximum amount of respelling they will tolerate is probably less than 10%. The great hope of the SSS has always been that there can be a compromise, a half way measure that will satisfy both constituencies. This may be a false hope. Find Hoffstaeder quote: ... than to change their orthography. "People are more likely to change religions than to change orthographies." The amount of resistance to change cannot be underestimated. What seems clear from two years of discussion is that it is very difficult to get those committed to the general idea to agree on a particular half way measure. There are hundreds of ways to make this compromise. How do you determine where to make the break? Should it be a 50% solutions such as surplus cut spelling, a 70% solution such as RITE, or a 90% solution such as Spanglish? Should the new spelling accept sound symbol correspondences closer to the Latin original that every other language uses or retain the idiosyncratic shifted values of the traditional writing system? What is the threshold of inconvenience of those already literate? My guess is that it is closer to a 10% change than to 70%. What is the It is possible to spell out the requirements of a new spelling system? 1. It must be readable without
a key. So far we have not come up with an objective test for
readability.
2. There must be an ASCII based version of the new code. While its published form may use diacritics, there must be a form of the new spelling that can be quickly typed on a standard QWERTY keyboard. 4. The new notation must not obscure the regularities found in the traditional notation. It should be compatible with widely accepted simplifications such as altho, thru, thoro, lite, acomadation, etc. There should be a way to get from one code to 85% of the other. This has sometimes been called backward compatibility. I think the new code should also illuminate Middle English and Old English. 5. It must be shown to make a 50% improvement in literacy rates. Unless the new code can make a significant dent in the illiteracy problem, it is not going to be seen as worth the temproary inconvenience. While i.t.a. enabled children to acquire a kind of literacy twice as fast as with the traditional writing system, most of those gains were often erased when the students transitioned to the conventional code. My thought is that people have to become literate in two codes, a pronunciation guide code and a hopefully evolving traditional code. The only type of evolving I can imagine for the traditional code is the greater acceptance of simpler variant spellings. although, through, thru, accommodation, etc. The new spelling should not be at odds with these evolutionary changes. From an article in the Journal of the Simplified Spelling Society [JSSS27] by Ed. Rondthaler There is already software on the Internet that will automatically convert any text written in the traditional writing system [TES] to ALC Fonetic. It is simply a matter of copying the text you want to convert and pasting it into the textbox on the screen. In seconds, the converted text appers in another textbox where it can be cut and pasted into email or printed out. The BTRSPL PERL converter simply substitutes words found in a word pair database. [many, meny years, yeers ago,ago ]. If you entered many years ago you would get back meny yeers ago. [fonetic converter] In 2000, ALC will unveil new stand alone software package that will convert words typed in TES to fonetic. This will enable one to type in simplified spelling before he or she has learned it. [ER] The SoundSpel notation ALC uses is a slight modification of 1941 Ripman, with 1960 Dewey revisions plus a bit of New Spelling [ NS90] (but not the y for ie), and no change in a dozen or so short high frequency words such as of, to, do, etc. A good example of it is the Nue York Tiems page in the JSSS 27-2000/1. I give a lecture on spelling reform, and at the end I ask a person in the audience who has never seen it before to read aloud an entire Mark Twain page printed in SoundSpel. The others in the audience have copies of the page and can follow along. NEVER has anyone had the slightest difficulty reading it. It always brings cheers. It convinces the group that reading a simplified spelling would be no problem. This has told me fifty times that SoundSpel can be read easily by present readers. As to writing it, they will be able to write it automatically with the new program -- until the spelling becomes familiar . So as to a notation that has been proved acceptable and workable by numerous readers I think we have it in SoundSpel (with an ample corpus of 44,000), and as to the automatic implimentation of writing we will have that with the new program. [SB] The same can be said about
Saxon Spanglish which is closer to Middle English than ALC fonetic.
Many words described as irregular turn out to be correct in Saxon: [They] should not be converted to [THAY]. [ Alien Amino Acid ] should not be respelled as [AELEEUN and UMEENO ASID in fonetic] it should be slightly repronounced as [ah-lee-en ah-mee-no ah-sid]. The point is not to duplicate
a particular dialect but to get close enough that the word can be understood
by all dialects. Just because [alien] has a spelling pronunciation
in Saxon of [a:li:'n]
is not a prescription for everyone to change their speech patterns.
sound ----------------------------------> spellings /a/ is represented by a:at /ae/ is represented by ae:sae,wae,sprae,maeking /aa/ is represented by a:car, aa:faather /au/ is represented by au:auto, aw:saw, a:allmoest (followed by ll), o:sofft (followed by ‘ff’, ‘st’ or ‘ng’) /air/ is represented by air:fair, err:staeshunerry /e/ is represented by e:bed /ee/ is represented by e:feever, e-:re-enter (stressed long vowel prefix) /er/ is represented by er:her /i/ is represented by i:it /ie/ is represented by i:iecon, i: justifi (words ending in /ie/) /o/ is represented by o: pot [same as aa?] /oe/ is represented by oe: soelar, o: potaeto (words ending in /oe/) /oi/ is represented by oi:toi,boi,joi /oo/ is represented by oo:moon, u:evenchual (unstressed /oo/ following ‘ch’, ‘j’ or ‘zh’) /ou/ is represented by ou: out, ow: cow /u/ is represented by u: up /ue/ is represented by ue: manuescript, yoo: yooth ues /uu/ is represented by uu: cuuk, u: jury shwaa is represented by a: abuv, e:ietem, i:pensil, o:iedol shwee is represented by e: react, i:patio, y:hapy | riyact, patiyo, happy shwer is represented by er: leter, or: author, ar: colar /b/ is represented by b:rob /ch/ is represented by ch:such /d/ is represented by d:sad /f/ is represented by f:fat /g/ is represented by g:big /h/ is represented by h:hat /j/ is represented by j:job /k/ is represented by k:kit, c:cat, q:qit (followed by /w/) /l/ is represented by l:let /m/ is represented by m:map /n/ is represented by n:sin /ng/ is represented by ng:sing, n:junk,jinx (preceding ‘k’ or ‘x’) /p/ is represented by p:pep /r/ is represented by r:raly, rr:carry (following stressed short-a,e,i,o,u) /s/ is represented by s:so, ss:wunss,sinss /sh/ is represented by sh: she, shoe, shoo /t/ is represented by t: tot, taut, pet /th/ is represented by th: the,thin /v/ is represented by v:vote /w/ is represented by w: wet, wh: when (following /h/) ’x’ is represented by x: extra, exam, cs: ecstasy /y/ is represented by y: yung /z/ is represented by z: zebra, s: tois /zh/ is represented by zh:mezher
Each cell in the table represents one of 36 phonemes and 12 compounds
found in English speech.
ALC Fonetic: Soundspel
[to ] is a word sign [U2 tu, tu] There is no rule to get from tu/too to [to]. *The au sound requires four exception rules to handl saw off, sofft,
all, moss? or? and song.
Can you recognize these words?
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For the complete Spanglish correspondence table see www.unifon.org/sp3.html
ee
is not defined and could be an alternate for ie. In ancient Saxon,
ee=ehh or ey. There are a variety of complexities [such as z=s and
s=ce [ais-aice?], tion for shen] that could be added to Saxon that would
make it more like TO. The issue is how many of the exceptions and
complexities to add in the base form. Saxon already includes the irregular
c. This convention makes ci, ce = si, se. Otherwise, c=k. o=awe
and can be replaced with ao or aw in the terminal position but not au
which is a slightly better approximation for ou in haus/house. y
which was the whistle lip y in Saxon [equivalent to the French
tu and rue] is now the schwi or [unstressed i:] in very. In other
positions, traditional spelling uses e for schi as in relief. [rielief,
rylief]
The Nu York Taimz
Fraiday, Janiuery 1, 2100 big raiz in littracy with Littracy in Other Devellopd Cunntryz
  
version 2 from R.A. Mole's Kid's Page: http://www.diac.com/~entente/spkids.htm#rules Rules for Sound Spell ALC's 'Soundspel' alphabet is shown below. Children, adults, and foreign pupils who learn this one-page system will be able to write-- "as it sounds"-anything they can say in English. The inherent phonetic principle is the well-established one normally followed by languages that use an alphabet. It is for English, an equivalent of the phonetic spelling used daily by all who write in Spanish, German, Hungarian, Swedish, Finnish, Italian, Turkish, Portuguese, Hebrew, Serbo-Croatian, Swahili, Dutch, Korean, Hindu and scores of other languages. Today we have the expertise, the system, and the great social and economic need for an orthography that frees us from the ordeal of memorizing thousands of spelling irregularities. Consonants and single sound consonant pairs b as heard in beg, habit, rib c/k as in cat, cup, became, kit, back ch as in chin, teacher, much d as in dog, ladder, bad f as in fan, effort, chief g as in get, wagon, big h as in hop, hip, head j as in jam, judge, edge l as in leg, alley, table m as in me, common, him n as in no, manner, tan ng as in song, ringing nk as in ink, think p as in pet, pepper, cap q as in queen, quake, liquid r as in red, arise, arrow s as in sit, lesson, sets sh as in she, issue, motion t as in top, butter, hit th as in thin, this v as in van, river, give w as in will, awoke, weather wh as in wheat, why, worthwhile x as in extra, exam y as in yet, victory z as in zebra, zones zh as in vision, pleasure Short vowels... the most frequently heard vowel sound a as heard in act, at, am, bag, can, tap, carry .... weak-a as in organ. e as in ebb, end, set, bed, mend, merry...weak-e as in novel. i as in it, in if, tip, pin, gives, banish .. weak-i as in pencil. o as in ox, odd, hot, sobs, boxes, sorry ... weak-o as in lemon. u as in up, us, but, fun, mud, gum, love. Long vowels ... Silent-e gives a preceding vowel its long name-sound. Ae as in A, ate, aim, same, cape, day, they ways. (Ae, aet, aem, saem...) Ee as in E, eel, eat, feet, field, team, scene, ski, key. (eel, feet, feeld, teem...) IE as in I, ice, tie, eye, guide, fight, ride, buy. (ies, tie, ie, gied...) OE as in O, old, toe, only, home, boat, sew, know (oeld, toe, oenly, hoem, boet,...) UE as in U, unit, hue, cute, used, utilize, few. (uenit, hue, cuet...) Vowel Pairs... each pair of letters represents a unit of sound. aa as in father, calm, ma air as in hair, fair, care, swear, where, their all as in all, tall, fall ar as in are, card, far, dollar au/aw as in auto, fraud, cause/ saw , sawing, lawyer er as in her, early, mercy, baker oi as in oil, join, toy oo as in ooze, eventual, moon, zoo or as in for, original, doctor, order ou/ow as in out, mouth, sound/ how, cows, power uu as in should, bush, put, foot, book, good ur as in jury, rural, allure, tour, azure
No change, by and large, in names that begin with a Capital letter. No change in was,as,of,he,she, me, we, be, do, to, thru , off, -ful, and their compounds. No change in plural-s (man's, his) and in the 3rd person present singular (he runs), even tho the s is pronounced z. Where confusion might arise (sees) use ss (seess). r r continues, as now, to indicate that the preceding vowel is short -- carry, merry, sorry. Unstressed "1/2-ee" sound continues to be spelled with e or i or y as heard in unstressed syllables of between, detect, reform, champion, editorial, fifty. Short vowels (a,e,i,o) in unstressed syllables are often given a neutral
pronunciation close to the sound of `uh' (about, system, easily, atom).
Phoneticians and linguists
NOTE: When you hear a word with a schwa, you cannot tell what vowel
is used to spell it. For example, the same sound is heard in nectar, theater
(British theatre),
A long-O or long-I sound at the end of a word may be written as a single
letter -- banjo, go, so, alibi, hi, mi fli (but -e is retained before a
suffix: banjoes, alibieing,
In vowel strings the syllable ends after the first fonetic vowel-pair -- flooid, freeing, hieer, power, continueing, evalueate; creativ, react, re-enter. We accept the flattery of a capital I for 'me'. Why not extent the courtesy -- a capital U for 'you'? culkin-40characters40sounds |
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14 Pure Vowels [first two columns]
6 short vowels, 8 long vowels, 4 combinations,
8 r- combinations,
Four notations: traditional spelling - [SS]
- {U2} - /ipa/
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| bat [batter] /baet/
bet [better] /bet/ bit [bitter] [bit] bottle [bottl] {bqtcl} * boss [bos] {bQs} put [pwt] {pvt} /put/ * book [pwt bwk] putt [bvt] {bxt} /bLt/ |
balm [baam] {bqm} /ba:m/
bait [beit] {bAt} /beit/ burn [bern] {bRn} /b3n/ beet [biet] {bEt} /bi:t/ bought [baot] {bQt}/bo:t/ boat [boat] {bOt} /bout/ booty [buuty] /bu:ty/ bogas {bOgcs} /boug's/ |
bite [bait] {bIt} /bait/
beauty {bUty} /bju:ti/ boil [boil] {boil} /boil/ bout [bout] {baut}/baut/ bough, [bou] / bau / pure vowels that are sometimes pronounced as two sounds * bait {bAt} /beit/ boat {bOt}/b@ut,bout/ |
ire [air] {Ir} bqrbc
barber [baarber] /ba@b@/ arrow [arro] {ar} /ae@/ bear [beir] {ber} /be@/ bird [berd] /b@rd/ beer [bir] {bir} /bi@/ bore [bor] /bo@/ tour [tur] /tu@/ tower [taur] /tau@/ |
Polyvalence
ei-18
uu-18 uu-29
uu-29
http://www.unifon.org/subtitle2.gif
The 14 pure vowels in different orthographies [foneme-symbols]
Long
Vowels in 
a
ei ie aw ow uu
Key Truespel Unifon Uni2 Spanglish Ian m-w SAMPA
--- ---- ---- ---- --------- ---- ---- ----
at at at at aet att ct at {t
el el el el ell el el El
it it it it itt it it It
odd GA aad od qd odd aad* a:d Ad
odd RP aud xd* Qd od od od Qd
hook ook Ck vk huk wk huk huk hUk
up up up 'cp xp upp vp ap ap '&p Vp
-----------6 short above----------------8 free below-----------
are aar or qr aar aar a:r Ar
ago uggoe cgO cgO ago agou &gO @goU
herd herd hurd hRd hurrd h3d h&rd h3`d
ace aes As As eis eis As es/eIs
eel eel El El iel jl iil El il/i:l
awe au x o ao o oo o O
or or xr or or or or O@/Or
owe oe O O oa ou O oU/&U
ooze uez uz uz uuz uuz u:z uz
use yuez Yz Uz yuuz yuuz yu:z juz
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out out qt aut out aut aut aut
boy boi bQ boi boi boy boi boi
