foniemic transcrippshn & pronunncieishn gaid spelling

saxon-alfa-compared to truespel
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The PROBLEM - Reading - writing - spelling

Saxon Spanglish [SS] is a proposal to restore the Saxon alphabet and to use it as the basis for a new pronounciation guide spelling standard. 

The objectives of SS are very modest: Teach everyone two systems of writing English: The traditional mostly logographic system primarily based on the way that words were pronounced before the invention of the printing press and a modern pronunciation guide spelling suitable for dictionaries and for everyday typing and communication.  The primary use of the new [old] code would be as an i.t.a. and pronunciation guide.

Everyone agrees that we need a way to talk about English speech sounds but there is disagreement over what the code should be and when it should be introduced.  Few primary school or ESL teachers want to be bothered with teaching two codes. 

English already requires two systems of spelling so the only novelty in the proposed introduction of a saxon based ascii code is a pronunciation guide spelling that can be used for everyday communication. Spanglish is not handicapped with special characters or unfamiliar sound signs.

Spanglish represents a proposal to introduce a practical keyboard compatible pronunciation guide spelling. The Spanglish code [SS] is practical in several respects: 

[1] looks like English, 
[2] shows pronunciation
[3] shows primary stress
[4] can be typed rapidly 
[5] makes spelling predictable 
[6] can be used as a simple consistent initial teaching alphabet. 

Saxon-Spanglish [SS] starts with the historical English alphabet and the most historial spelling conventions.  The transition to the multicode traditional spelling system is achieved by adding additional coding coventions. It not only introduces modern spelling and pronunciation but OE and ME as well. 

For an introduction to sound spelling
check out www.unifon.org/truespel-intro.html and www.unifon.org/unifon-intro.html

SS is a broad phonemic transcription and writing system for American and British English.  Saxon Spanglish is based on the 10th century west Saxon standard, an augmented Latin alphabet. This is why the orthography retains a latin or spanish flavor. The Old English or Saxon writing system was highly phonemic which makes this alphabet worth restoring in an updated form. The Oxford philologist and Anglo Saxon scholar, Henry Sweet, was instrumental in getting much of it restored in the IPA, The International Phonetic Alphabet.

Since IPA invented new letters and symbols, there was no need to restore the practice of using double consonants to mark short stressed vowels.  Since Spanglish introduces no new symbols, it not only uses the old double consonant convention but extends it to words of non-germanic origin: e.g., acommodeit for accommodate. The practice of using a silent e to mark long vowels was not used until after 1600 to deal with the shifted pronunciation of the broad a. The [silent e] is not part of Spanglish but it is part of another notation, RITE.

The present day writing system used for English is archaic. [Shaw's assessment] The spelling is largely based on Middle English pronunciation, a dialect that no one currently speaks. This accounts for much of the lack of correspondence between speech and the written word. We are not spelling today's pronunciation but the pronunciation of some bygone era.

Spanglish restores the old English alphabet and most of the sound system used from the time the Roman letters were first adopted until around 1400. It is the same set of symbol-sound correspondences used by the rest of the world. All languages that adopted the Roman letters also adopted the associated Latin sounds. 

Over time the vowels in some words will shift.  When this happened in other countries, they respelled the word.  Such a correction never happend in England. Instead of standardizing the alphabet [letter-sound correspondences], England standardized word spellings.

The original latin based Saxon sound system was highly phonemic and is of greater value than the Middle English spellings such as knight, knife, and enough since these words are no longer pronounced as they were then. The gutteral [gh] sound in enough is no longer a recognized sound so it and a few others are dropped in the updated SS alphabet.  The word enough is respelled enuff reflecting today's speech. The double consonant [ff] indcates a short stressed vowel [in the cased a mid lax vowel].

Saxon Spanglish [SS] represents a proposal to introduce a practical keyboard compatible pronunciation guide spelling. The Spanglish code is practical in several respects: [1] SS looks like English, [2] SS shows a pronunciation that can be widely understood, [3] SS shows primary stress without the use of diacritics, [4] SS can be typed rapidly, [5] SS can be spelled with near 100% accuracy, [6] SS can be used as a simple consistent initial teaching alphabet.

The alphabet below will appear quite familiar. The main difference is the inclusion of all of the vowels [yellow cells] and the fact that most letters have only one sound.  c has two sounds [k and s]. th has two sounds. w has three possible sounds since [wh] is not included as a separate letter. w and y are semi vowels. Their vowel sounds are /u/ and unstressed /i:/. The only new consonant is [zh] as in mezher [measure], lezher [leisure], and azher [azure]. The stressed ending is spelled [ur] as in ashyur [assure]

L I N K S

According to Mark Twain, Noah Webster, and Benjamin Franklin, the first step in a rationalization of the English writing system is the restoration of a [phono-graphic] alphabet.  This is the most important feature of the proposed reform.  There has to be a more fixed relationship between symbols and sounds if spelling is to be a relaible guide to pronunciation.  Something close to the 1000 year old Saxon alphabet [above] is used as the model.  Using this alphabet or sound-symbol correspondenses, most English words can be pronounced as written and understood.  The pronunciation will be strange, something like Middle English but most words will not be beyond recognition. [see the 500 most frequently used words].

Sounding out words as they are spelled is called spelling pronunciation.  This practice, pronouncing words as they are spelled, is a little dangerous in a script with an abundance of silent letters.  [a list of ghost letters].  One is likely to pronounce the <B> in <debt> and pronounce [cubberd] as "cup board".

The sounds of many words will be shifted slightly so the accent may be a little off but not so far off as to change the meaning of a word.  Only about 10% of the present day spellings would have to be changed in order to be understood when pronounced according to the Saxon alphabet. 

In one sense the revised Saxon alphabet is incomplete.  It provides no guidelines for the pronunciation of [gh].  Since this gutteral sound is no longer pronounced, there seemed to be little justification in adding it to the list of phonograms.  Words containing [gh] have to be respelled.  through-thru, rough-ruff, plough-plau, thought-thot/thawt, ...

In the proposed alphabet reform, only words that cannot be pronounced as spelled and be understood in context would be candidates for respelling.  Useless silent letters would also be subject to removal because they generally serve only to confuse.  [giv] and [hav] are just as easy to read as <give> and <have>.

The typical respellings involve removing letters that are no longer pronounced such as the [gh] in rough and replacing them with the sound signs that matches today's pronunciation. [ruff].  It also involves standardizing the use of double consonants to make spelling more predictable. Check out the list of the 500 most frequently used words.

One can also write using a pronunciation guide spelling such as  but this is not the proposal.  If we wrote using the Saxon alphabet and today's pronunciation we would change over 60% of the word spellings. Anything more than a 10% change is probably more than most people would want to deal with.  However, if the writing system was fully overhauled, the next paragraph shows what it would look like.  The Saxon-Spanglish proposal is simply to standardize the alphabet and pronunciation guide spelling and use the latter as an i.t.a.  next paragraph 

Thiez peijaz discraib a foanograffic alfabet and a transcrippshen sisstem.  The werd, Spanglish, yuuzualy refurrz tu a haibrid Spanish-English vocabbulary - yuuzualy Spanish with a smattering av English werds. The following peijaz descraib a consisstent Laetin beisd orthoggrafy for English that will meik mor sens tu Spanish spiekerz thann tradisshanal historrical spelling. [i.e., spelling words as they were pronounced 500 years ago]. 

Spanglish daz not straiv for perfecshan.  The goal iz tu bi as funcshanal as the raiting sistems for Spanish and Italian.  The Spanish spelling sisstem iz 90% predictabl, so iz Spanglish. Ritten Spanish provaidz a reliabl gaid tu pronuncieishen - the seim iz tru for Spanglish: it can bi pronounst az ritten.

Wat yu aar rieding hir iz not the propoazd riform.  Spanglish iz a parralel script, i.t.a., and pronunnciashan gaid.  Spanglish iz sisstemaetic raether than 100% foniemic.  A fully foniemic sistem wud hav wan and only wan simbel per sound.  Spanglish yuuzualy hazz twu spellings per sound, stresst soundz aar not spelld the seim az unstresst soundz.  Therr aar olso pozishanal varriashans in SS such az the yuus av e instead of a with [r] az in her. 

Summ aargyu that this kind av variashan iz still foniemic bicoz [er] and [err] bicomz separate simmbals for sound. If [er] is the sound in [her], then it cannot bi yuuzd for the sound in error unless [err] is another [anvther] simbal.  Spanglish yuuzaz dubbl connsonants to indikeit stress: e.g.,  [err] [edj], [ell].  hair=herr or heir.  The sound spelling <HAIR> [haa+ir] corresponds tu the the tradishanal pronunnciashan av [hire]. 

One of the most common sources of misspellings is the lack of a rule regarding double consonants.  Middle English had a rule, double after a stressed short vowel.  Modern English uses etymological spellings about half the time.  The two conflicting principles lead to total chaos.  Short of memorizing the dictionary, there is no way to keep these spellings straight.  Spanglish drops all references to etymological spelling leaving one consistent rule: Double consonants after a short stressed vowel.
 

Spanglish	Traditional	Spanglish	Traditional
asist astrollajy aenonimmity advans appathy aplaud	assist astrology anonymity advance apathy applaud	asassin atennd aplaud agrieabl acusstom adress [v]   addres [n]	assassin attend applaud agreeable accustom address

 

Saxon-Spanglish is a simple phonemic transcription system for English that serves as a starting point for learning the more complex tradtional writing system.	Saxon-Spanglish iz a simpl foniemic transcrippshan sisstam for English thaet servz az a staarting point for lerning the mor complex tradishanal raiting sistem.
Words that are spelled the same rhyme   Werdz thaet aar spelld the seim raim
Spanglish is a type of pronunciation guide spelling.  It is highy correlated with the pronunciation guide in the dictionary but not highly correlated with historical spelling. The historical spelling  of a word is often based on and old [pre-1500]  pronunciation.  The difference between Spanglishand other pronunciation guide systems is [1] Spanglish shows stress without using diacritics, [2] Spanglish uses only the symbols found on the standard keyboard, and [3] Spanglish looks good in print and is quite readable.  Since redundant letters are removed, Spanglish is about 6% shorter than traditional English and can but cut more by eliminating the double letters used to mark stress.  Since Spanglish is also designed to teach the traditional system, it includes some irregularities found in Spanish such as the two valued letter c:  can city [cann citty]	I  N  D  E  X - Problems   | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 - Definitions  |  1 |  2  |  3  |  4  |  5 | - Audio        |  1 |  2  |  3  |  4  |  5 | - Dyslexia & writing systems | 1 | 2 | - Basic Code    1 | 2 | 3  | 4 | 5 | 6 - Number of phonemes |  46 | 21v | 44f - Symbols for phonemes12  3  4 -History   |  1 |  2  |  3  |  Origins |  1 | 2  | - Criteria for adequate solutions - Start with a unifonic alphabet/keyboardu2 - Rationale for the SS solution | 1 | 2 | 3 | - Arguments against   1 | 2 | 3 | 4 - Humor   |  1  |  2  |  3  |  4  |  5 - JSSS   |  28  |  29  | 30  |  31  | 32  | -Six Axioms    Alt. Solutions  | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 |

A comparison of Spanglish and IPA.  Spanglish is [1] more readable, [2] broader, [3] uses only ascii keyboard characters, [4] uses the same system as English for marking short stressed vowels. 
4
Vowels and Combinations (Br./Am.) in five notations
Unifon II, SAMPA, Kirshenbaum, Saxon-Spanglish, Truespel
14 Pure Vowels [uncombined] | IPA-american  |  43 Rye List

6 short CHECKED vowels  [in alphabetical aeiou order]

U2 -S - K -SS   key         SAMPA    U2     TRUESPEL
--  -   -  --   --------   -----  ---    ---     --------
a   {   &  ae   pat  add    p{t   paet   pat      pat
e   E   E  e.   pet  el     pet   pet    pet      pet
i   I   I  i.   pit  ill    pIt   pit    pit      pit
Q   Q   A. Q    pot  odd    pQt   pQt    pQt Br   --- 
q   A   A  aa   pot  odd    pAt   pott   pqt Am   paat 
x   V   V  v    putt up     pVt   putt   pxt pct  put 
v   U   U  w    put  hook   pUt   put    pvt      poot

8 long FREE vowels

q   A   A  aa   alms father Amz   aamz   qmz fqDc aamz
A   e   e  ei   ace  ale    eis   eis    As       aes
E   i   i  ie   eel  east   il    iel    El       eel
R   3   V" urr  her  sir    h3d@  hurr   hRrdcr   herder
o   O   O  ao   awe  taut   tOt   taot   tot      taut
O   @U  @U oa   oat  owe    @ut   oat    Ot       oat
u   u:  u  uu   ooze hoop   u:z   uuz    uz       huep
c   @   O  a    ago  sofa   @g@u  ago    cgO      uggoe 
[blue - unstressed]

3 combinations
        keyss
I   @i  @i  ai   eyes  aiz
au  {u  &u  ou   out   out

any-enny
apathy - appathy, appathetic  [In English, double consonants are almost random]
apply - aplai, applicashan      [In Spanglish double consonants mark short stressed vowels]
around - around/araund      [aew would be the true blend] ou and au are approximations.
Simplified spellings - dictionary approved variants http://www.americanliteracy.com/spellings_.htm
 

The basic rules of Saxon Spanglish:  cut redundant letters - retain silent letters that have a function cut surplus double consonants [aply, acount ] but retain double      consonants used to mark short stressed vowels [ better, butter, appl]  stressed short vowels must be marked in multi-syllable words      The marker is a double consonant - enny better wimmen     bizzy & bizness both have two consonants before the next vowel.    The marker can be any two consonanats as in pickerand hvnter there are no short terminal vowels:  haa resumey the si silo so guru     but they can be unstressed ones in two syllable words: berry verry sofa stressed long vowels are marked with digraphs ei ie er ai oa yuu stressed short vowels are followed by dbl. consonants att, edj, ill,     off, buck as in [ attituud, appathy, bizzy, suddenly ]. All other double     consonants are surplus and can be eliminated [ aply, acount, alowance] No silent letters except in digraphs. [ h] used as a marker in th, ch, sh, zh

LATIN-1

[DE, P ] How do you spell through, trough, thought, taught  in Spanglish?
[SB]       thru, trof, thot, tawt.  Hi thot he had tawt the tott [taat, tqt] hau tu ried.

Dyslexic Dictionary - give the pronunciation guide spelling first. 

NTC published such a dictionary. All of the common mispellings are listed in light face and the "correct" spellings are in bold. There are over 2000 words with variant spellings in English. Some of the variants are British spellings [colour, theatre].  Here are a few. alc variant spellings

David Downing, Spell It Right Dictionary, NTC, Lincolnwood, IL

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/saundspel/files/14ipa-vowels16c.gif 

http://www.xibalba.demon.co.uk/jbr/phono.html    Good introduction to lingistical terms 
and an ascii IPA.