short intro		truespel-2	truespel-3	ts-converter
alfaubet key	#vowel chart	#benefits	#samples	#quizts-dict

foenneemik transkrripshin sistim	afubet-- [see below] sampulz- [what it looks like] gettysburg address in truespel truespel products truespel converter vowel-chart- [with I.P.A.]
Because Truespel shows stress, 40 symbols can mark 43 speech sounds. i, u,  er & ee corresond to shwa, shwer, & shwi: related sounds sounds that are distinguished by stress: up/sofa   up/ soefu her/other  her/ uther very  :    vairee  :  Lp/sof'' h3:/ Ld'r  veri:  *17 symbols can represent 20 vowels	Table of Significant Sound Elements and Correspndences 40 SYMBOLS & a DOUBLING CONVENTION for 43 SOUNDS
Truespel Alfubet:- 40 phonograms: 17 vowels* - 23 consonants Truespel distinguishes these sounds as well as the IPA and much better than most reform orthographies. The short o, common in the british dialect, is missing in TS. Truespel is based on the  American accent or GA.

Truespel establishes a new alphabet for English and a new convention for showing stress.  Using this notation, you can indicate exactly how you pronounce any word, including regional dialects and most foreign words. 

Truespel is perhaps the World's first notation for phonemic spelling that

shows stress

uses common English spelling patterns

does not augment the alphabet with any special characters

Results of an automated transcription: Thee ubjjektiv uv truespel iz tue pruvvied u consistent noettaeshin that ennaeboolz yue tue spel ukkordeeng tue thee soundz or foeneemz yue heer. Convverselee, it ennaeboolz yue tue reed ulloud enee dieyulekt or laengwij speld in truespel. Truespel iz faar beter fer rieteeng dieyulekt than thu tradtional rieteeng sistim. Wun uv thee goelz uv thu truespel foundashin iz tue form u foenneemik anglocentric baesis fer lerneeng speekeeng reedeeng and anuliezeeng moest uv thee maejer laengwijiz.  [convert your own paragraph into truespel]
 

Simplee staetid, thu alfubbetikool printsipool implliez werdz that aar speld thu saem riem  (riemz with time, I'm, thyme, ....) and werdz that riem aar speld thu saem.  (riems with vein, sane, main,..) Eer riemz beekkum  ie riemz!

Since truespel gives a written rendering of the spoken word, it spells slang and accents as as easily as the standard dialect known as GA or General American. In effect, you spell what you hear. This both celebrates our diversity and enriches our communication.  Dialects can be clearly unambibuously  indicated using Truespel conventions.  Most books would be written mostly in the standard dialect [General American or Broadcast English] but it would be much easier to drop into a dialect and be understood.

To the extent that people could hear the standard dialect, they could spell it.  Most books would still be written in broadcast English or GA. Thus, in actual practice, spelling would be almost as standardized as it is today.  The definition of a spelling error would change and when the majority of people started to pronounce a word differently, there would be an automatic change in spelling. 

Truespel does not dictate a spelling standard.  Each dialect of English would be spelled in a different way and those reading aloud these spellings would tend to mimic the accent. 

TEXAS: "Aa luv maa haund daug."

Vowel Chart

The following chart compares three phonemic notations.  The most well know phonetic system is the one developed around 1900 by the International Phonetic Association.  Spanglish is an IPA type notation that does not use any special characters. 

There is general agreement among linguists that English speech contains a minimum of 12 pure or uncombined vocalic phonemes.  The American dialect does not have a separate phoneme for father and bother so the long a [aa] and short [au]  can be combined in GA -- the same symbol  [faather | baather] can be used for both sounds. 

Because of the unique stress marking system employed by Truespel, only 9 symbols are needed to mark 11 of the 12 pure vowels in English.  The obscure vowels are marked.  The only missing sound is the one missing from GA [General American], the short [au]. The following chart shows all the vocalic phonemes recognized by linguists.  The IPA conventions are those used by Jones, Wijk, and most dictionaries.
 

IPA INTERNATIONAL PHONETIC ALPHABET

foenneemik transkrripshin

Vowel Phoneme Table  with key words  - 4x6 table 
Mapping Truespel onto IPA's 21 essential sounds for RP English 
Since Truespel merges o/aa, and u/schwa, it has needs only 16 phonograms plus the 3 R combinations.
WIth 19 phonograms, and 3 unstressed vowels [u, er, aa], Truespel covers the same territory as IPA
the two missing IPA phonograms are [ng] and the British RP short [o].

IPA.21. - . Spanglish.25. - .Truespel.19
  6 checked    |   6 unchecked    |    5 - diphthongs   |   4 -  with shwa  [=21]

Chekt - short	Free - long	5 Difthongz	7 with schwa
æ ae a .	a: aa aa .	'i ai ie .	a' aar | ai' ier
at, ax ask, act cat	alms, want, star  5	eye, ice, bite, high	are, car  |  ire, fire
e e e .	3: er er er	ei ei ae .	e' er air .
edge let elbow  3	her girl surfer  word	ace, ape, vein, day	air, care, there, barely wear
i i. i .	i: ie ee ee	oi oy oi .	i' ir eer .
it, in, index, ill	eel, ski, sing, very	oil, boy, loyal, oyster	ear, fear, deer, mere, iritate
a o. aa . .turned a	: ao au . turned c	ou oa oe . turned e + u	:' or or oer turned c + schwa
ox, pot, otter	awe, call, cost, law	oh, oat, low, silo	for, four, floor, more, war
u w oo .	u: uu ue .	ju yu yue .	ju:' yur yuer .
hook,  put, could	ooze zulu zoo glue	you, few, fuse, utility	your,  tour, sure, cure
L a u . turned v	' a u . turned e [schwa]	au ou ou . ae +  u	au' our our . tripthongs not listed -Jones
upper,  putt,  cut	ago, sofa unit, sufer	out, down, cow, trout	our, flour, flower, power
peach colored phonograms are not part of the minimum phoneme set light blue phonograms have a related stressless variation yellow phonograms have been merged

© 2000 BETA Interactive 

The 17 Truespel vowels [below] plus  uer,  aar,  and eer  and 3:  equals 21 vowels, the number isolated in Longman's IPA. There is no sound in English that Truespel cannot represent as well as IPA.  There is one sound in British RP, the short o, that would require an additional phonogram to adequately represent.

The Truespel Alfubet Key  40 phonograms: 17 [to 20] vowels - 23 consonants An alphabet is a grapheme-phoneme or symbol-sound correspondence table: A collection of sound signs linking visible marks to speech sounds

Truespel has a symbol for just about every phoneme in English. Because Truespel shows stress, 40 symbols can mark 43 sounds.  Most systems have problems with schwa, schwer, and schwi, Truespel doesn't.  They are just the unstressed versions of u/i, er, and ee.  In the chart, short vowels come before the long vowels [yellow].  R combinations [air, er, or ]are listed last. As in IPA, yue [you] is not listed as a phoneme but as a combination of a consonant Y plus /ue/. The two phonograms are unrepresented: ng and the British short [o] - see listing

Spelling Samples  [more .examples]
There are at least 100 different ways to code English speech.  The most common phonemic transcription since 1900 has been IPA [the International Phonemic Alphabet].  This is the code used by linguists, ESL teachers, and most dictionaries and pronunciation guides.

There are two basic problems with IPA.  (1) it uses non-standard or non-ascii symbols and (2) it does not look much like traditional English. This makes it more difficult than truespel to learn, recall, and read.

Which of the following transcriptions is the easiest to read.  Which would be the easiest to write? Which ones are the most consistent?  Which ones provide the best guide to pronunciation?  [quiz]
For more extended text samples, convert your favorite story to Truespel using the on-line converter at http://www.ldc.upenn.edu/cgi-bin/sb/orthography/convert.cgiand www.foreignword.com
 
 

Spelling Samples  [examples], IPA, ALC Fonetic, Spanglish Which of the following transcriptions is the easiest to read.  Which would be the easiest to write? Which two notations are the most consistent?  Which one shows if primary  stress is on the first or second syllable? Truespel Fonetic - Sample 6: Speleeng rifformers tipiklee waant tue riet withh u dikshinairee prununseeyyaeshin gied rather than truddishinool Eenglish speleeng. Thae waant thu speleeng sistim tue bee neerlee 100% alfubbetikool instted uv 40%. Eenglish speleeng iz haard bikkuz thair aar tue menee orthhugrrafik aapshinz.source  I P A  broad romic)   speling rifomz tipikli wont tu rayt wið  dikòneri prnnsieyòn gayd rað ðæn tradiòanl Ingliò speling. ðey wont ð speling sistm tu bi niyrli 100% ælfbetic insted v 40%. Ingliò speling iz hard bikaoz ther ar tuu meni orthogræfik opònz. ALC Fonetic  [20 exceptions to the rule] Speling reformers tipicaly wont to riet with a dicshunairy pronunsiaeshun gied rather than tradishunal English speling. Thay wont the speling sistem to be neerly 100% alfabetical insted of 40%. English speling is hard becauz thair ar too meny orthografic opshuns  Saxon Spanglish Systematic Spelling reformerz tipickly want tu wrait with a dickshanerry pronunnciashan gaid rathr thaen tradishanal English spelling.  They want the spelling sisstem tu bi nirly 100% alfabettic instead ov 40%.  English spelling iz haard bicoz therr aar tuu menny orthografic opshans Truespel is more consistent than ALC fonetic which uses ar for aar, e and y  for the stressed and unstressed ee sound, c for k, and s for all plural endings rather than s and z, ...  In English, stress is normally on the root syllable which would be the first syllable in two syllable words ~ unless the first syllable was a prefix such a- re- or un-.  the suffix -er is always unstressed.  Words borrowed from Greek, Latin and French do not have this consistency. Leman [as in Lak Leman] would be pronounced 'lemon' in English but ley-maahn in Frech.  Truespel can represent this stress variation as lemun / laemmaan SS lemman lemaan> MORE SAMPLES

Spanglish uses a different correspondence table where a =uh, o=awe, o'/ow=owe, aet=at, i/y=ee, r = /3:/ /''/, w=hook /u/. shan / ò'n/ [tion], th=th/dh,.. .

In Saxon Spanglish, they does not have to be changed to thay or thae, because they is one of the original Saxon spellings that was not affected by the great vowel shift.  Phonemic notations have to respell 60% of the words in the dictionary.  One alternative is Spelling Pronunciation [SP] which does not endorse respelling unless the old sound pronunciation cannot be understood in context.  In SP-Spanglish, say would keep its traditional spelling because pronouncing it as spelled [suh-ee] can be understood.

Truespel shows stress with double letters and uses digraphs for extended vowels.  This can make a Truespel transcriptions 10% longer than an augmented script such as IPA broad romic or the less systematic Spanglish.

*It may take over 10 minutes to learn to write Truespel but certainly after two weeks of practice, students should be able to spell better in Truespel than in the traditonal writing system.  What they spell is their own pronunciation.  This means that each region will spell a few words in unique ways. 

Q U I Z

Answers[highlight to read]
1.  TS BR SS ALC TO
2.  TS
3.  BR SS
4.  TS BR SS ALC TO  [Romic and Truespel are both phonemic]
5.  TO SP ALC TS BR  [ALC might be a little more like TO, e.g., morphemic regularities]
6.  TO SP ALC TS BR  [SP has two versions, one easier than ALC, one a little harder]
7.  TO ALC TS BR TS  [not at all sure about this one]
8.  TS  BR TS ALC TO
9.  BR
 

B E N I F I T S

Benefits of Truespel

Creates an easy-to-read pronunciation guide, better in two respects than the  (IPA) which uses special symbols and sound values unfamiliar to English readers.

Establishes for the first time a qwerty keyboard or ASCII based standard phoneme set based on conventional English spelling. 

When other languages are transcribed or spelled in truespel, the words can be pronounced  – eliminating  the usual spelling barrier. Foreign language menus written in Truespel would make ordering much easier.

Eliminates the accent marks and diacritics found in some foreign spellings. 

Facilitates text-to-speech computer  applications.

Useful in phonics instruction, remedial reading, and in ESL classes.

Most ESL classes currently use IPA which is not well adapted to English.

Enables an English based analysis of pronunciation in dialects and foreign tongues.

A converter can take a file written in regular English and convert it to Truespel. There are at present two converters designed to do this:  one is available on-line and the other, called BTRSPL, can be downloaded [from Alan Mole's Website].  This means that creating reading material in Truespel is just a click away. 

Note that Truespel versions for English accents other than represented by the American Heritage Talking Dictionary © (AHTD) will need to be built for UK, NZ, Australia, etc. The AHTD is a good phonetic representation of typical or generalnAmerican English as spoken over the media (radio and TV).
 

P R O D U C T S

Truespel products developed so far.

Truespel Converter Cut and paste a sentence or a chapter from a book in this on-line converter.  Get back a  phonemic transcription in the truespel notation.

truespel converter kut and paest u sentints or u chapter frum u book in this aan-lien converter get bak u foenneemik transkrripshin in thu truespel noettaeshin.
 

Truespel Maniffestoe. Shows the basic philosophy behind truespel and gives a brief tutorial.

Truespel Phoneme List. Shows each of the 40 phonemes and examples.

 

Truespel Game.Print it out and cut out the phonemes. Play it like scrabble by making words or make up your own rules. Good learning or teaching tool.

 

Truespel Phoneme Justification. [Truespel laagik] Shows why the phonemes were picked. Truespel is very similar to ITA (the Initial Teaching Alphabet) but does not use any special symbols, ligatures, or fonts. Truespel can also indicate stress which effectively adds three more phohnograms.

 

Truespel Discussion Group. If you have questions about truespel or want to assist with its development, send a blank email to truespel-subscribe@yahoogroups.com

 

Truespel Dictionary. Each line in this dictionary consists of a truespeld word next to a regularly spelled word. This format is suitable for the BTRSPL converter, which can take a text file and convert it to truespel.

 

Truespel Converter.  With the Phonemic Converter you can convert entire books to pronunciation guide spelling.  Simply locate the digital text from among the over 10,000 available on the web and cut and paste into the window on the converter page.

 

Truespel Foundation.Truespel@hotmail.com. PO Box 71, Cologne NJ 08213.

SAUNDSPEL phonology forum an e-discussion group - phonemic alphabets for English and more

Texting

Unifon2

Sampa notation unicode    american english 
ttp://www.phon.ucl.ac.uk/home/sampa/american.htm

Founder and President, Tom Zurinskas,  Truespel@hotmail.com.

Vice President,  Bruce Rosenberg,  b.l.rosenberg@worldnet.att.net

Treasurer,  Bernie Sypniewski,  syp@eticomm.net

We have much work to do in respelling many languages to truespel. This will mean adopting some new spelling conventions for some phonemes. Much help is sought in this endeavor. Don’t hesitate to drop us a line if you’d like to pitch in or have any ideas for us.
join-truespel@yahoogroups.com www.yahoogroups.com/group/truespelnext page>

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