Re: Artlang-driven English spelling reform

For my general western American dialect, I submit ...

ii    like 'ee' as in 'feet'
i    as in 'pit'
ei    as in 'eight'
e    as in 'pet'
a    as in 'cat'
aa    like 'a' as in 'father'
y    schwa (unstressed) or like 'u' as in 'up'
o    like 'aw' as in 'saw'
ou     like 'o' as in 'go'
u    as in 'put'
uu    like 'oo' as in 'goo'

ýr    "syllabified 'r,'"  stressed and unstressed
ýl    syllabified 'l'    note contrast with 'yl'     lidýl  (little) vs.
cyl (cull)

au    like 'ow' in 'cow'
ai    as in 'aisle'

Jim



----- Original Message -----
From: "Carlos Thompson" <chlewey@...>
To: <CONLANG@...>
Sent: Friday, May 12, 2000 9:22 AM
Subject: Artlang-driven English spelling reform


Inspired on the English spelling reform, I was thingking in
a pseudo spelling reform, which could drive English into a
more phonetic language but it's not aimed to go that way.

First, it will take diagraphs and changed for extended or
accented Latin letters, like changing <th> /T/ with <þ>
(thorn).

Some of these changes:
  <th> into thorn, when pronounced /T/.
  <th> into eth, when pronounced /D/.
  <ng> into eng, when pronounced /N/, left <ng> when /Ng/.
  <ch> into either c acute or c cedilla*, when /tS/.
  <sh> into either s acute or s cedilla.
  <gh> into yoth, when mude or /f/, <g> when /g/.
  <wh> into something I found in the Thyromanes font, which
is as a <hu> diagraph.
  <ph> into f.

Then, when a letter can have two sounds, it could be split
in two symbols.  As c acute /tS/ can be seen a a
palatization of c /k/, then we could use g acute for /dZ/.
This allow <gh> and <gu> diagraphs to become <g>.

Now is time for vowels... volunteers?

-- Carlos Th

* my original idea was to use c cedilla, s cedilla and g
cedilla and leave <c> with two different values: /k/
and /s/.  But I've been thinking on using c cedilla
for /s/, then the palatization could be rendered with an
acute.