Re: Advanced English + Babel text

From:    "Pascal A. Kramm" <pkramm@...>
> Here it is, my own take at an English spelling reform!
> Unlike many others, it doesn't make up some awkward far-fetched spellings,
> but rather stays close to the actual official Ipa pronunciations.
>
> So that you get the general idea, I will post the Babel text below:
>
> 1 Nau se houl wörld häd wan längwidg wis se säim wörds.
> 2 Djörniing ihstwards, men faund ä pläin in Shinar änd seteld ser.
(Referring to this page:
<http://www.choton.org/ae/spell-pron.html>)

I enter into this thread with much fear and trembling, lest it become
just the kind of flame war that spawned the AUXLANG list.  So, I will
keep my comments brief:

(1) It's not clear how this is closer to the IPA (note capitalization)
than any number of proposed spelling reforms of English.  E.g. <dg>
or <dj> as potential forms for /dZ/, but <jh> for /Z/.  Also, there
is not IPA symbol for /ks/, which you continue to represent as <x>.
(2) You seem to think a number of sounds exist in English which in
fact do not, at least in any of the remotely standard forms of the
language (e.g., [OY], onsetting [kv] except in rare loans, [œ], etc.)
(3) You seem to think that some sounds that *do* exist are not worthy
of even the separate orthographic representation they already have.
For example, you conflate four phonemes /s/, /z/, /T/ and /D/ into
one grapheme <s>, which, to be frank, looks like a caricature of
foreign-speak in English.  Most dialects of English have at least
three if not four distinct back mid or low vowels:  /a/, /A/, /O/,
and /ow/.  Also, all dialects have a contrast between /w/ and /v/,
yet you conflate these as <w>, and some dialects have a phonemic
/w_0/ in addition which you do not represent at all, or indeed
seem to be aware of.
(4) Why are you imposing all sorts of oddities of the German orthography
onto English -- <ei> for /aj/, <ä> for /&/ and /e:/, and, with respect,
most bizarrely <eu> for /oj/?
(5) Some of your transcriptions suggest that you ought to ask a native
speaker of English for help: <question> is pronounced [kwEStSn=], not
[kwEstS@n].  I believe most speakers of English also have [&w], not [aw],
yet you transcribe it with <au>. "conceived" in your Gettysburg Address
is /kOnsivd/, not /kOnsift/, and "lives" is [lajvz], not [lajfs].  Some
of the words you use in metadescription are either not words of English,
such as "metapher" (correctly "metaphor" /mEt@'fOr/) or do not exist in
the sense you use for them, such as "superfluent" which should be
"superfluous".(I could go on and on with such errors of pronunciation
and usage, but I said I wouldn't, so I won't.)

I'm not sure I'm understanding the intention of this "reform". If
you want to construct a conworld in which this reform takes place,
that's fine with me.  But as is, it represents more an imposition of,
well, the entire German language on English, which naturally fails
to oblige you.

 =========================================================================
Thomas Wier	       "I find it useful to meet my subjects personally,
Dept. of Linguistics    because our secret police don't get it right
University of Chicago   half the time." -- octogenarian Sheikh Zayed of
1010 E. 59th Street     Abu Dhabi, to a French reporter.
Chicago, IL 60637