SoundSpel is an English language spelling reform proposal. Its origins date back to 1910.[1]
SoundSpel has been endorsed by the American Literacy Council[2] because English speakers can easily read it.[3]
Contents |
Phonemes are represented as follows:[4]
| Notation | Vowel of |
|---|---|
| a | sat |
| e | set |
| i | did |
| o | dot |
| u | cut |
| Notation | Vowel of |
|---|---|
| ae | sundae |
| ee | see |
| ie | die |
| oe | toe |
| ue | cue |
| Notation | Vowel of |
|---|---|
| ar | bar |
| er | merger |
| or | for |
| Notation | Vowel of |
|---|---|
| arr | marry |
| err | cherry |
| orr | sorry |
| Notation | Vowel of |
|---|---|
| air | air |
| aa | alm |
| eer | beer |
| oo | moon |
| uu | book |
| oi | oil |
| ou/ow | out |
| au/aw | saw |
| ur | tour |
| uer | cure |
| Notation | As used in |
|---|---|
| b | bat |
| c/k | cat, kit |
| ch | chat |
| d | did |
| f | fat |
| g | gag |
| h | hat |
| j | jet |
| l | let |
| m | met |
| n | net |
| ng | singing |
| nk | ink |
| p | pep |
| q | quake |
| r | red |
| s | set |
| sh | shed |
| t | tot |
| th | thin |
| th | this |
| v | van |
| w | war |
| wh | why |
| x | box |
| y | yes |
| z | zoo |
| zh | azure |
U, meaning "you", is capitalized.
There is no change in the words was, as, of, the, he, she, me, we, be, do, to, and off. Words derived from these (such as being, together, and thruout) also remain unchanged. Words ending in -ful remain unchanged.
There is no change in the plural suffix -s (as in jobs), the possessive suffix -'s (as in man's), and in the third person present singular verb suffix -s (as in he runs), even though in all these cases the s is sometimes pronounced [z].
There is no change in the digraph th, even though it can be pronounced as voiced [ð] or unvoiced [θ]. Similarly the letter x is retained for both voiced [gz] and unvoiced [ks]. The reason may be that unvoiced occurrences outnumber the voiced 5 to 1, and words normally calling for a voiced x are understood even if pronounced unvoiced.
There are usually no changes in the spelling of short (schwa) vowels in the unstressed syllables of words like organ, novel, pencil, and lemon, unless the spelling would otherwise indicate an overpronunciation of the word (as in mountain).
Depending on its position in the word or root, the unstressed "half ee" (as in between, detect, reform, champion, editorial, hapyer, and fifty) continues to be spelled as e, i, or y.
Double rr, as in traditional orthography, indicates that the preceding vowel is short (as in carry, merry, and sorry).
Double ll indicates that the preceding a is pronounced /ɔː/, as in fall, tall, and call.
The long o or long i sound at the end of a word may be written with a single letter, as in banjo, go, so, alibi, hi, fli, mi (but banjoes, alibieing, flies, etc., since the vowel is no longer at the end of the word).
A hyphen following a vowel unambiguously separates a long vowel from another vowel following, as in re-enter and co-operaet.
If two vowels—such as ea—do not match a digraph on the SoundSpel chart, then the syllable ends with the first vowel: react (ea is not a digraph), jeenius, memorial, creaetiv. In cases of more than two vowels the syllable ends with the first digraph: flooid (oo, being the first digraph, ends the syllable—it is not flo-oid), hieest, freeing, inueendo, power, continueing, paeabl, evalueaet.[5]
It was on the ferst dae of the nue yeer the anounsment was maed, allmoest siemultaeniusly frum three obzervatorys, that the moeshun of the planet Neptune, the outermoest of all planets that wheel about the Sun, had becum verry erratic. A retardaeshun in its velosity had bin suspected in Desember. Then a faent, remoet spek of liet was discuverd in the reejon of the perterbd planet. At ferst this did not cauz eny verry graet exsietment. Sieentific peepl, however, found the intelijens remarkabl enuf, eeven befor it becaem noen that the nue body was rapidly groeing larjer and brieter, and that its moeshun was qiet different frum the orderly progres of the planets. – Herbert George Wells.
We mae nowadaes be chairy about uezing the werd "jeenius", but we stil hav a guud iedeea whut is ment bi it. For exampl, thair ar graet numbers of verry gifted muezishans hoo ar admierd but not calld jeeniuses. But thair ar uthers, manifestly prodijus, performing offen at extraordinerrily erly aejes, a varieety of feets so complex that the muezical laeman cuud hardly imajin, eeven with the moest desperet laebor, acomplishing eny of them, whiel eeven muezishans ar astonisht and we then reech for the guud, handy, vaeg Enlietenment werd and call them jeeniuses. The list incloods Mozart and Mendelssohn; and, despiet all the limiting jujments, it incloods Benjamin Britten. – Frank Kermode [7]
Mi hart aeks, and a drouzy numnes paens
Mi sens, as tho of hemlok I had drunk,
Or emptyd sum dul oepiaet to the draens
Wun minit past, and Lethe-wards had sunk:
'Tis not thru envy of thi hapy lot,
But beeing too hapy in thien hapynes,
That thow, liet-wingèd Dryad of the trees,
In sum meloedius plot
Of beechen green, and shadoes numberles
Singest of sumer in fuul-throeted eez.
– John Keats
In 1910 philologist Alexander John Ellis played a major role in developing a system now known as "Classic New Spelling". Walter Ripman and William Archer wrote the first dictionary of the system, "New Spelling" (NuSpelling), which was republished in 1941 by the Simplified Spelling Society.[2]
In 1969 Godfrey Dewey improved upon Ripman's and Archer's work, producing "World English Spelling". Dewey and Edward Rondthaler, a prominent typesetter, CEO of International Typeface Corporation, corresponded from 1971.
In 1986 the book "Dictionary of Simplified American Spelling" written by Rondthaler and Edward Lias was published by the American Language Academy. Its full title was "Dictionary of American spelling: A simplified alternative spelling for the English language : written as it sounds, pronounced as it's written". This called for improvements to spelling, with clearer rules and better grapheme/ phoneme correspondence. It was slightly less strict than Classic New Spelling, allowing "the" rather than "dhe", for example.
The system was further reformed from 1987 on and became SoundSpel.