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Hi John
Sorry, I didn't get back to you earlier. I have been busy with the
Holidays and some other stuff.
I haven't let my study in Phonetics die completely. I have been
looking at a Revision of the Pitman Initial Teaching Alphabet (ita).
The ITA was invented by Sir James Pitman,
grandson of the inventor of Pitman shorthand.
Talk about credentials.
It has an underlying phonemic logical structure that is similar to
the Shavian Alphabet, except that it retains some of the Redundant
Roman Alphabet letters.
Quite interesting.

But in response to your comments, altho Shavian does not show the
variations in plosive and non-plosive consonants andthe syllabic or
Dark L and is overly explicit about vowel sounds, someofwhich I don't
even hear, those are the traditional British Phonemic categories.
American English as you pointed out just doesn't concern itself with
some of these vowel differences.

I recommended that people make greater use of the Ado (Schwa sound)for
indistinguishable short vowel sounds. And we could add 2 wildcard
vowel letters to indicate any unstressed short vowel, or any
unstressed long or Dipthong vowel.

As far as the normative aspect goes, I would suggest indexing and
ordering English words just by their consonant letters. It is crude,
but would include both British and American Pronunciations.

Regards, Paul V.

P.S. By looking at the limitations of Pitman's ITA,
I can see a number of benefits for having the Syllabic R letters,
Array, Urge, Are, Or, Ear, Air.
Without them it is hsrd to write distinct spellings for
Sore Sower
More Mower
Gore Gower
prayer prayer like player
mare mayor
______________attached_________________________________

-- In shawalphabet@yahoogroups.com, John Burrows <burrows@t...> wrote:
>
> Two things struck me:
>
> Shavian in Androcles clearly harks back to traditional spelling
and
> the appearance of words.
> It also argues for consistency, but it was a normative age.
> (I say dipthong and diphthong indiscriminately, if I say them at
all
> -- would like to spell accordingly)
>
> Phonetic transcripts apply distinction between long and short
vowels
> too stringently.
> In contrast the distinction between initial and final consonants
is
> not made.
>
> All in all, a quick way to revise phonetics.
> jb
>

Hi Blue Night

Welcome to the Shavian Alphabet Forum.
Unfortunately, lately our discussion has lapsed.
However, we still teach the Shavian Alphabet to one and
all. I can provide a Subset of the Shavian Alphabet appropriate to an
English speaker with an American accent, if necessary.

In any case, feel free to express yourself in either the Shaw Alphabet
or the more traditional Roman Alphabet.
Roman numbers are almost obsolete, but I expect the Roman Alphabet will
still be around for a while, even tho it is singularly unsuited for
writing English.

All the best, Paul V.

P.S. Are you a Chess Player?

Hi Lee

I think we need to provide a revised edition of the Bi-Alphabetic
Androcles and the Lion.
Although I really like G.B. Shaw's writing and even tho
it is the both the orinal and the best source text for the Shavian
Alphabet, it has a number of inadequecies.

First, it has never been properly proofed for Modern English
pronunciation.
Second it is in the form of a play. Stage Directions and all.
It needs to be converted to a more readable Novel format.
Third it is a Christian Faith Story for Children. This probably can
not be corrected without destroying the story, but there probably
should be at least some kind of advisory or at the very least an
explanation of the background situation for a Non-Christian reader.

Many of the Third World people, that we are targeting as needing an
easy path to learning English through Shavian are ignorant of early
Christian Church History.

We really need a revised version accessible from the Internet.

Regards, Paul V.
________________attached____________________________
--- In shawalphabet@yahoogroups.com, by Lee A. Miller
As for errors in the Androcles text, there are a number of obvious
typographical
errors. Probably unavoidable in a production of this sort. (The page
numbers
in the paperback are the same, by the way). I don't think we can take
the text
in each particular as a model, but the general usage established in
the text is
reliable. Hopefully any future publications in the Shaw alphabet will
have a
higher standard of accuracy . . . .

Lee

-----Original Message-----
From: Lionel Ghoti <ghoti@...>
To: Shavian eGroup <shavian@egroups.com>
Date: Wednesday, March 24, 1999 8:46 AM
Subject: [shavian] Errors in Androcles

While I don't think that we should overly concern ourselves about the
decisions and/or mistakes made in the production of the Shavian
reading key and _Androcles_and_the_Lion_ at that time, when there are
other more pressing issues, it will need to be addressed eventually.

And as I said in my previous message that I thought
any major errors in the reading key could easily have been
corrected before _Androcles_ was published. But that has made
me think of a number of errors in the Shavian text of _Androcles_
which I have spotted, which should have been picked up as
glaring mistakes by anyone copy-editing or proof-reading the
text of _Androcles_, as long as they were adequately familiar
with the alphabet, and as long as they weren't in a terrible hurry.

In the examples below, I'm assuming that anyone checking my
references will have the same page-numbering. I'm reading the
hardback Public Trustee's edition. I've typed the errors as they
would appear if viewed in a Shavian font; I know this is hard to
read in plain text, so I've put a much more friendly HTML-and-GIF
version on my web site at:

http://www.homeusers.prestel.co.uk/den/shavian/errors.html

I assume the errors were duplicated in the Penguin paperback
edition. If someone with a paperback _Androcles_ cannot find
them, could you please let me know?

Here are some errors from the first few pages of _Androcles_:

Page 32, line 7 Roman: "pull" Error: pul Should be: pUl
Compare: page 32, line 6

Page 36, line 11 Roman: "good-looking" Error: /gUd-lUkiN
[Unnecessary namer dot]

Page 36, line 13 Roman: "centurion" Error: /sentjUDian
[Unnecessary namer dot] Compare: page 38, line 9

Page 44, line 4 Roman: "Lavinia" Error: /ravinia
Should be: /lavinia Compare: page 44, line 1


If there are at least four such daft errors in just the first 13
Shavian pages of _Androcles_, just how highly should we regard the
book as a model of the Shavian alphabet?

Fr. Lionel Ghoti O.Pisc.

Hi Sidney

Thanks for your thoughts on the future of the Shavian Alphabet.
Sorry it took me a little time to reply to my message.
I'd like to point out that any written message is almost invariably
clearer than its spoken equivalent.
Altho the Shaw Alphabet incorporates some of te advantages of a
spoken alphabet for normal conversations, it loses the benefit that
the Roman Alphabet provides.
The Roman Alphabet provides a distinct spelling (One correct
spelling) for every english concept. Even though many English words
have multiple meanings, the Roman Alphabet provides many more
distinctive spellings for even different words with the same
pronounciation.
For example, our hour
to, too, two
one, won
their, there, they're
all, awl
So when you read the word, without sounding out the Roman alphabet is
a much more efficient code.
But Shavian with its many indistinguishable Homonyms is much easier
to learn.
The benefits of literacy are so great that provide a tool (alphabet)
accessible to all, rather than a small educated elite is of paramount
importance.
English written with the Roman Alphabet is evolving into such a
stylized idiosyncratic method of communication that people require a
University Education to gain full grasp of the literary language.
This resemble the situation in Mandarin China, where officials in the
government would require 12 years of education in their language in
order pass the Civil Service exams and gain a Job in the government.

We need an alternate route to English literacy.
Once fully developed the Shavian Alphabet will provide that route.

Regards, Paul V.
____________________________attached_________________________________
--- In shawalphabet@yahoogroups.com, "sidney tanaban"
Hi! I would like the new www.shawalphabet.com to become the central
site for the Shavian alphabet. It takes a lot of time to jump from
one site to another.
Moreover, I think it might just give the Shavian alphabet a sense of
authority rather than just something used as an amusement.

If we want to promote the Shavian alphabet rather than just
use it among ourselves then we have to consider how to "package" the
Shavian alphabet so that it attracts the interest of others.

And that is another point that could be discussed. Should the Shavian
Alphabet continue to be identified with Shaw, Mr. Read, and the
discussion of phonetics or should our site attempt to "modernize"
things a bit.
Actually, I would like to see some sites dedicated to the history,
thoughts and feelings of the older Shavian writers, such that
remain, if there are any out there.

Those members could be referred to as classical Shavian writers.
Next, our site would make room for those who would like to suggest
improvements in the fonts or letters. These
would be experimental for the amusement or use of those who take a
fancy to them for their personal use.
The most critical point however, is that we use the classical Shavian
alphabet as the Baseline among members.
If we cannot do this or won't do this then we will have to accept the
Shavian alphabet has been limited by egotism into a personal script
or shorthand in which to write things down that we don't want others
to read.

Now that we can write in the Shavian alphabet for postings and other
E-mails between member a whole new world should be opening up.
However, even though I have seen this done, I have not yet seen easy
step by step instruction on how I or some othe novice can Post an E-
Mail message to this Forum.
Can someone explain this to me?
I need someone to walk me through on this. Once I understand how to
do this I would be happy to write my comments in the Shavian alphabet.
I am happy to read the many interesting thoughts from other writers
written in the Shavian Alphabet. Only by including some Shavian text
in this e-mail forum will we really
stimulate one another to becoming fully literate in the Shavian
Alphabet.
By the way, I am not 100 percent permissive about people using Shaw's
alphabet according to their regional accents. I would find it
difficult with certain Scottish or Irish accents or the cockney
accent. Movies from England using strong British accents or unusual
ones have had to develop a more international British English accent
over the years in order for the Americans to understand them. It may
be a novelty or some interest to linguists but for general purposes I
would
suggest that there should be a general understanding that we take
into account the nationality of the person we are writing to and
whether they are familar with the way we pronounce our words. This is
just a common courtesy for an alphabet that is to be used in a number
of English speaking countries.
People who take a certain pride in their regional accents may find
this difficult to accept because they may not have traveled very much
and so do not really
understand the need for this. However, anyone who has traveled a
great deal
will realize the thoughtlessness in trying to pressure people from
other cultures to conform to one's own expectations.
I think that even though the Shavian alphabet works a little better
when the people who use it are from the same region
it does not preclude easy understanding accross National boundaries.
Although I would probably have difficulty understanding the
pronunciation of New Yorkers or people from certain areas of Texas or
Louisiana, I think just seeing it written down in a regular fashion,
even though peculiar to one area, will be better than random
uninformed spellings.
I do know that I have run into this problem when I was in New York
and Georgia, in conversations with the locals.

sidney

helO HX!
Hello there! Just figured I'd say hello to get myself started off on the right foot.

My first encounter with Shavian came in a new English textbook in 11th grade. It had a little side article about it and showed the key as featured in Androcles and the Lion, and I immediately decided I wanted to learn it. My friends didn't catch on so well, and as such I sort of let it die out. I occasionally would think back on it, write some things in Shavian, etc. but I never really bothered to truly learn it. I'd like to change that this time.

I think I picked up on Shavian so quickly because I'd been writing phonetically for quite some time using my own little system. So it was sort of a natural extension for me. mI sistM wuz not kwIt sO nIs 2 luk at thO!

Alright, I no longer know where I'm going with this, so I'll just end it here.

Actually if I can just go ahead and reply to my own post, I have a
question. What's the proper vowel symbol for the a in "can"?

> -----Original Message-----
> From: shawalphabet@yahoogroups.com [mailto:shawalphabet@yahoogroups.com]
> On Behalf Of circtf
> Sent: 31 October 2005 20:37
> To: shawalphabet@yahoogroups.com
> Subject: [shawalphabet] Re: Hey there. Newbie here.
>
> Actually if I can just go ahead and reply to my own post, I have a
> question. What's the proper vowel symbol for the a in "can"?

The symbol you're looking for is A.

And by the way, welcome to the group! I stumbled upon Shavian in 1998 via a
copy of Androcles that had sat unused on a friend's bookshelf for almost 30
years. I took to it instantly, as I too had spent several years developing
my own encryption codes, ending up with a supposedly 'unbreakable' code
using phonemic characters (chart attached); I was beginning to realise that
writing as you speak is a good idea for all written communication, not just
encryption, and Shavian is what I stuck with. And as with you, it sure looks
nicer than my own code.

Now I just treat Shavian as a bit of fun (alas, my interest in languages
isn't what it used to be), and I'm keen to help keep the original Shaw
alphabet intact and available for future generations to enjoy.

Hugh B

Welcome aboard.
Two questions?
Do you have a preferred name for use in further discussions?
Do you make use of the American or the British Accent.
I'm a Canadian myself, so I swing more towards the American side,
although I'm passibly familar with the British Accent. (RP, 30 years
out of date)
Regards, Paul V.
__________attached_________________________________
--- In shawalphabet@yahoogroups.com, "Hugh Birkenhead"
<mixsynth@f...> wrote:
>
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: shawalphabet@yahoogroups.com
[mailto:shawalphabet@yahoogroups.com]
> > On Behalf Of circtf
> > Sent: 31 October 2005 20:37
> > To: shawalphabet@yahoogroups.com
> > Subject: [shawalphabet] Re: Hey there. Newbie here.
> >
> > Actually if I can just go ahead and reply to my own post, I have a
> > question. What's the proper vowel symbol for the a in "can"?
>
> The symbol you're looking for is A.
>
> And by the way, welcome to the group! I stumbled upon Shavian in
1998 via a
> copy of Androcles that had sat unused on a friend's bookshelf for
almost 30
> years. I took to it instantly, as I too had spent several years
developing
> my own encryption codes, ending up with a supposedly 'unbreakable'
code
> using phonemic characters (chart attached); I was beginning to
realise that
> writing as you speak is a good idea for all written communication,
not just
> encryption, and Shavian is what I stuck with. And as with you, it
sure looks
> nicer than my own code.
>
> Now I just treat Shavian as a bit of fun (alas, my interest in
languages
> isn't what it used to be), and I'm keen to help keep the original
Shaw
> alphabet intact and available for future generations to enjoy.
>
> Hugh B
>

1. My real name is Kyle [/kFul], but I also go by Circuitous [/sxkVitis] (Circ [/sxk] for short). I'll answer to either, so use whatever you prefer.

2. I use an American accent - Midwestern, specifically. The a in my "can" sounds almost like ian (W), but I've been using ash (A) anyway. It's close enough.

--- In shawalphabet@yahoogroups.com, "paul vandenbrink" <pvandenbrink11@h...> wrote:
>
> Welcome aboard.
> Two questions?
> Do you have a preferred name for use in further discussions?
> Do you make use of the American or the British Accent.
> I'm a Canadian myself, so I swing more towards the American side,
> although I'm passibly familar with the British Accent. (RP, 30 years
> out of date)
> Regards, Paul V.

Hi Circ
Sounds like a good name to me.
Thanks for answering my questions.
The Midwest American Accent works for me as well. It is Rhotic,
and a little simpler than the British RP pronunciation.
In particular, Americans especially in the Midwest don't generally
differentiate the British Soft o sound and from the Broad ah sound.
I treat those 2 Shaw letters (i.e. on,"o", ah,"y") as the same.
The Ian is pretty rare for me except maybe in the endings of words
like Canadian and Indian.
Regards, Paul V.
P.S. The use of the Ado or Schwa sound is pretty common in my
English, as well. bunAna, palIs, tamEtO, inta-restiN

--- In shawalphabet@yahoogroups.com, "circtf" <circtf@y...> wrote:
>
> 1. My real name is Kyle [/kFul], but I also go by Circuitous
[/sxkVitis] (Circ [/sxk] for short). I'll answer to either, so use
whatever you prefer.
>
> 2. I use an American accent - Midwestern, specifically. The a in
my "can" sounds almost like ian (W), but I've been using ash (A)
anyway. It's close enough.