[WikiEN-l] morphophonics for wikipedia

Mon Jul 28 02:53:10 UTC 2003

>-LittleDan wrote: 
wikipedia -> w-ek-ep-ed-e"u
wiktionary -> wi-ikshun-ar-e
Daniel Ehrenberg -> Dany-l E'rxnb-rg
>unintuitive -> xnint'y-u"itiv

You can't really glean much of how the system works
from those samples, though.
I like the simpler is best approach, Daniel -- but
take issue with your choice of using strictly English
vowel voicings. (E, and :"U" for what would be better
as an "a" (far) -- like its written now, incidentally!
:)

Like I talked about before --  you have to consider
the vowels used per language as they vary over
different languages, and rate these based on
population.  In this internationalist sense the sharp
"A" sound (cat, bat ) must be **secondary** to the
more *widely* understood *softer* "A" sound (bar,
car).  By widely understood -- take a look at
Espertanto -- the phonetics of that language are based
on the more common soft vowel sounds -- just as in
Spanish.
The "o"s dont morph into (ah)'s, the "e"'s dont morph
into (ii)'s, etc.  

Since many languages (inglesh) will allow for flexible
sounds, from flat (resembling a different vowel) to
soft (moderate) to sharp (extreme), etc -- the idea of
a **standard phonetic scheme** is basically premised
on *removing that *flexibility so that vowels then
become static.  This is the counterintuitive part --
most of us think of vowels as flexible, and which way
they flex hints at our language origin/bias.  How can
you tell a Hindi/Arabic/Chinese/German/Spanish accent?
(when speaking english) --by their vowel bias. 
A system, if its going to be usable has to map its
vowels according to language use statistics.

For example:  I see your using the "E" as in a "me"
sound, as opposed to a "ben" sound -- for a "me" sound
this should be a "mi"  --

Example 2:Just as say, Arabic, defaults to an A ....
(an Arabic A is often halfway tween an A("cat") and an
E("ben")  (alef,ba,ta,tha, jiim,h!a, kha,
daal,thaal,zai, siin,shiin, saad, daad, taa, vaa, ayn,
thayn, fe, q'af, kef, lam, mim, nuun, he, waw, yah

So too does English (\inglesh\) defaults to an EE (the
letters
(ei)(bi)(ci)(di)(ii)(ef)(gi)(eich)(ai)(jei)(kei)(el)(em)(en)
(oh)(pi)(kiu)(ar)(es)(ti)(iu)(vi)W(eks)(wai)(zi)

If English was an abjad -- most of its words would
naturally default to an /i/ sound ("ee"). These
languages have a marked bias toward their respective
sounds --and as such are unusable in the
internationalist task of creating a phonetic scheme. 

Sincerely,
-S-

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