Draft Alphabet

I based this one off of my old work and the American Heritage Dictionary pronunciation key.

The diacritics used are the macron (to indicate length in terms of quality), the circumflex (usually for rhotic assimilation), the diaeresis (for misc. sounds), and the acute (for primary stress). There are 26 letters of the alphabet. They are ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ (though, X and Q(U) may be omitted in lieu of KS and GZ, and KW and K).

A is short A: the vowel [æ] as in "pat" (PA: "pat"). Ā is long A: the diphthong [eɪ] as in "pay" (PA: "pā").  is the rhoticized A: the triphthong [eɪə] as in "care" (PA: "kar" or "kâr"). Note that the circumflex can be omitted if the vowel is immediately followed by an R in the same syllable. That being said, one will not typically find the written  at all. Ä is the open A: the vowel [ɑ] (or sometimes [a]) as in "father" (PA: "fä́dher" or "fä́dhêr").

B is simply [b] as in "bib" (PA: "bib").

C is used only in the digraph CH as [tʃ] as in "church" (PA: "church").

D is [d] though it may devoice to [t], especially as the preterite marker after an unvoiced consonant. It is as "deed" (PA: "dēd"). When with H in the digraph DH, it is [ð] as in "this" (PA: "dhiss").

E is short E: the vowel [ɛ] as in "pet" (PA: "pet"). Ē is long E: the vowel [i] as in "bee" (PA: "bē"). Ê is the schwa and rhoticized E. If it appears before R, the circumflex can be dropped. It is [ə] (schwa) or [ɚ] (rhoticized) as in "center" (PA: "sénter" or "séntêr").

F is [f], though it may voice to [v] if it is intervocalic or word-final or adjacent to a voiced consonant. In those cases, if [f] is required, double it to FF. The F is as "fife" (PA: "fīff"). This particular rule was borrowed from S and is not necessarily consistent...it requires more research.

G is [g] as in "gag" (PA: "gag"). When preceded by N, both will assimilate as [ŋ] as in "-ing" (PA: "-ing").

H is [h] as in "hat" (PA: "hat"). Following a D as in DH will make it [ð] as in "this" (PA: "dhiss"). S is used with H in SH to be [ʃ] as in "ship" (PA: "ship"). Following a T as in TH will be [θ] as in "thin" (PA: "thin"). Preceding W in HW, it distinguishes [ʍ] from the W [w] as in "which" (PA: "wich" or "hwich").

I is short I: the vowel [ɪ] as in "pit" (PA: "pit"). Ī is long I: the diphthong [aɪ] as in "I" (PA: "Ī"). Î is the rhoticized I: the triphthong [aɪə] as in "liar" (PA: "lir" or "lîr"). The circumflex may be omitted if followed by an R in the same syllable.

J is [dʒ] as in "judge" (PA: "juj").

K is [k] or [kʰ] as in "cat" (PA: "kat").

L is [l] as in "lid" (PA: "lid"). If syllable final, it is often [ɫ] as in "full" (PA: "fül").

M is [m] as in "mum" (PA: "mum"). It may assimilate to [ɱ] as in "symphony" (PA: "símffenē").

N is [n] as in "no" (PA: "nō") though it is obligated to assimilate next to G (or other velar consonants such as K, Q, W, and X) as [ŋ] as in "-ing" (PA: "-ing").

O is short O: the vowel [ɒ] as in "pot" (PA: "pot"). Ō is long O: the diphthong [oʊ] as in "toe" (PA: "tō"). Ô is rhoticized R: the vowel [ɔ] as in "four" (PA: "for" or "fôr"). Depending on the person, Ô may occur outside of a rhotic environment and so it may be necessary to write all the time.

P is [p] or [pʰ] as in "pop" (PA: "pop").

Q is always used in the digraph QU as the cluster [kw] as in "queen" (PA: "quēn").

R is [ɹ] as in "roar" (PA: "ror" or "rôr").

S is [s] though it may voice to [z] if intervocalic, word-final, or adjacent to a voiced consonant. If it is required to be [s] in these positions, it must be doubled to SS. It is as the S in "sauce" (PA: "soss"). S is used with H in SH to be [ʃ] as in "ship" (PA: "ship")

T is [t] or [tʰ] as in "tight" (PA: "tīt"). When with H as in TH, it is [θ] as in "thin" (PA: "thin").

U is short U: the vowel [ʌ] as in "cut" (PA: "kut"). Ū is long U: the vowel [u] as in "you" (PA: "yū"). Ü is the misc. Ü the vowel [ʊ] as in "look" (PA: "lük"). Û is the rhotacized U, [ɜ] or [ɝ] or even [ʌɹ] as in "girl" (PA: "gurl" or "gûrl").

V is [v] as in "vain" (PA: "vān").

W is [w] or [ʍ] (if a distinction must be made, HW is used) as in "wine" (PA: "wīn") though the HW and W distinction is dying, it may fall out of disuse.

X is [ks] or [gz] if intervocalic or in a voiced environment. It must be doubled if it is unvoiced in such positions. It is as "exit" (PA: "éxit") or "ex-" (PA: "ex-"). One can argue to voice it in the word-final position rendering "egg" and "eggs" as "eg" and "ex" instead of "eg" and "egs". But this would cause great confusion so the plural forms undergo assimilation without graphic change, as "Greek" and "Greeks" would be "Grēk" and "Grēx" which is confusing. So, it will be "Grēk" and "Grēks" or not. Again, up to discussion.

Y is [j], the consonant as in "yes" (PA: "yess").

Z is [z] as in "zebra" (PA: "zḗbre").

Of course, some rules need to be appended to...and fixed, but this will suffice.

Uf corss, sum rūls nēd tū bē epénded tū...and fixd, but dhiss wil seffī́ss.

Radical Way

I was listening to the news (watching it rather) and I heard about another problem with the Qantas airlines. Qantas, was pronounced "kwantas" and which would lead you to believe that it had a U in it...perhaps the Q should be used alone for the sound QU and the C for CH...



We could try to reduce the amount of digraphs...like introduce old letters like eth, and thorn from Old English and get rid of my DH and TH... Introduce ezh and esh for ZH and SH...



Meh...Je ne sais pas...



You could make it based on Romance phonetics since a good chunk of the English lexicon is Romance/Greek...or maybe German. English...is a conglomerate of all of these influences...it's that unique...and it needs its own orthography.

Q

The letter Q.



The letter Q is a consonant. It is only used in the digraph QU representing [kw] as the QU in "queen"; quēn.



The name of Q is its old name, [kju], kyū.

P

The letter P



The letter P is a consonant. It is [p] as the P in "pot"; "pot". There is no PH digraph representing [f] anymore.



The name is [pi], pē.

O

The letter O.



The letter O is a vowel. It has a long value [o] (or [oʊ]) as in "boat" written as ō; bōt. The short value is [ɒ] as in "pot"; pot. There is an assimilated one (often there is a distinction in certain dialects but I'll leave it alone for now). It is [ɔ] as in "for". A diacritic...has not yet been assigned.



The name of O is its long value, [oʊ], ō.