A Guide to American Shavian Spelling

by Haruki “Haley” Wakamatsu

The Shavian Alphabet is a phonemic spelling system for English that aims to be internationally recognizable and useful; the current standard to coalesce around rhotic Standard Southern British Engilsh mostly accomplishes that task. However, I have observed that many American learners are left confused about the distinctions made in (the ReadLex dialect of) English but not (their own dialect of) American English.

In this guide, I will propose an alternative US-based standard, and instruct you on how to use it.

What to call it?

While I propose the name “American Shavian”—“American” as in the continent(s)—early reviews pointed out that Canadians may feel left out by this name. I also suggest the alternate Shavian initialism “Cueish”: 𐑒𐑩𐑯𐑱𐑛𐑾𐑯 𐑯 𐑿𐑯𐑲𐑑𐑩𐑛-𐑕𐑑𐑱𐑑𐑕 𐑦𐑙𐑜𐑤𐑦𐑖 𐑖𐑱𐑝𐑾𐑯.

Goals

The motivations behind this standard are:

Changes

Trap–bath split

The trap–bath split is present in SSBE and Australian English, but is not widespread elsewhere. Therefore, American Shavian also drops it, respelling some 𐑭’s with 𐑨’s.

A non-exhaustive list of affected words:

The “Foreign A” vowel

AmE and SSBE treat the “A” in certain loanwords differently, in a split that goes the other way around from the trap–bath split. Therefore, some 𐑨’s are replaced by 𐑭’s.

The CLOTH lexical set

While SSBE puts the “CLOTH” vowel with the “LOT” vowel, AmE puts the “CLOTH” vowel with the “THOUGHT” vowel. Therefore, some (not all) words with 𐑪 will be respelled using 𐑷.

One-off changes

Here is a non-exhaustive list of words differently pronounced between American and British English without an apparent pattern (or a small enough pattern to not really matter):

Changes that will NOT be made

Some recurring sources of confusion from American learners will be left as-is, because of increased confusion from AmE speakers who do not have those mergers and alterations.

The suggested solution to learn these distinctions is to be exposed to foreign accents that have them.

Baht, bot, bought

The three-way merger between “baht”, “bot”, and “bought” will not be made, as its adoption is not widespread in New England, and merging them will cause unnecessary confusion.

Jammer, hammer

The raised realization of TRAP before some nasal consonants will not be distinguished, as this allophonic variation is not widespread or consistently done to the same words throughout the US.

Mary, marry, merry

The three-way merger between “Mary”, “marry”, and “merry” will also not be made due to the same reason as the other three-way merger. Some American speakers merge two of them but leave one distinct, or even distinguish between all three.

The CURE vowel

The CURE vowel in “sure” and “you’re” will still be spelled 𐑫𐑼, since there is no decisive majority for pronouncing it 𐑻 or 𐑹.

STRUT–commA, NURSE–lettER, and FLEECE–happY

These six lexical sets cause confusion in many American English speakers, because for many of them, these sound the same. However, since they serve important roles in determining the stressed syllable of a word, they will not be merged.

Perfect STRUT–commA minimal pairs

Perfect NURSE–lettER minimal pairs

Perfect FLEECE–happY minimal pairs:

Pre-L breaking

“Pre-L breaking” refers to the tendency for some speakers to insert an epenthetic 𐑩 between a high diphthong (𐑰, 𐑱, 𐑶, 𐑲, 𐑵, 𐑿, 𐑴, 𐑬) and 𐑤, so that “vile” merges with “vial”, and “foul” rhymes with “vowel”.

Since this feature is not universal across the US and Canada, and inserting an epenthetic vowel comes naturally to these speakers when reading, Pre-L breaking will not be reflected in spelling.

Yod-dropping/-coalescence

Yod-dropping is the act of dropping the 𐑘 sound of 𐑿 after certain consonants, like how some speakers merge “new” with “gnu”, and “Tuesday” with “two’s day”. After 𐑑 and 𐑕, SSBE speakers tend to exhibit yod-coalescence instead, turning “Tuesday” into “choose day” instead. This ambiguity is signaled to the reader by the compound letter “𐑿” to start with.

Just as British Shavian doesn’t spell “Tuesday” as “𐑗𐑵𐑟𐑛𐑱”, American Shavian will not spell “Tuesday” as “𐑑𐑵𐑟𐑛𐑱”.

You can’t handle the chruth

For similar reasons, turning 𐑑 and 𐑛 before 𐑮 into 𐑗 and 𐑡 will not be done, since it is simply allophonic variation and has the potential to confuse readers with obscured derivation (e.g. 𐑢𐑦𐑯𐑑𐑼 → 𐑢𐑦𐑯𐑗𐑮𐑦).