IPA and GF Latin SSA

[moyogo]

Several Latin African orthographies are based on the International African Alphabet, published in 1927 and in the 1930 Practical Orthography of African Languages, which is directly derived from the IPA of the time. The IPA has slightly evolved since but there are no major relevant differences.

Samples from the Practical Orthography of African Languages

The style used in Practical Orthography of African Languages may useful.

Notes:

• /A/a in italic are confusable with /Alpha-latin/alpha-latin from a later General Alphabet of Cameroon Languages (also borrowing from IPA). In Playfair, /a/alpha-latin need to be distinct. One solution is to have /alpha-latin as a more traditional Greek-like alpha with not vertical stem but the in-stroke of the loop crossing the out-stroke of the loop, with a hook terminal on the out-stroke. Unicode does not distinguish between IPA’s script-a and GACL’s Latin alpha, as both sometimes have the other’s shape. Alternatively, the /a could have an alternate slanted shape, this is not common but can be useful.
• Ɓ had the shape of Latin Ƃ /Btopbar or Б /Be-cy. The B-shape is used instead nowadays, except in Liberia where the Ƃ-shape is still used. locl variant Bhook needed for Toma TOD0, Dan-Gio DNJ , Kpelle Liberia XPE language systems.
• Ə and ə are used here and are still used in several language orthographies. In some countries, the Ǝ and ǝ are used instead. No locl feature is required in this case.
• ƒ needs to be different from f in italic in Ewe EWE , Avatime AVN , Lelemi LEF , Waci Gbe WCI language system. The ƒ and f are already good for these languages in Playfair. If that wasn’t the case an alternate /f would be needed for the locl feature in those language systems. Keep in mind that English, French or other languages used in the countries where those languages are used may have borrowed words or proper names with ƒ. So either the default f needs to not have a hook, or at least a ssXX or cvXX feature needs to also provide the alternative f without hook.
• Ŋ had and still most often has the n-form instead of the N-form in African languages. However while the n-form is often preferred by editors, readers don’t seem to care either way. So depending on the style, both may not be necessary, especially when one hardly fits. In Playfair both seem to fit. The n-form can be the default as there is a larger number of languages that use that form, several of which do not have an OpenType Language System Tag, and the N-form should be the locl variant for Northern Sami NSM or other Sami languages which may use it in borrowed names: Inari Sami ISM , Lule Sami LSM , Skolt Sami SKS , Souther Sami SSM -- it’s not clear for KSM as it used the n-form in the 1930s -- or other adjacent languages (Swedish, Norwegian, Finnish).
• Ʃ had the shape of Greek Σ /Sigma, the ʃ-shape (or Cyrillic Ꚃ-shape) is used in the Gabon Scientic Alphabet reference and the Guine National Alphabet reference. locl variant Esh Greek Σ-shape could be added for the Ga GAD , Xhosa XHS , Zulu ZUL language systems that used it between the 1930s and the 1950s or 1960s.
• Ʋ /Vhook had a squarish shape. The shape nowadays is more round like the ʋ /vhook. In Playfair the ʋ /vhook will be confusable with /v. In some works of the period, /vhook has a closed loop. The locl variant with an angular-v shape and an above-x-height hook is used in the Toma TOD0.
• Ʒ had the shape of a reversed Greek Σ /Sigma, it has a baseline large ʒ-shape nowadays instead. The old shape is not needed. The a reversed Greek Σ shape could be added for the GAD language system.
• the bold has some issues in this work:
  • ɓ /bhook has its hook too high, the regular is good
  • ɣ /gamma-latin is a bit out of balance, the regular looks better

IPA consonants and vowels (only lowercase, note ɬ and ɮ are only used as IPA symbols)

Capital letters and written forms.

Alphabetical order of the letters

Samples from The New Script 1930

See https://archive.org/details/the-new-script-and-its-relation-with-the-languages-of-the-gold-coast

This shows a lot of letters with a modern style.

Notes:

• There no appropriate Ɛ.
• The Ga Ʒ ʒ /Ezh/ezh and Ʃʃ /Esh/esh have been replaced by J j and digraph Sh sh in the 1960s.

Sample from A. Burssens & G. van Bulck, "De Africa-spelling en de Kongoleesche talen", Kongo-Overzee, vol. 2, no. 2,‎ December 1935, p. 65-93

(sorry for quality)

• These are lowercase, directly from the same type as used in Maitre Phonétique, the journal of the IPA.
• ɑ /alpha-latin has a script-a shape. It’s not clear the authors intended to use italic at all.
• ꭓ /chi-latin is raised by mistake. In any case, the letter isn’t used in African orthographies but was or may used in phonetic transcriptions. It’s not SSA so don’t worry about it.
• ʔ /glottalstop is a cut question mark. This should be avoided and the letter should be drawn from baseline to ascender-height.

Samples from UNESCO Niamey meetings 1978

See https://unesdoc.unesco.org/ark:/48223/pf0000060064

These aren’t super useful for Playfair but are still an important reference for letter identity.

Notes:

• Several shapes are poorly designed (like Ɛ being a cut reversed B, or Ɣɣ or Ʊʊ or ʒ).
• Here ɑ /alpha-latin and Ɑ /Alpha-latin do not have the script-a form but are closer to the loop-form in some way.
• The special /Eth nor /eth are used in Latin African orthographies so it can be ignored.
• The hooks on ƁƊƘƳ /Bhook/Dhook or /Khook/Yhook are mild or slightly off, they should be better defined and more pronounced.
• Ƒ /Fhook has a centered crossbar but no hook. This should be avoided, it should have a bottom hook (on the baseline or below).
• Ɩ ɩ have the shapes of Ɪ ɪ as IPA used both ɩ and ɪ as alternates of the same symbols for a while. Nowadays they are distinct. Ɩ ɩ should be distinct from iıl /i/idotless/l in particular in italic. The hook terminal of Ɩ ɩ can be more pronounced, like a milder reversed J and milder reversed ᴊ in italic. The distinction is less needed in roman in some styles, like Playfair roman styles.
• Ʈ /Tretroflexhook has a peculiar Ŧ-shape instead of a T-shape with a bottom right hook, like ʈ /tretroflexhook. This should be avoided, the T-shape with a bottom right hook is more appropriate. This letter is rare or not used in orthographies, it still need to do some research on its current use.
• The z with hook isn’t used in orthographies and hasn’t been encoded in Unicode. It can be ignored.
• The Ʃ has the ʃ-shape (like in the Gabon Scientific Alhpabet and the latest Guinea National Alphabet).
• Ʋʋ are boxy but this can work with the style.

Turned letters

Turned letters are not necessarily turned (also in IPA), these are actually nicer: ɥ /hturned can be a u with a q-terminal, ɯ /mturned can be a u-u ligature, ʌ /vturned can be angular even when v is round.

Ismall and its capital

Ɪ ɪ is used in at least on language in Côte d’Ivoire. Historically it’s a variant of Ɩ ɩ, at least ɪ and ɩ being variants in IPA as mentionned above.

Like in IPA, ɪ /Ismall should be noticeably distinct from i or ı. That seems straightforward in Playfair, the serif can still be slightly more pronounced on ɪ /Ismall.
The capital /uniA7AE should have top and bottom bars instead of serifs. It’ a bit of a Frankenstein letter, it can be built from a narrow T and turned narrow T.

Vhook

Regarding the /vhook/v issue, in Le Maître phonétique, April-June 1932, p. 34, two solution are presented.

Here it is in print in Clement M. Doke, English-Lamba Vocabulary, 1933

This solution seems to not have been used recently, rather the distinction is made with angular-v for /v and round-v for /vhook.
Since Playfair has a round-v for /v, one could consider this old form as a solution.

Alternatively, in italic, the /vhook could have a hook in-stroke terminal (like i, n, etc.) and a shape closer to a slanted roman.

Note the Toma TOD0 locl variant with the angular-v shape and above-x-height hook mentionned above likely wouldn’t work in several languages as in many cases /vhook is used as a vowel (due to its similarity with Ʊ ʊ /Upsilon-latin/upsilon-latin).

ramshorn and capital

ɤ /ramshorn is used in two languages in Côte d’Ivoire and the capital uniA7CB will be in Unicode 16 this year. Both should be distinct from Ɣɣ /Gamma-latin/gamma-latin. The IPA symbol ɤ used to be a "baby-gamma" (small capital Ɣ on the baseline) but since 1989 it has hook terminals on both in- and out-strokes.

[clauseggers]

Denis do you have the alphabet for each of the languages we are doing?

[moyogo]

Yes, 579 of them with 130 which I updated with sources.

Do you need all of them in a specific format?
They are in gflanguages.

[clauseggers]

I need some of them populate my test documents. Looking at the sheer number of languages I should probably start with a dozen of them. I would need sample texts/corpus for each. Can you recommend such a short list?