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An experiment with phonetic writing
- An experiment with phonetic writing
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RE: An experiment with phonetic writing
ololololo > 08-09-2026, 11:06 AM
(08-09-2026, 03:00 AM)Jorge_Stolfi Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.You cannot know that.
Yes, everyone perceives words differently, but in my opinion, a person without an advanced knowledge of French will quite likely read “aujourd'hui” as “ujuvi” or “oujovey.” With a certain degree of probability, a French speaker will understand it. -
RE: An experiment with phonetic writing
nablator > 08-09-2026, 12:32 PM
(08-09-2026, 11:06 AM)ololololo Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.“ujuvi” or “oujovey. With a certain degree of probability, a French speaker will understand it.
Unlikely. The "j" is good (if pronounced like Russian ж, or the "s" in "pleasure"), nothing else seems remotely correct. -
RE: An experiment with phonetic writing
ololololo > 08-09-2026, 12:48 PM
(08-09-2026, 12:32 PM)nablator Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.
That's right. He can definitely recognize this sound. The rest is up to his interpretation.(08-09-2026, 11:06 AM)ololololo Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.“ujuvi” or “oujovey. With a certain degree of probability, a French speaker will understand it.
Unlikely. The "j" is good (if pronounced like Russian ж, or the "s" in "pleasure"), nothing else seems remotely correct. -
RE: An experiment with phonetic writing
eggyk > 08-09-2026, 01:04 PM
Isn't the premise of this that the french person would potentially understand the word once re-spoken by the person transcribing? If we assume that most of the sounds were roughly correctly interpreted by the transcriber, it doesn't matter how they wrote it down, it only matters that they can correctly reproduce the sounds they intended to represent within their system. (the lack of a d in "ujuvi" indicates that this has not taken place)
So if someone were to write "ajawdwi" to mean "aujourd'hui", regardless of what others can interpret by reading it, as long as the writing system consistently reads "ajawdwi" as "aujourd'hui" it doesn't matter.
Show ajawdwi to a dutch person and it reads "ayavdvi", and perhaps to other english speakers it may be "ahjordwih". It only matters that I -as the person creating the system- can reliably reproduce the sounds that I intended to store.
The same would apply to contractions: "aub" would be read as "au-b" or "oub" to those not in the know, but as long as the person writing knows that it represents "alstublieft"- and reads it as such - the information has been preserved. -
RE: An experiment with phonetic writing
ololololo > 08-09-2026, 01:36 PM
(08-09-2026, 01:04 PM)eggyk Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.Isn't the premise of this that the french person would potentially understand the word once re-spoken by the person transcribing?
It’s strange that you’re stopping at this after I’ve confirmed it. Yes, a Frenchman will understand this person if he says “aujourd’hui,” and he will understand this person if he reads it in his letter. But he might not understand what he wrote.
By analogy with Russian: There is the word “Солнце”. It is pronounced almost like “Сонце”, but some people might hear the sound “a” in the last unstressed letter and write it as “Сонца”, or even “Сонц”.
How quickly can I recognize that Сонц = Солнце? Well, maybe quickly, because if you write Russian with some mistakes, it will still be understandable. As far as I know, French can be made completely unreadable with these mistakes. -
RE: An experiment with phonetic writing
eggyk > 08-09-2026, 02:36 PM
(08-09-2026, 01:36 PM)ololololo Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.
(08-09-2026, 01:04 PM)eggyk Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.Isn't the premise of this that the french person would potentially understand the word once re-spoken by the person transcribing?
It’s strange that you’re stopping at this after I’ve confirmed it. Yes, a Frenchman will understand this person if he says “aujourd’hui,” and he will understand this person if he reads it in his letter. But he might not understand what he wrote.
By analogy with Russian: There is the word “Солнце”. It is pronounced almost like “Сонце”, but some people might hear the sound “a” in the last unstressed letter and write it as “Сонца”, or even “Сонц”.
How quickly can I recognize that Сонц = Солнце? Well, maybe quickly, because if you write Russian with some mistakes, it will still be understandable. As far as I know, French can be made completely unreadable with these mistakes.
I've only just joined the conversation
What is the point that you are trying to make here? That someone writing phonetically may produce text that others cannot read? Of course that is true.
But this all depends on how accurately the transcriber interprets the sounds, exactly how his system works, and exactly how much the other person understands the system (or how good they are at pattern recognition). In order to reasonably try to write phonetically, the transcriber must surely be reasonably able to interpret the sounds of the language, at least to a point where they would feel able to do so.
So, if the purpose was to phonetically write down french words in order for a french person to read, why would someone do that? Why not just learn french spelling, and then write the book? I feel that this breakdown in the metaphor is a consequence of using a language like french, instead of a completely different writing system like chinese. -
RE: An experiment with phonetic writing
ololololo > 08-09-2026, 02:39 PM
I was watching a review of a game and found an example in it that clearly illustrates what I’m saying.
Example in Polish:
Będę się za ciebie modlil (I will pray for you) - 1
It is read as:
Bede sheu za tiebe moigliua (the way I heard it from the character) - 2
If you write it as 1, a Polishman will read it and understand. If it’s like in point 2, he might not understand what you wrote at all.
@Rafal could say more here, as someone who knows Polish well, but in my opinion, this example also illustrates that the perception of words is not so straightforward. -
RE: An experiment with phonetic writing
ololololo > 08-09-2026, 02:43 PM
(08-09-2026, 02:36 PM)eggyk Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.So, if the purpose was to phonetically write down french words in order for a french person to read, why would someone do that? Why not just learn french spelling, and then write the book? I feel that this breakdown in the metaphor is a consequence of using a language like french, instead of a completely different writing system like chinese.
You are completely right.
This entire metaphor involving French is meant to show that two people can pronounce the same word in the same way, but hear it differently. I think this is all very obvious, because it’s the same as saying “someone who didn’t learn to speak this language well will speak it poorly.”
But still, it was worth clarifying...
(08-09-2026, 02:36 PM)eggyk Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.I've only just joined the conversation
Oh, I thought you were talking about the whole theory. Anyway, sorry.
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RE: An experiment with phonetic writing
Linda > 09-09-2026, 03:34 AM
I had never heard pronunciation of aujourd'hui” as “ujuvi” but I heard it on the radio today. -
RE: An experiment with phonetic writing
ololololo > 09-09-2026, 11:26 AM
(09-09-2026, 03:34 AM)Linda Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.I had never heard pronunciation of aujourd'hui” as “ujuvi” but I heard it on the radio today.
This is how a person who doesn’t know French well might pronounce it. Purely theoretically, in fast speech, a person might not pronounce all the sounds, which could result in, for example, the sound “r” being omitted.
A more accurate phonetic rendering is “oujourdvie,” but I don’t think the person who is learning French in our metaphor would be able to write it that way.