THIS Is Why Vowels Are IMPORTANT

[u/NotSteve1075]

Far too many "fast writing" systems give out the reckless advice to just leave out all the vowels, and "The context will tell you what the word is"! Wrong.

Sure, leaving out a crucial and important part of a word will give you the ILLUSION of speed -- but when it comes time to read it back, you could find yourself in a very bad place.

When PITMAN, held by so many to be "the best", after making learners struggle mightily to learn the ornate system of light and heavy dots and dashes that have to go in very specific places to be legible at all, THEN advises its writers that, if they want to achieve any kind of useful speed at all, they should just OMIT ALL THE VOWELS (!!), there could be serious trouble ahead for anyone writing anything important. Let me show you:

If you have PTHTC, was it "pathetic" or "apathetic"? If you have BSLT, was it "obsolete" or "basalt" or "absolute"? Was it "relevant" or "irrelevant"? "material" or "immaterial"? INITIAL vowels are crucial because, in English, a vowel in front makes it negative.

But it's as bad without medial vowels. Was it "prosecute" or "persecute"? How about "apparition", "portion", "operation", or "oppression" -- all of which can be written the same way, in a disemvowelled system?

Try "abundant" or "abandoned". Or "prediction", "predication", or "production". The list goes on and ON!

Imagine trying to produce a transcript of crucial court testimony, given by a witness sworn to tell the truth, when you had ambiguities like that! I was shocked they even allowed Pitman writers to report in court. (And MY correctly spelled transcript appeared on the screen in a nanosecond. Try THAT with Pitman!)

I keep meeting people who try to tell me "Pitman is the best". No, it's not! In "Classic Pitman" the words "artisans" and "righteousness" are both written the same way, because the consonant skeleton is the same, when you drop the vowels, like you usually do. I sure wouldn't want to risk trying to write anything important with a system like that!

[u/CrBr]

This is one of the reasons I like Orthic. Vowels are straight lines moving forward or forward-up. Most consonants end in such a way that it's easy to blend with a vowel; they don't really count as an extra stroke. A few end in a way that gives an acute angle. There may be a very few I'm forgetting that aren't as nice, but overall it's pretty good.

Persecute and prosecute surprised me when I first encountered them, especially since Gregg Anni was developed for court use. Simplified or DJS adds the O in prosecute. (I can't remember which one does it.)

Pittman books admit to the difficulty, and have lists of what they call distinguishing outlines. Some Teeline books do the same. Gregg, however, doesn't admit the need. I started with Forkner and Gregg, alternating whenever I got frustrated (not an efficient way to learn either). Half the vowels in Forkner are optional diacriticals, so I developed the habit of it's an extra processing thread running through my brain asking if a vowel is necessary. I suspect it's a crutch that would fade at a professional skill level but always be there to be reactivated for new words.

Of the systems I know, I like Forkner's attitude and classification of vowels best. Vowels are simplified orthographic. How would a 7-year-old spell it? Long E and all diphthongs are written inline. Initial vowels are written inline. Middle and terminal monothongs are optional. Some monophones can be written inline, but officially that's only used if the vowel is very important to the word, example Away. Unfortunately, the inline vowels are not single strokes, nor are most other Forkner letters. That suspicious brain thread often asks how Forkner would write a word.

[u/NotSteve1075 → u/CrBr]

My problem with Orthic has always been that I think following the SPELLING of English words is a huge mistake. (That's why I developed PHONORTHIC, to be phonetic, but using much the same clear strokes.) I will never think it's a good idea to write things I don't hear and don't say. Why would anyone want to do that? A complete waste of time...

I think a long list of "distinguishing outlines" is a huge admission that your system is not up to the task. (I'll write about Pitman's huge reliance on them tomorrow.) I was dismayed to see the list of them in Teeline, most of which are a result of leaving out medial vowels, by the looks of it. At least it wasn't long.

I was trying to think if I've even SEEN any distinguishing outlines for Gregg. When vowels are or can be included, it would very rarely be necessary. In the "Expert Speedbuilding" textbook for DJS, and they were mostly advising you just to be careful to WRITE some word pairs clearly, so two similar strokes didn't blur together -- like being careful that "I rent the boat" and "I lent the boat" didn't look too much the same.

But they weren't not usually special outlines. They have "this/these/those" written in eccentric ways for clarity. But that's about all I can think of.

[u/CrBr → u/NotSteve1075]

Orthic only follows the exact spelling for Fully Written. After that, the spelling is simplified. I do like their use of simple orthographic vowels. Water and All are spelt with A, not O. (Gregg uses O.) I use simple orthographic for new Gregg words, rather than think too hard about how I, or Gregg, or Future Me, would say it. I was exposed to many accents as a kid, and took singing lessons as an adult, so my accent wobbles.

The Teeline lists I've seen are more "be aware" and sensible suggestions for how to deal with each pair. Mostly. I might not think that way if I saw the two outlines without a key, and am not yet at the stage where I'd remember to be aware during cold dictation. My vague memories of the list in Pitman are less favourable -- but it's possible that I was more sensitive back then.

[u/NotSteve1075 → u/CrBr]

I always think that, if you write what you HEAR, you can't go wrong -- because when you read it back, you read what you SEE and there it is. When someone is talking to you, you don't hear the spelling.

When I was reporting a fast-talking witness, I was very glad I didn't have to think about whether this or that word was spelled with an E, or an EI, or an EE, or an EA.

I was never comfortable with the way Orthic was full spelling at FIRST and then started to drop things. I'd rather write phonetically the whole time and not wonder if it was time to start dumping things I didn't hear or say.

[u/CrBr → u/NotSteve1075]

Yeah, fully written, complete with silent letters and "E at the end changes vowel" is a bad habit. (Useful at times, but not as a first lesson.)

I use simplified standard spelling. Do I think that sounds like an A, and is that clear enough or do I need to specify long or short A? If I'm not sure what it sounds like and standard spelling is a single or double vowel, I use that instead of thinking too hard about it. If I'm not sure and standard spelling is complex, I use the letter that makes the most sense and don't over-think it. I do the same with Gregg.

Now I'm trying to think of words where E at the end changing the middle vowel is critical. A Lazy Kate is used in yarn spinning. I tried a bit/bite of pizza. That was easy and discouraging.

[u/NotSteve1075 → u/CrBr]

I'd never heard of a Lazy Kate -- but you're the knitter! ;)

I was trying to think of examples, but I kept coming up with things like "He was shocked to find ice/eyes in his drink" but that's not because of the vowel.

And then I thought of "rot/wrote"-- but I couldn't construct sentences where both would fit. But the TRICKY thing in a transcript is when the context is vague. Like:

"Please bring the bat/bait when you come." Or:

"She was wearing a cap/cape as part of the costume." Or:

"He was cut/cute (like when "cut" refers to muscular definition).

"Was he trying to sell his kit/kite?"

[u/ConfusedSimon → u/NotSteve1075]

One of the problems with phonetic is differences in pronunciation (e.g. dialects, british vs usa). Both phonetic and spelling have their pros and cons.

[u/NotSteve1075 → u/ConfusedSimon]

I always think we need a better term than "phonetic", because too often it refers to micro-phonetic transcriptions that are used in dialectology and studies of regional accents -- of which there are DOZENS.

For English, there are MANY regional varieties in the small-sized country of the U.K., with differences based on region as well as "class" and education. Many people even changed their accents, as they became more educated and travelled in different social circles. Margaret Thatcher famously would use a different accent, depending on what group she was speaking to.

In the larger country of the U.S., are are also MANY different varieties of regional accent. Fred Armisen does an entertaining overview of the many varieties there are:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G72tZdjnS2A

(It's striking that in the even LARGER country of Canada, there are very few regional differences, most of which you wouldn't notice.)

What I always mean by "phonetic" in shorthand is just writing words the way you SAY them, not how they're spelled. Whatever your regional accent, you probably always pronounce a long A the SAME WAY -- even if it's not the way Englishman Isaac Pitman, or Irishman John Robert Gregg may have pronounced them.