Americanist phonetic notation


Americanist phonetic notation, also known as the North American Phonetic Alphabet, the Americanist Phonetic Alphabet or the American Phonetic Alphabet, is a system of phonetic notation originally developed by European and American anthropologists and language scientists for the phonetic and phonemic transcription of indigenous languages of the Americas and for languages of Europe. It is still commonly used by linguists working on, among others, Slavic, Uralic, Semitic languages and for the languages of the Caucasus, of India, and of much of Africa; however, Uralicists commonly use a variant known as the Uralic Phonetic Alphabet.
Despite its name, NAPA has always been widely used outside the Americas. For example, a version of it is the standard for the transcription of Arabic in articles published in the Zeitschrift der Deutschen Morgenländischen Gesellschaft, the journal of the German Oriental Society.
Diacritics are more widely used in Americanist notation than in the International Phonetic Alphabet, which seeks to use as few diacritics as possible for phonemic distinctions, retaining them only for the dental-alveolar distinction. Americanist notation relies on diacritics to distinguish many other distinctions that are phonemic in the languages it transcribes. On the other hand, Americanist notation uses single letters for most coronal affricates, whereas the IPA requires digraphs. Otherwise Americanist notation has grown increasingly similar to IPA, and has abandoned many of the more obscure letters it once employed.

Summary contrast with the IPA alphabet

Certain symbols in NAPA were once identical to those of the International Phonetic Alphabet, but have become obsolete in the latter, such as. Over the years, NAPA has drawn closer to the IPA. This can be seen, for example, in a comparison of Edward Sapir's earlier and later works. However, there remain significant differences. Among these are:
  • for, for, or for, for and for
  • Palato-alveolar and sometimes alveopalatal
  • Advancing diacritic for dentals and palatals, and retracting diacritic for retroflex and uvulars
  • or for a flap and for a trill
  • Ogonek for nasalization
  • Dot over vowel for centering, two dots over a vowel to change fronting
  • Acute and grave accents over vowels for stress

    History

used an early set of phonetic symbols in his publications on American language families, although he chose symbols which had their origins in work by other phoneticians and American writers. The influential anthropologist Franz Boas used a somewhat different set of symbols. In 1916, a publication by the American Anthropological Society greatly expanded upon Boas's alphabet. This same alphabet was discussed and modified in articles by Bloomfield & Bolling and Herzog et al.. The Americanist notation may be seen in the journals American Anthropologist, International Journal of American Linguistics, and Language. Useful sources explaining the symbols – some with comparisons of the alphabets used at different times – are Campbell, Goddard, Langacker, Mithun, and Odden.
It is often useful to compare the Americanist tradition with another widespread tradition, the International Phonetic Alphabet. Americanist phonetic notation does not require a strict harmony among character styles: letters from the Greek and Latin alphabets are used side-by-side. Another contrasting feature is that, to represent some of the same sounds, the Americanist tradition relies heavily on letters modified with diacritics; whereas the IPA, which reserves diacritics for other specific uses, gave Greek and Latin letters new shapes. These differing approaches reflect the traditions' differing philosophies. The Americanist linguists were interested in a phonetic notation that could be easily created from typefaces of existing orthographies. This was seen as more practical and more cost-efficient, as many of the characters chosen already existed in Greek and East European orthographies.
Abercrombie recounts the following concerning the Americanist tradition:

Alphabet

Consonants

There is no central authority. The Western Institute for Endangered Language Documentation has recommended the following conventions since 2016: Note however that WIELD is designed specifically for Native American languages, whereas NAPA, despite its name, is widely used elsewhere, e.g. in Africa.
Advanced is and retracted is. Geminate is or. Glottalization is e.g. or .
Palatalization is written. Labialization, velarization, aspiration, voicelessness and prenasalization are as in the IPA. Pharyngeals, epiglottals and glottals are as in the IPA, as are implosives and clicks.
Differences from the IPA fall into a few broad categories: use of diacritics to derive the other coronal and dorsal articulations from the alveolar and velar, respectively; use of c j λ ƛ for affricates; y for its consonantal value, and r for a tap rather than a trill.
Notes:
About 90% of languages only have one phonemic rhotic consonant. As a result, rhotic consonants are generally transcribed with the character. This usage is common practice in Americanist and also other notational traditions. This lack of detail, although economical and phonologically sound, requires a more careful reading of a given language's phonological description to determine the precise phonetics. A list of rhotics is given below.
AlveolarRetroflex/Uvular
Approximantrṛ
Flapřṛ̌
Tapᴅᴅ̇
Trillr̃ṛ̃

Other flaps are,, etc.

Common alternate symbols

There are many alternate symbols seen in Americanist transcription. Below are some equivalent symbols matched with the symbols shown in the consonant chart above.
  • may be used for , or for.
  • may be used for .
  • may be used for .
  • may be used for .
  • may be used for .
  • may be used for.
  • may be used for.
  • may be used for.
  • may be used for.
  • ʸ may be used for fronted velars.
  • Some transcriptions superscript the onset of doubly articulated consonants and the release of fricatives, e.g.,.
  • There may be a distinction between laminal retroflex and apical retroflex in some transcriptions.
  • The fronting diacritic may be a caret rather than an inverted breve, e.g. dental and palatal.
  • Many researchers use the x-caron for the voiceless uvular fricative.
  • The use of the standard IPA belted l for the voiceless lateral fricative is becoming increasingly common.

    Pullum & Ladusaw

According to Pullum & Ladusaw, typical Americanist usage at the time was more-or-less as follows. There was, however, little standardization of rhotics, and may be either retroflex or uvular, though as noted above or may be a retroflex flap vs as a uvular trill. Apart from the ambiguity of the rhotics below, and minor graphic variants, this is compatible with the WIELD recommendations. Only precomposed affricates are shown below; others may be indicated by digraphs.
Ejectives and implosives follow the same conventions as in the IPA, apart from the ejective apostrophe being placed above the base letter.

Pike

provides the following set of symbols:
Voiceless, voiced and syllabic consonants may also be C̥, C̬ and C̩, as in IPA. Aspirated consonants are C or C̥ʰ / C̬ʱ. Non-audible release is indicated with superscripting, Vꟲ.
Fortis is C͈ and lenis C᷂. Labialization is C̮ or Cʷ; palatalization is Ꞔ, or Cʸ; velarization is C⁽ᵘ⁾, and pharyngealization is C̴.
Other airstream mechanisms are pulmonic ingressive C←, ejective Cˀ, implosive Cˁ, click C˂, and lingual ejective C˃.

Vowels

WIELD recommends the following conventions. It does not provide characters for distinctions that are not attested in the literature:
No distinction is made between front and central for the lowest unrounded vowels. Diphthongs are e.g. or, depending on phonological analysis. Nasal vowels are e.g.. Long vowels are e.g.. A three-way length distinction may be or. Primary and secondary stress are e.g. and. Voicelessness is e.g., as in the IPA. Creak, murmur, rhoticity et al. are as in the IPA.

Pullum & Ladusaw

According to Pullum & Ladusaw, typical Americanist usage at the time was more-or-less as follows:

Pike

Pike presents the following:
Nasalization is V̨ or Vⁿ. A long vowel is V꞉ or Vꞏ; half-long is V‧. Positional variants are fronted V˂, backed V˃, raised V˄ and lowered V˅.

Bloch & Trager

Bloch & Trager proposed the following schema, which was never used. They use a single dot for central vowels and a dieresis to reverse backness. The only central vowels with their own letters are, which already has a dot, and, which would not be distinct if formed with a dot.

Kurath

Kurath is as follows. Enclosed in parentheses are rounded vowels. Apart from and some differences in alignment, it is essentially the IPA.
FrontHalf-
front		CentralHalf-
back		Back
Highi ɨ ɯ
Lower highɪ ᵻ ɤ
Higher mide ɘ
Midə
Lower midɛ ɜ ʌ
Higher lowæɐ
Lowaɑꭤ

Chomsky & Halle

Chomsky & Halle proposed the following schema, which was hardly ever used. In addition to the table, there was for an unstressed reduced vowel.