User talk:Trainer David

Shorthand

Background

Phonography, commonly known as shorthand is a system of rapid writing using symbols (phonography). There are several systems of shorthand available - the most popular are 1) Pitman's New Era (British system) and 2) Gregg's Shorthand (American system). This article focuses on the Pitman system, as it is the system that the author knows fluently.

Shorthand's advantage over written English (longhand): it can record human speach at speeds up to 300 words per minute, or faster. Handwritten English is only able to record neatly at about 20 words per minute, and type written English (using a keyboard) is only capable of around 100 words (although faster speeds are possible).

The Romanic alphabet (26 letters) cannot represent the thirty-six typical sounds of the English language. As a consequence, many of the letters are used to represent different sounds. It would be cumbersome and pointless for any shorthand system to be based on the 26 letters of the English language: some of the characters would be required to represent several sounds, as is done in ordinary spelling and, on the other hand, C, Q and X are unnecessary, as they represent sounds provided for by other consonants.

Two examples adequately represent the fundamental difference between shorthand and written English. In gaol and gale, the sounds of the first consonant are different, although represented in longhand by the same letter. Again, in tub and tube, the same letter is used to represent the vowel sound in longhand (the final e of tube being omitted because it is not sounded), though the sounds are different. Pitman's shorthand provides separate symbols for the sounds hear in the respective words (ǔ and u).

It should be noted that, although phonetic, Pitman's system is not designed to represent minute shades of pronunciation. To learn shorthand, the student must be articulate, intelligent and have a superior knowledge of the English language, grammar, spelling.

Theory

Shorthand, put simply, uses strokes and curves to represent consonants and dashes and dots to represent vowels.

1 The Consonants are formed writting 26 different strokes. 1.1 through 1.6 summarises the strokes.

1.1 explodents

pee, bee, tee, dee, chay, jay, kay, gay

1.2 continuants

ef, vee, ith, thee, ess, zee, ish, zhee

1.3 nasals

em, en, ing

1.4 liquids

el, ar, ray

1.5 coalescents

way, yay

1.6 aspirate

hay



Examples

References With the advent of the digital age, the use of written shorthand is rapidly becoming obsolete.

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