ALUPEC
Encyclopedia
The Alfabeto Unificado para a Escrita do Caboverdiano (Unified Alphabet for Cape Verdean Writing), commonly known as ALUPEC, is the alphabet
that was officially recognized by the Cape Verde
an government to write Cape Verdean Creole.
based on the Latin script and states only which letters should be used to represent each sound. The system does not establish rules for spelling (orthography
). For that reason, Cape Verdean creole writing is not standardized; the same word or the same sentence may appear written in different ways. Cape Verdeans, then, write idiosyncratically — that is, each person writes in his or her own dialect
, sociolect
, and idiolect
.
The descriptive texts concerning the ALUPEC claim that it is “a system composed by 23 letters
and four digraph
s”. What those texts do not specify is that the ALUPEC also includes the letter Y and the digraph RR.
Older documents, such as the 1994 Proposed Criteria of the Unified Alphabet for the Cape Verdean Writing System, showed the following order:
A B S D E F G H I J DJ L LH M N NH N̈ O P K R T U V X TX Z
Later documents (after 1998) show the following order:
A B D DJ E F G H I J K L LH M N NH N̈ O P R S T TX U V X Z
The ALUPEC comes close to a perfect phonetic system in that almost every letter represents only one sound and almost every sound is represented by only one letter. The vowels may have a graphic accent, but the system does not consider letters with accents as separate letters.
Additional notes:
} is written debóxe, not dbóx (compare Sotavento dibaxu)
} is written amedjeres, not amdjers (Sotavento mudjeris)
This is a contradiction within the ALUPEC, which intends to be a phonetic system in that every letter should represent only one sound and every sound should be represented by only one letter. Some words in Barlavento Creoles will have, therefore, a dubious representation, with the pronunciation to be deduced by context. Examples:
On July 20, 1998, the ALUPEC was approved by the Conselho de Ministros de Cabo Verde, for a five year trial period. According to the same council, the ALUPEC would “take into account the diversity of the Cape Verdean Language in all the islands, and only after that trial period its introduction in schools would be considered”.
In 2005, the ALUPEC was recognized by the Cape Verdean government as a viable system for writing the Cape Verdean Creole, being until now the only one officially recognized by the same government. In spite of being the only one officially recognized, the same law allows the usage of alternative writing models, “as long they are presented in a systematized and scientific way”.
Alphabet
An alphabet is a standard set of letters—basic written symbols or graphemes—each of which represents a phoneme in a spoken language, either as it exists now or as it was in the past. There are other systems, such as logographies, in which each character represents a word, morpheme, or semantic...
that was officially recognized by the Cape Verde
Cape Verde
The Republic of Cape Verde is an island country, spanning an archipelago of 10 islands located in the central Atlantic Ocean, 570 kilometres off the coast of Western Africa...
an government to write Cape Verdean Creole.
Description
The ALUPEC is a phonetic writing systemPhonemic orthography
A phonemic orthography is a writing system where the written graphemes correspond to phonemes, the spoken sounds of the language. In terms of orthographic depth, these are termed shallow orthographies, contrasting with deep orthographies...
based on the Latin script and states only which letters should be used to represent each sound. The system does not establish rules for spelling (orthography
Orthography
The orthography of a language specifies a standardized way of using a specific writing system to write the language. Where more than one writing system is used for a language, for example Kurdish, Uyghur, Serbian or Inuktitut, there can be more than one orthography...
). For that reason, Cape Verdean creole writing is not standardized; the same word or the same sentence may appear written in different ways. Cape Verdeans, then, write idiosyncratically — that is, each person writes in his or her own dialect
Dialect
The term dialect is used in two distinct ways, even by linguists. One usage refers to a variety of a language that is a characteristic of a particular group of the language's speakers. The term is applied most often to regional speech patterns, but a dialect may also be defined by other factors,...
, sociolect
Sociolect
In sociolinguistics, a sociolect or social dialect is a variety of language associated with a social group such as a socioeconomic class, an ethnic group, an age group, etc....
, and idiolect
Idiolect
In linguistics, an idiolect is a variety of a language unique to an individual. It is manifested by patterns of vocabulary or idiom selection , grammar, or pronunciations that are unique to the individual. Every individual's language production is in some sense unique...
.
The descriptive texts concerning the ALUPEC claim that it is “a system composed by 23 letters
Letter (alphabet)
A letter is a grapheme in an alphabetic system of writing, such as the Greek alphabet and its descendants. Letters compose phonemes and each phoneme represents a phone in the spoken form of the language....
and four digraph
Digraph (orthography)
A digraph or digram is a pair of characters used to write one phoneme or a sequence of phonemes that does not correspond to the normal values of the two characters combined...
s”. What those texts do not specify is that the ALUPEC also includes the letter Y and the digraph RR.
Older documents, such as the 1994 Proposed Criteria of the Unified Alphabet for the Cape Verdean Writing System, showed the following order:
A B S D E F G H I J DJ L LH M N NH N̈ O P K R T U V X TX Z
Later documents (after 1998) show the following order:
A B D DJ E F G H I J K L LH M N NH N̈ O P R S T TX U V X Z
The ALUPEC comes close to a perfect phonetic system in that almost every letter represents only one sound and almost every sound is represented by only one letter. The vowels may have a graphic accent, but the system does not consider letters with accents as separate letters.
| Letter | IPA | Description |
| a | /a/ or /ɐ/ |
like a in Portuguese pá or like a in (European) Portuguese para |
| á | /a/ | like a in Portuguese pá |
| â | /ɐ/ | like a in (European) Portuguese para |
| b | /b/ | like b in English but |
| d | /d/ | like d in Portuguese dedo |
| dj | /tʒ/ | like j in English just |
| e | /e/ * | like e in Portuguese dedo, never like i in Portuguese filho * see notes on Barlavento usage |
| é | /ɛ/ | like e in Portuguese ferro |
| ê | /e/ | like e in Portuguese dedo |
| f | /f/ | like f in English for |
| g | /ɡ/ | always like g in English go, never like s in English pleasure |
| h | used only in the digraphs lh and nh | |
| i | /i/ or /j/ |
like i in Portuguese vi or like y in English yes |
| í | /i/ | like i in Portuguese vi |
| j | /ʒ/ | like s in English measure |
| k | /k/ | like c in Portuguese caco |
| l | /l/ | like l in French elle |
| lh | /ʎ/ | like lh in Portuguese filho |
| m | /m/ | like m in English me |
| n | /n/ | like n in Portuguese não |
| nh Nh (digraph) Nh is a digraph of the Latin alphabet, a combination of N and H. Together with lh and the interpunct, it was a typical feature of Old Occitan, the language used by medieval troubadours.-African languages:... |
/ɲ/ | like nh in Portuguese ninho |
| n̈ (n with diaeresis N-diaeresis "'", or "'" is a grapheme from several minor extended Latin alphabets, the letter N with a diaeresis mark.... ) |
/ŋ/ | like ng in English king |
| o | /o/ | like o in Portuguese amor never like u in Portuguese tu |
| ó | /ɔ/ | like o in Portuguese porta |
| ô | /o/ | like o in Portuguese amor |
| p | /p/ | like p in Portuguese para |
| r | /ɾ/ or /ʀ/ |
like r in Portuguese porta or like r in Portuguese rato |
| rr | /ʀ/ | like rr in Portuguese ferro |
| s | /s/ * | like s in Portuguese sim, never like z in Portuguese zero * see notes on Barlavento usage |
| t | /t/ | like t in Portuguese tu |
| tx | /tʃ/ | like ch in English chair |
| u | /u/ or /w/ |
like u in Portuguese tu or like w in English wet |
| ú | /u/ | like u in Portuguese tu |
| v | /v/ | like v in English vain |
| x | /ʃ/ | like sh in English ship, never like the Portuguese words sexo, próximo or exame |
| z | /z/ | like z in Portuguese zero |
Additional notes:
- The letter y is used only to represent the copulative conjunctionGrammatical conjunctionIn grammar, a conjunction is a part of speech that connects two words, sentences, phrases or clauses together. A discourse connective is a conjunction joining sentences. This definition may overlap with that of other parts of speech, so what constitutes a "conjunction" must be defined for each...
(corresponding to "e" in Portuguese, which means and), in the same fashion as in Spanish. - The letter r has the sound /ʀ/ only in the beginning of the words.
- The letter n in the end of the syllables is not pronounced, it only indicates the nasality of the preceding vowel.
- The personal pronoun that represents the subject form of the first person of the singular (English “I”) is always written with the capital letter N, whatever the pronunciation, whatever the Creole variant.
- The graphic accents are used to indicate the stressed syllable in proparoxytoneProparoxytoneProparoxytone is a linguistic term for a word with stress on the antepenultimate syllable, e.g the English words cinema and operational. Related terms are paroxytone and oxytone .In English, most nouns of three or more syllables are proparoxtones...
words, and to indicate the stressed syllable in oxytoneOxytoneAn oxytone is a word with the stress on the last syllable, such as the English words correct and reward. A paroxytone is stressed on the penultimate syllable. A proparoxytone is stressed on the antepenultimate syllable.-See also:*Barytone...
words that do not end in a consonant; the acute accent is also used in paroxytoneParoxytoneParoxytone is a linguistic term for a word with stress on the penultimate syllable, that is, the syllable before the last syllable, e.g, the English word potato...
words when the stressed syllable has the sounds /ɛ/ or /ɔ/. - When writing Santo Antão Creole and São Vicente Creole, the letter s can be pronounced as [s], [ʃ], and [ʒ], depending on context. This mostly corresponds to the (European) Portuguese s, except, as noted, the intervocalic s . See Portuguese phonologyPortuguese phonologyThe phonology of Portuguese can vary considerably between dialects, in extreme cases leading to difficulties in intelligibility. This article focuses on the pronunciations that are generally regarded as standard...
.When writing Barlavento Creoles, the letter e is written in the place of vowels that would exist in equivalent SotaventoSotavento CreolesSotavento Creoles is the name given to the group of Cape Verdean Creoles spoken in the Sotavento Islands of Cape Verdean Islands.Some characteristics of Sotavento Creoles:...
words. If this written vowel was simply omitted, syllables could be left without vowels, or consonants left at the end of a word, in ways deemed improper. For example:
} is written debóxe, not dbóx (compare Sotavento dibaxu)
} is written amedjeres, not amdjers (Sotavento mudjeris)
This is a contradiction within the ALUPEC, which intends to be a phonetic system in that every letter should represent only one sound and every sound should be represented by only one letter. Some words in Barlavento Creoles will have, therefore, a dubious representation, with the pronunciation to be deduced by context. Examples:
| word with the phoneme /e/ indeed | translation into English | Word with the phoneme elided | comparison with the same word in Sotavento Creoles | translation into English |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| bejon /beˈʒõ/ |
big kiss | bejon /bʒõ/ |
bujon /buˈʒõ/ |
imaginary bird that haunts children (Pt: abujão) |
| kemâ /keˈmɐ/ |
to burn | kemâ /kmɐ/ |
kumâ /kuˈmɐ/ |
that (subordinating conjunction) |
| pelâ /peˈlɐ/ |
to peel | pelâ /plɐ/ |
pilâ /piˈlɐ/ |
to pound |
| petâ /peˈtɐ/ |
to defy someone with the chest |
petâ /ptɐ/ |
botâ /boˈtɐ/ |
to throw |
| pezâ /peˈzɐ/ |
to weigh | pezâ /pzɐ/ |
pizâ /piˈzɐ/ |
to step on |
| remâ /ʀeˈmɐ/ |
to row | remâ /ʀmɐ/ |
rumâ /ʀuˈmɐ/ |
to put in place, to arrange |
| se /se/ |
his / her | se /s/ |
si /si/ |
if |
History
The ALUPEC emerged in 1994, from the alphabet proposed by the Colóquio Linguístico de Mindelo, in 1979.On July 20, 1998, the ALUPEC was approved by the Conselho de Ministros de Cabo Verde, for a five year trial period. According to the same council, the ALUPEC would “take into account the diversity of the Cape Verdean Language in all the islands, and only after that trial period its introduction in schools would be considered”.
In 2005, the ALUPEC was recognized by the Cape Verdean government as a viable system for writing the Cape Verdean Creole, being until now the only one officially recognized by the same government. In spite of being the only one officially recognized, the same law allows the usage of alternative writing models, “as long they are presented in a systematized and scientific way”.
Present situation
In spite of having been officially recognized by the Government, the ALUPEC has neither official, neither mandatory usage, being used only by enthusiasts.External links
- Proposed Criteria of the Unified Alphabet for the Cape Verdean Writing System
- Na diféza di un skrita pa kriolu di Kabu Verdi (in Creole)
- Pa Nu Skrebe Na Skola (in Portuguese)
- Orthographic guidelines for writing São Vicentean Kriol — a proposal for São Vicente Creole writing