The Kolagian Phonetic Alphabet

Revised version 1.1

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The Kolagian Phonetic Alphabet, or KPA, developed from a dissatisfaction with SAMPA and similar schemes devised to transcribe the IPA using only characters in the standard ASCII character set. SAMPA, which was originally devised to represent the sounds of European languages, is adequate for representing all of the symbols of the IPA (in its extended form X-SAMPA), but many of its symbols are non-intuitive and difficult to read. In addition, the curly braces { } are used to represent vowel sounds, which conflicts with their more ordinary use as brackets.

Here is a complete chart of the KPA, which corresponds in layout to the 1996 revision of the IPA. A detailed description of this system and how it compares to other ASCII-IPA schemes follows the chart.

Consonants (pulmonic)
bilab. lbdnt. dent.  alv. postalv. retr.  palat. velar  uvul. pharyn. glottal
p  b                 t  d          t. d.  c  J   k  g   q  Q          ?
   m      M             n             n.     n"     N      N"
   B"                   r                                  R"
                        r"            r.
P  B   f  v   T  D   s  z   S  Z   s. z.  C  j"  x  G   X  R   H  9   h  h"
                     l" Z"
          v"            r*            r*.    j      w"
                        l             l.     L      L"

W      voiceless labial-velar fricative
w      voiced labial-velar approximant
y"     voiced labial-palatal approximant
H"     voiceless epiglottal fricative
9"     voiced epiglottal fricative
?"     epiglottal plosive
c" z"  alveolo-palatal fricatives
l*     alveolar lateral flap
$      simultaneous S and x [originally: x"]
{kp}   double articulations [originally: kp)]
{ts}   affricates [originally: ts)]

(non-pulmonic)
p!            T!     t! tl!               c!                   clicks
   b(                   d(                   J(     g(     Q(  vcd. implosives
p`                   t` s`                       k`            ejectives

Vowels   Front     Central    Back
Close    i  y       i" u"     U" u
              I  Y          U
Close-mid   e  o"     @" 8    O" o
                        @
Open-mid       E  e"   E* 8"  V  O
                &        a*
Open              a  E"       A  6 [originally: A*]

Suprasegmentals
'      primary stress
,      secondary stress
:      long
;      half-long
^(     extra-short [originally: (]
-      syllable break
|      minor (foot) group
||     major (intonation) group
=      linking (absence of a break)
5 ^"   extra high
4 ^'   high
3 ^-   mid
2 ^`   low
1 ^=   extra low
>      downstep
<      upstep
24 ^v  rising (optionally, [/])
42 ^^  falling (optionally, [\])
<<     global rise
>>     global fall

diacritics
_h     voiceless          _:     breathy voiced     _d     dental
       [originally: _o]
_v     voiced             _~     creaky voiced      _a     apical
^h     aspirated          _m     linguolabial       _l     laminal
_)     more rounded       ^w     labialized         ~      nasalized
_(     less rounded       ^j     palatalized        ^n     nasal release
_+     advanced           ^G     velarized          ^l     lateral release
_-     retracted          ^9     pharyngealized     ^7     no audible release
^:     centralized        ^~     velarized or pharyngealized
^x     mid-centralized    _^     raised
_|     syllabic           _V     lowered
_^     non-syllabic       _<     advanced tongue root
^r     rhoticity          _>     retracted tongue root

Additional symbols not included in IPA:
(mainly from Ladefoged & Maddieson, The Sounds of the World's Languages)
_M     labiodental (alternatively, [{qp}] and [{db}] for labiodental stops)
_.     apical retroflex (if necessary to distinguish from sub-apical retroflex)
^m ^N  prenasalized (^mb ^nd ^"nJ ^Ng, etc.)
^^     closed post-alveolar (hissing-hushing) fricatives
^h"    alternative representation of breathy voice
^x ^G  affricate click release
^?     glottal click release
_=     strident vowels (double tilde below)
_w     simple labialization (not velarized)
7      velarized l (X-SAMPA [5])
I" Y"  central vowels slightly lower than ["i] and ["u] (X-SAMPA [I\], [U\])
i*     U+027F reversed r with fishhook (resembles iota turned 180 degrees)
i.     U+0285 squat reversed esh (represents a retroflex vowel)
^s     sibilant fricative; no IPA equivalent
^o     whistled; no IPA equivalent
%      arbitrary phonetic symbol, e.g., the so-called "voiced glottal stop"
^*     arbitrary diacritic, for example to represent stiff voice

Major differences from SAMPA:

The retroflex diacritic, which is [`] in SAMPA, has been replaced with [.], which is commonly used in other ASCII-IPA schemes (such as Kirshenbaum's system), and suggests the typical romanization of Sanskrit and other languages of India, which use a dot under a consonant.
SAMPA uses a backslash [\] as an "escape" character, to double the number of possible symbols. KPA uses the quotation mark ["] instead, which is less distracting and allows [\] to be optionally used to indicate a falling tone. This use of ["], and a number of the modified characters that differ from SAMPA (such as [n"] for the palatal nasal), are borrowed from an ASCII-IPA scheme created by Miguel Carrasquer in 1994, although his system used it as a suffix rather than a prefix.
Another ASCII-IPA scheme, created by David Prager Branner (also in 1994), provided the idea of representing ligatures such as "ae" and "oe" by adding a right parenthesis [)]: for example, [ae)]. The original version of KPA extended this practice to represent double articulations such as [kp)], affricates such as [ts)], and the fricative trill [rZ)].
Branner's system also has a convenient way to represent inverted characters (turned 180 degrees) by adding [&]. Since [&] is a common representation of [ae)], KPA uses [*] for this purpose. This provides optional alternatives for characters such as the palatal lateral ([L] or [y*]) and the low-mid unrounded back vowel ([V] or [v*]).
KPA uses the digits 1-5 to represent tones, as in Kirshenbaum's and Branner's systems, which is less awkward than SAMPA's diacritics [_B _L _M _H _T].
Diacritics in KPA are divided into two groups: those that are printed under the letter (which are marked with an underscore [_] as in SAMPA), and those that are printed over the letter, along with superscripts (which are marked with a caret [^]). This allows for more logical representation of diacritics such as centralized [^:] and breathy voiced [_:], which are [_"] and [_t], respectively, in SAMPA.
Clicks are regularly formed in KPA by adding [!] after a stop: [p! t!] etc., as in most ASCII-IPA systems other than SAMPA. Similarly, the "reverse apostrophe" [`] is used to represent ejectives. Implosives are marked with a left parenthesis [(], which is supposed to remind the reader of the hook on the IPA symbols.
The use of [$] for the Swedish sound represented by "hooktop heng", [6] for the turned open A, and the curly braces for ligatures and double articulations was suggested by B. Philip Jonsson.

Miscellaneous differences between KPA and SAMPA:

KPA     SAMPA | KPA     SAMPA | KPA     SAMPA | KPA     SAMPA | KPA     SAMPA | KPA     SAMPA
J       J\    | Q       G\    | M       F     | n"      J     | r"      4     | P       p\
H       X\    | 9       ?\    | l"      K     | Z"      K\    | v"      P     | r*      r\
r*.     r\`   | w"      M\    | y"      H     | 9"      <\    | ?"      >\    | c"      s\
l*      l\    | kp)etc. k_p   | 7 / l^~ 5     | i"      1     | u"      }     | U"      M
o"      2     | O"      7     | e"/oe)  9     | E*      3     | 8"      3\    | & / ae) {
a*      6     | E"/OE)  &     | 6       Q     | '       "     | ,       %     | ;       :\
)       _X    | =       -\

Extension to non-phonetic uses (e.g. representing the spelling of words)

^o      ring above
_,      cedilla or comma below
_c      ogonek (Polish nasal hook)
^+      stroke through letter (Croatian Ð, etc.)
^.      dot above (or middle dot in the case of l^.)
f"      long s
k"      kra (Greenlandic)
T"      thorn
ss)     German double s

KPA symbols in ASCII order with their IPA / Unicode equivalents:

!       (click diacritic)
#       (word boundary)
$       U+0267 LATIN SMALL LETTER HENG WITH HOOK
%       (arbitrary phonetic symbol)
&       U+00E6 LATIN SMALL LETTER AE
&"      U+0276 LATIN LETTER SMALL CAPITAL OE
'       U+02C8 MODIFIER LETTER VERTICAL LINE
(       (marks implosive consonants)
)       (used for creating ligatures, etc.)
*       (turns the preceding character 180 degrees)
+       (juncture phoneme)
,       U+02CC MODIFIER LETTER LOW VERTICAL LINE
-       (syllable break)
.       U+0322 COMBINING RETROFLEX HOOK BELOW
/       (delimiter for phonemic transcription)
        (optionally, marks rising tone)
//      (delimiter for morphophonemic transcription)
0       (unused: too similar to O)
1       U+02E9 MODIFIER LETTER EXTRA-LOW TONE BAR
2       U+02E8 MODIFIER LETTER LOW TONE BAR
3       U+02E7 MODIFIER LETTER MID TONE BAR
4       U+02E6 MODIFIER LETTER HIGH TONE BAR
5       U+02E5 MODIFIER LETTER EXTRA-HIGH TONE BAR
6       U+0252 LATIN SMALL LETTER TURNED ALPHA
7       U+026B LATIN SMALL LETTER L WITH MIDDLE TILDE
8       U+0275 LATIN SMALL LETTER BARRED O
9       U+0295 LATIN LETTER PHARYNGEAL VOICED FRICATIVE
9"      U+02A2 LATIN LETTER REVERSED GLOTTAL STOP WITH STROKE
:       U+02D0 MODIFIER LETTER TRIANGULAR COLON
;       U+02D1 MODIFIER LETTER HALF TRIANGULAR COLON
<       U+2191 UPWARDS ARROW
<<      U+2197 NORTH EAST ARROW
=       U+203F UNDERTIE
>       U+2193 DOWNWARDS ARROW
>>      U+2198 SOUTH EAST ARROW
?       U+0294 LATIN LETTER GLOTTAL STOP
?"      U+02A1 LATIN LETTER GLOTTAL STOP WITH STROKE
@       U+0259 LATIN SMALL LETTER SCHWA
@"      U+0258 LATIN SMALL LETTER REVERSED E
@^r     U+025A LATIN SMALL LETTER SCHWA WITH HOOK
A       U+0251 LATIN SMALL LETTER ALPHA
A*      U+0252 LATIN SMALL LETTER TURNED ALPHA
B       U+03B2 GREEK SMALL LETTER BETA
B"      U+0299 LATIN LETTER SMALL CAPITAL B
C       U+00E7 LATIN SMALL LETTER C WITH CEDILLA
D       U+00F0 LATIN SMALL LETTER ETH
E       U+025B LATIN SMALL LETTER OPEN E
E"      U+025E LATIN SMALL LETTER CLOSED REVERSED OPEN E
E*      U+025C LATIN SMALL LETTER REVERSED OPEN E
E*^r    U+025D LATIN SMALL LETTER REVERSED OPEN E WITH HOOK
F       (reserved)
G       U+0263 LATIN SMALL LETTER GAMMA
H       U+0127 LATIN SMALL LETTER H WITH STROKE
H"      U+029C LATIN LETTER SMALL CAPITAL H
I       U+026A LATIN LETTER SMALL CAPITAL I
        U+0269 LATIN SMALL LETTER IOTA
I"      barred small capital I (X-SAMPA [I\])
J       U+025F LATIN SMALL LETTER DOTLESS J WITH STROKE
J(      U+0284 LATIN SMALL LETTER DOTLESS J WITH STROKE AND HOOK
K       (reserved)
L       U+028E LATIN SMALL LETTER TURNED Y
L"      U+029F LATIN LETTER SMALL CAPITAL L
M       U+0271 LATIN SMALL LETTER M WITH HOOK
N       U+014B LATIN SMALL LETTER ENG
N"      U+0274 LATIN LETTER SMALL CAPITAL N
O       U+0254 LATIN SMALL LETTER OPEN O
O"      U+0264 LATIN SMALL LETTER RAMS HORN
OE)     U+0276 LATIN LETTER SMALL CAPITAL OE = ["&]
P       U+0278 LATIN SMALL LETTER PHI
Q       U+0262 LATIN LETTER SMALL CAPITAL G
Q(      U+029B LATIN LETTER SMALL CAPITAL G WITH HOOK
R       U+0281 LATIN LETTER SMALL CAPITAL INVERTED R
R"      U+0280 LATIN LETTER SMALL CAPITAL R
S       U+0283 LATIN SMALL LETTER ESH
S^j     U+0285 LATIN SMALL LETTER ESH WITH CURL
T       U+03B8 GREEK SMALL LETTER THETA
T!      U+01C0 LATIN LETTER DENTAL CLICK
T"      U+00FE LATIN SMALL LETTER THORN
U       U+028A LATIN SMALL LETTER UPSILON
        U+0277 LATIN SMALL LETTER CLOSED OMEGA
U"      U+026F LATIN SMALL LETTER TURNED M
V       U+028C LATIN SMALL LETTER TURNED V
W       U+028D LATIN SMALL LETTER TURNED W
X       U+03C7 GREEK SMALL LETTER CHI
Y       U+028F LATIN LETTER SMALL CAPITAL Y
Y"      barred small capital U (X-SAMPA [U\])
Z       U+0292 LATIN SMALL LETTER EZH
Z"      U+026E LATIN SMALL LETTER LEZH
Z^j     U+0293 LATIN SMALL LETTER EZH WITH CURL
[       (delimiter for phonetic transcription)
\       (optionally, marks falling tone)
]       (delimiter for phonetic transcription)
^"      U+030B COMBINING DOUBLE ACUTE ACCENT = [5]
^'      U+0301 COMBINING ACUTE ACCENT = [4]
^(      U+0306 COMBINING BREVE
^*      (arbitrary diacritic)
^+      U+0335 COMBINING SHORT STROKE OVERLAY
^-      U+0304 COMBINING MACRON = [3]
^.      U+0307 COMBINING DOT ABOVE
^7      U+031A COMBINING LEFT ANGLE ABOVE
^9      U+02E4 MODIFIER LETTER SMALL REVERSED GLOTTAL STOP
^:      U+0308 COMBINING DIAERESIS
^=      U+030F COMBINING DOUBLE GRAVE ACCENT = [1]
^?      U+02C0 MODIFIER LETTER GLOTTAL STOP
^G      U+02E0 MODIFIER LETTER SMALL GAMMA
^N      superscript eng
^^      U+0302 COMBINING CIRCUMFLEX ACCENT
^`      U+0300 COMBINING GRAVE ACCENT = [2]
^h      U+02B0 MODIFIER LETTER SMALL H
^h"     U+02B1 MODIFIER LETTER SMALL H WITH HOOK = [_:]
^l      superscript l
^m      superscript m
^n      U+207F SUPERSCRIPT LATIN SMALL LETTER N
^o      U+030A COMBINING RING ABOVE (Scandinavian languages, Czech)
        (whistled diacritic; no IPA equivalent)
^j      U+02B2 MODIFIER LETTER SMALL J
^r      U+02DE MODIFIER LETTER RHOTIC HOOK
^s      (sibilant diacritic; no IPA equivalent)
^v      U+030C COMBINING CARON
^w      U+02B7 MODIFIER LETTER SMALL W
^x      U+033D COMBINING X ABOVE (mid-centralized vowels)
        (superscript x, indicating a fricative release of a click)
^~      U+0334 COMBINING TILDE OVERLAY
_(      U+031C COMBINING LEFT HALF RING BELOW
_)      U+0339 COMBINING RIGHT HALF RING BELOW
_+      U+031F COMBINING PLUS SIGN BELOW
_,      U+0326 COMBINING COMMA BELOW
        U+0327 COMBINING CEDILLA
_-      U+0320 COMBINING MINUS SIGN BELOW
_.      U+0323 COMBINING DOT BELOW
_:      U+0324 COMBINING DIAERESIS BELOW
_<      U+0318 COMBINING LEFT TACK BELOW
_=      (combining double tilde below)
_>      U+0319 COMBINING RIGHT TACK BELOW
_M      (labiodental diacritic; no IPA equivalent)
_V      U+031E COMBINING DOWN TACK BELOW
_^      U+031D COMBINING UP TACK BELOW
_a      U+033A COMBINING INVERTED BRIDGE BELOW
_c      U+0328 COMBINING OGONEK
_d      U+032A COMBINING BRIDGE BELOW
_h      U+0325 COMBINING RING BELOW
_l      U+033B COMBINING SQUARE BELOW
_m      U+033C COMBINING SEAGULL BELOW
_n      U+032F COMBINING INVERTED BREVE BELOW
_v      U+032C COMBINING CARON BELOW
_w      U+032B COMBINING INVERTED DOUBLE ARCH BELOW
_|      U+0329 COMBINING VERTICAL LINE BELOW
_~      U+0330 COMBINING TILDE BELOW
`       U+02BC MODIFIER LETTER APOSTROPHE
        U+02C0 MODIFIER LETTER GLOTTAL STOP
a*      U+0250 LATIN SMALL LETTER TURNED A
ae)     U+00E6 LATIN SMALL LETTER AE = [&]
b(      U+0253 LATIN SMALL LETTER B WITH HOOK
c!      U+01C2 LATIN LETTER ALVEOLAR CLICK
c"      U+0255 LATIN SMALL LETTER C WITH CURL
c*      U+0254 LATIN SMALL LETTER OPEN O = [O]
d(      U+0257 LATIN SMALL LETTER D WITH HOOK
d.      U+0256 LATIN SMALL LETTER D WITH TAIL
dZ")    U+03BB GREEK SMALL LETTER LAMBDA
dZ)     U+02A4 LATIN SMALL LETTER DEZH DIGRAPH
dz")    U+02A5 LATIN SMALL LETTER DZ DIGRAPH WITH CURL
dz)     U+02A3 LATIN SMALL LETTER DZ DIGRAPH
e"      U+0153 LATIN SMALL LIGATURE OE
e*      U+0259 LATIN SMALL LETTER SCHWA = [@]
f"      U+017F LATIN SMALL LETTER LONG S
f*      U+025F LATIN SMALL LETTER DOTLESS J WITH STROKE = [J]
g       U+0261 LATIN SMALL LETTER SCRIPT G
g(      U+0260 LATIN SMALL LETTER G WITH HOOK
h"      U+0266 LATIN SMALL LETTER H WITH HOOK
h*      U+0265 LATIN SMALL LETTER TURNED H = ["y]
i"      U+0268 LATIN SMALL LETTER I WITH STROKE
i*      U+027F LATIN SMALL LETTER REVERSED R WITH FISHHOOK
i.      U+0285 LATIN SMALL LETTER SQUAT REVERSED ESH
j"      U+029D LATIN SMALL LETTER J WITH CROSSED-TAIL
k"      U+0138 LATIN SMALL LETTER KRA
k*      U+029E LATIN SMALL LETTER TURNED K
l"      U+026C LATIN SMALL LETTER L WITH BELT
l*      U+027A LATIN SMALL LETTER TURNED R WITH LONG LEG
l.      U+026D LATIN SMALL LETTER L WITH RETROFLEX HOOK
lZ)     U+026E LATIN SMALL LETTER LEZH = ["Z]
l^~     U+026B LATIN SMALL LETTER L WITH MIDDLE TILDE = [7]
m*      U+026F LATIN SMALL LETTER TURNED M = ["U]
n"      U+0272 LATIN SMALL LETTER N WITH LEFT HOOK
n.      U+0273 LATIN SMALL LETTER N WITH RETROFLEX HOOK
n_|     U+019E LATIN SMALL LETTER N WITH LONG RIGHT LEG
o"      U+00F8 LATIN SMALL LETTER O WITH STROKE
oe)     U+0153 LATIN SMALL LIGATURE OE = ["e]
        U+029A LATIN SMALL LETTER CLOSED OPEN E
p!      U+0298 LATIN LETTER BILABIAL CLICK
q(      U+02A0 LATIN SMALL LETTER Q WITH HOOK
r"      U+027E LATIN SMALL LETTER R WITH FISHHOOK
r*      U+0279 LATIN SMALL LETTER TURNED R
r*.     U+027B LATIN SMALL LETTER TURNED R WITH HOOK
r.      U+027D LATIN SMALL LETTER R WITH TAIL
rZ)     U+027C LATIN SMALL LETTER R WITH LONG LEG
s"      U+0282 LATIN SMALL LETTER S WITH HOOK
ss)     U+00DF LATIN SMALL LETTER SHARP S
t!      U+01C3 LATIN LETTER RETROFLEX CLICK
        U+0297 LATIN LETTER STRETCHED C
t*      U+0287 LATIN SMALL LETTER TURNED T = [T!]
t.      U+0288 LATIN SMALL LETTER T WITH RETROFLEX HOOK
tS)     U+02A7 LATIN SMALL LETTER TESH DIGRAPH
tc")    U+02A8 LATIN SMALL LETTER TC DIGRAPH WITH CURL
tl")    U+019B LATIN SMALL LETTER LAMBDA WITH STROKE
tl!     U+01C1 LATIN LETTER LATERAL CLICK
        U+0296 LATIN LETTER INVERTED GLOTTAL STOP
ts)     U+02A6 LATIN SMALL LETTER TS DIGRAPH
u"      U+0289 LATIN SMALL LETTER U BAR
v"      U+028B LAITN SMALL LETTER V WITH HOOK
v*      U+028C LATIN SMALL LETTER TURNED V = [V]
w"      U+0270 LATIN SMALL LETTER TURNED M WITH LONG LEG
w*      U+028D LATIN SMALL LETTER TURNED W = [W]
y"      U+0265 LATIN SMALL LETTER TURNED H
y*      U+028E LATIN SMALL LETTER TURNED Y = [L]
z"      U+0291 LATIN SMALL LETTER Z WITH CURL
z.      U+0290 LATIN SMALL LETTER Z WITH RETROFLEX HOOK
{       U+2329 LEFT-POINTING ANGLE BRACKET
|       U+007C VERTICAL LINE
||      U+2016 DOUBLE VERTICAL LINE
}       U+232A RIGHT-POINTING ANGLE BRACKET
~       U+0303 COMBINING TILDE