Pitman shorthand

Pitman was asked to create a shorthand system of his own in 1838. He had used Samuel Taylor's system for seven years, but his symbols bear greater similarity to an older system created by John Byrom. The first phonetician to invent a system of shorthand, Pitman used similar-looking symbols for phonetically related sounds. He was the first to use thickness of a stroke to indicate voicing (voiced consonants such as and are written with heavier and lighter lines than unvoiced ones such as /p/ and /t/), and consonants with similar place of articulation were oriented in similar directions, with straight lines for plosives and arcs for fricatives. For example, the dental and alveolar consonants are upright: = , = , = , = , = (as in thigh), = (as in thy). Pitman's brother Benjamin Pitman settled in Cincinnati, Ohio, in the United States and introduced Pitman's system there. He used it in the 1865–67 trial of the conspirators behind the assassination of Abraham Lincoln. In Australia the system was introduced by another Pitman brother, Jacob. Jacob Pitman is buried in Rookwood Necropolis, Sydney. His epitaph is written phonetically: IN LUVING MEMERI OV JACOB PITMAN, BORN 28th NOV. 1810 AT TROWBRIDGE ENGLAND, SETELD IN ADELAIDE 1838, DEID 12TH MARCH 1890. ARKITEKT, INTRODIUST FONETIK SHORTHAND AND WOZ THE FERST MINISTER IN THEEZ KOLONIZ OV THE DOKTRINZ OV THE SEKOND OR NIU KRISTIAN CHURCH WHICH AKNOLEJEZ THE LORD JESUS CHRIST IN HIZ DEVEIN HIUMANITI AZ THE KREATER OV THE YUNIVERS, THE REDEEMER AND REJENERATER OV MEN. GOD OVER AUL, BLESED FOR EVER. At one time, Pitman was the most commonly used shorthand system in the entire English-speaking world. Part of its popularity was due to the fact that it was the first subject taught by correspondence course. Today in many regions (especially the U.S.), it has been superseded by Gregg shorthand, developed by John Robert Gregg. Teeline has become more common in recent years, as it is based on spelling, rather than pronunciation. ==Writing==

Like Gregg shorthand, Pitman shorthand is phonemic: with the exception of abbreviated shapes called logograms, the forms represent the sounds of the English word, rather than its spelling or meaning. Unlike Gregg, pairs of consonant phonemes distinguished only by voice are notated with strokes differing in thickness rather than length. There are twenty-four consonants that can be represented in Pitman's shorthand, twelve vowels, and four diphthongs. The consonants are indicated by strokes, the vowels by interposed dots. Logograms (Short Forms) Common words are represented by special outlines called logograms (or "Short Forms" in Pitman's New Era). Words and phrases which have such forms are called grammalogues. Hundreds exist and only a tiny number are shown above. The shapes are written separately to show that they represent distinct words, but in common phrases ("you are", "thank you", etc.) two or three logograms may be joined together, or a final flick added to represent the. Consonants The consonants in Pitman's shorthand are pronounced pee, bee, tee, dee, chay, jay, kay, gay, eff, vee, ith, thee, ess, zee, ish, zhee, em, el, en, ray ar, ing, way, hay, and yay. When both an unvoiced consonant and its corresponding voiced consonant are present in this system, the distinction is made by drawing the stroke for the voiced consonant thicker than the one for the unvoiced consonant. (Thus s is and z is .) There are two strokes for r: ar and ray. The former assumes the form of the top right-hand quarter of a circle (drawn top-down), whereas the latter is like chay , only less steep (drawn bottom to top). There are rules governing when to use each of these forms. Vowels The long vowels in Pitman's shorthand are: . The short vowels are . The long vowels may be remembered by the sentence, "Pa, may we all go too?" , and the short vowels may be remembered by the sentence, "That pen is not much good" . A vowel is represented by a dot or a dash, which is written with either a light stroke (for a short vowel) or heavy stroke (for a long vowel). For example, sate is written as ")•|", but set is written as ")·|"; seat is written as ").|", but sit is written as ").|". Vowels are further distinguished by their position relative to the consonant stroke – beginning, middle or end – for a total of 12 possible combinations. Another feature of Pitman's shorthand allows most vowels to be omitted in order to speed up the process of writing. As mentioned above, each vowel is written next to either the beginning, middle or end of the consonant stroke. Pitman's shorthand is designed to be written on lined paper and when a word's first vowel is a "first position" vowel (i.e. it is written at the beginning of the stroke), the whole shorthand outline for the word is written above the paper's ruled line. For a second position vowel, the outline is written on the line, and for a third position vowel, it is written through the line. In this way, the position of the outline indicates that the first vowel can only be one of four possibilities. In most cases, this means that the first and often all the other vowels can be omitted entirely. Diphthongs ie \;\;\; ^\lor \qquad oi \;\;\; ^\mathfrak{7} \qquad ow \;\;\; _\land \qquad ew \;\;\; _\cap There are four diphthongs in Pitman's shorthand, representing , , , , as in the words "I enjoy Gow's music." The first three appear as small checkmarks; the "ew" sound is written as a small arch. Both "ie" and "oi" are written in first position, while "ow" and "ew" are written in third position. In the same way, the whole outline is placed above, on or through the paper's ruled line. If the diphthong is followed by a neutral vowel, a little flick is added. Other shapes ;Circles: Circles are of two sizes – small and large. A small circle represents 's' (sing) and 'z' (gaze). A large circle at the beginning of a word represents the double consonant 'sw' (sweep). Elsewhere it represents 's-s': a sequence of two 's' or 'z' sounds with a vowel in between (crisis, crises or exercise). The vowel in the middle may be any of the vowels or diphthongs, though any vowel other than 'e' must be notated inside the circle. ;Loops:Loops are of two sizes – small and large. The small loop represents 'st' and 'sd' (cost and based). The large loop represents 'ster' (master or masterpiece). The 'ster' loop is not used at the beginning of a word; i.e, it would not be used to notate the word sterling. ;Hooks :Stroke-initial hooks. For straight strokes, an initial hook may be written in a clockwise or counterclockwise direction. A clockwise initial hook represents 'r' after the stroke (tray, Nichrome, bigger). A counter-clockwise initial hook represents 'l' after the stroke (ply, amplify, angle). For curved strokes, the hook is written inside the curve and a small hook represents 'r' while a large hook represents 'l'. :Stroke-final hooks. For straight strokes, a final hook may be written in a clockwise or counterclockwise direction. A clockwise final hook represents 'en' after the stroke (train, chin, genuine), while a counter-clockwise final hook represents 'eff' or 'vee' after the stroke (pave, calf, toughen). For curved strokes, the hook is written inside the curve and it represents 'n' after the stroke (men, thin). :''''Shun' hook.''' A large hook written at the end of a stroke represents the sound 'shun' or 'zhun', as in fusion or vision. The 'shun' hook is written either to the left or right depending on the positions of other attachments and vowels in the stroke. Halving and doubling ;Halving: Many strokes (both straight and curved) may be halved in length to denote a final 't' or 'd'. The halving principle may be combined with an initial or final hook (or both) to make words such as "trained" appear as a single short vertical light stroke with an initial and final hook. There are some exceptions to avoid ambiguous forms; for example, a straight-r stroke can't be halved if it's the only syllable, because that might be confused for some other short-form (logogram) consisting of a short-stroke mark in that direction ("and" or "should"). ;Doubling: If a word contains 'ter', 'der', 'ture', 'ther', or 'dher'—for example, in matter, nature, or mother—the preceding stroke is written double the size. There are exceptions to avoid ambiguous forms; for example, "leader" is not written as a doubled-l but as l plus a hooked-d representing "dr". In contrast, "later", for example, is written with a doubled-l. Straight strokes at the beginning of a word are not doubled unless they have a final hook or attached diphthong. ==Notes==