Western Script (Sulat Pangnakatun'dan)

The Western Script was invented by Julius Alfred Cordova of Iloilo City, Philippines. It's an extension script of his Sulat Hiligaynon script, and is designed to write English and Spanish names and English words in Hiligaynon. It's also used to write localized Spanish loan words so that people will be aware that these words are not native, and can be used to write English and Spanish. Switching from Sulat Hiligaynon to the Western Script is like switching between Hiragana and Katakana in Japanese.

Notable features

Type of writing system: phonemic abugida with morpheme-based syllabification
Writing direction: left to right in horizontal rows
Number of glyphs: 33 consonants and six vowels
Used to write: English and Spanish

Special Features

Blue consonants are used in Spanish.
There are three hidden consonants that makes it 33 in total.
Gh [∅] x [ks] and ch [x] share the same glyph.
Silent letters are still written in Western Script, either consonant or vowel.
Double consonants are not written as two except if they are belong different morphemes.
The 21 vowels are short vowels (a, e, i, o, u), modern long vowels (ä, ë, ï, ö, ü), traditional long vowels are (ā, ē, ī, ō, ū), diphthongal and digraphic vowels (A, E, I, O, U) and zero vowel (').
The second vowel of diphthongal and digraphic vowels are written in the right side of the consonant.
Unwritten schwa [ə] between two consonants is written as zero vowel like in words little, ogre and prism.
Traditional long vowels are also written with zero vowel. It's written on the right side of the consonant.
Consonant clusters are also written with zero vowel. It's written below the consonant.

Western Script script

Western Script consonants

Download a script chart for the Western Script (Excel)
Download a font for the Western Script
Download the Western Script Rules (PDF)

Sample Text (English)

Sample text in Western Script (English)

Transliteration

All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights. They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood.
(Article 1 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights)

Sample Text (Spanish)

Sample text in Western Script (Spanish)

Transliteration

Todos los seres humanos nacen libres e iguales en dignidad y derechos y, dotados como están de razón y conciencia, deben comportarse fraternalmente los unos con los otros.

Translation

See above English transliteration

If you have questions about this alphabet you can contact Julius at juliusdalum87[at]gmail[dot]com

Also by Julius Alfred Cordova: Sulat Hiligaynon

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