Responses to a variety of threads, none of which have anything to do
with writing systems, so this will be the last I say on the list about
any of 'em:

(1) "Hamtramck" and "Dvořák" are both two syllables long. The little
half-hearted schwa (not an "i" nor any other definite vowel) that
English speakers tend to insert, because they aren't as accustomed to
pronouncing these consonant clusters as speakers of (e.g.) Slavic
languages are, doesn't qualify as a third syllable.

(2) ASCII IPA, and for that matter real IPA, is not that hard to
learn -- probably easier than apologizing four or five times for not
knowing it. :-) Search the Web for "SAMPA" or "Kirshenbaum" (no "c").

Note that Evan Kirshenbaum, creator of one of the popular ASCII IPA
systems, says on his Web site: "It is expected that when the Unicode/ISO
10646 character set becomes commonly used for mail, news, and web pages,
this transcription will no longer be needed, as the IPA characters will
be able to be used directly."

(3) In the Greater Los Angeles area, there are a few examples of a city
completely surrounded by another city: San Fernando (surrounded by Los
Angeles) and Signal Hill (by Long Beach). Villa Park is almost
surrounded by Orange; less than 2 km of its border is with
unincorporated county land. Beverly Hills was completely surrounded by
L.A. until West Hollywood, to its immediate east, was incorporated; the
pair is still enclosed by L.A. Waaay off topic here.

(4) I thought in Massachusetts, Worcester and Gloucester (no "h" in
either) were SUPPOSED to be pronounced "Wooster" and "Gloster" (or
"Glouster"). That is certainly how the British names, from which the
Massachusetts names were taken, are pronounced. Is this wrong in MA?

(5) Re Jameson/Jamison Hill Road: the city would have an official
record whereby the street is spelled one way or the other. On La Habra
Boulevard in La Habra, CA there is a street sign spelling it as one
word, LAHABRA, and there is clearly enough space on the sign so that
crowding was not what caused the space to vanish. The one-word spelling
is a common error in local advertising.

I do think proper nouns can be spelled "right" or "wrong"; it's just
that right and wrong are local to each instance of the word. If someone
wrote "Gabriela" Scelta, or "Gabriella" Sabatini, either one would be a
misspelling.

(6) For "Hyundai," anything from [hjUndeI] to [SUndE] -- with the "oo"
sound as in "book" -- ought to be close enough. [hVndeI] is not, but
that is how it is generally presented, at least in Southern California.
There was a radio commercial for a local Hyundai dealer that started out
"It's a fun day" and then rhymed that with Hyundai.

Back to writing systems, I hope.

-Doug Ewell
Fullerton, California
http://users.adelphia.net/~dewell/