Tags: #SocialScience/Linguistics/Orthography

Introduction

This article concerns a proposal of mine to introduce the interpunct ( · ) into English punctuation. I will explain how it would work, summarise the issues it addresses, and then briefly mention similar uses that exist currently and/or have existed in the past. I will use the IPA to denote pronunciation,^[1] but also give examples.

How it works

The interpunct separates a word into parts that are independently pronounced. So ⟨h·e·l·l·o⟩ would be pronounced like the sequence "H, E, L, L, O" /heɪtʃ iː ɛl ɛl oʊː/, and something like ⟨hap·py⟩ would be pronounced as "hap pea" /hap piː/.

But why?

Pronunciation & Diaeresis

For a start, the interpunct solves the problem of words with implied breaks in pronunciation. The famous example is ⟨cooperate⟩, which looks like "coo-perate" /kuːˈpəreɪt/ and not the correct "co-operate" /koʊˈɒpəreɪt/.

An oft-suggested solution is the use of a diaeresis, resulting in ⟨coöperate⟩. This usage was historically more prevalent, and is still used by some publications.^[2] However, it may be confusing to people speaking languages that use umlaut – a German might read the word as /koˈøpəʁeːt/ instead of /koˈopəʁeːt/. It is also asymmetric; ¿why should it be ⟨coöperate⟩ and not ⟨cöoperate⟩?

An alternative suggestion is a hyphen, ⟨co-operate⟩, but this makes the word feel like it's been "split in two" (and is often treated as such by software, splitting it across lines).

The interpunct, which gives us ⟨co·operate⟩, solves all of these issues!^[3] The use of a dot rather than a hyphen provides the togetherness of the diaeresis, while it still has the symmetry of the hyphen.

Some other example words include ⟨co·ordinate⟩, ⟨re·enter⟩, and ⟨in·group⟩. (The word ⟨coefficient⟩ feels more natural without a dot for me, but I find it a grey area.)

Exceptions:

• Foreign loanwords using a diaeresis may continue to use it for consistency, such as ⟨Noël⟩ instead of ⟨No·el⟩, ⟨Boötes⟩ instead of ⟨Bo·otes⟩, and ⟨naïve⟩ instead of ⟨na·ive⟩.
• Personal names using a diaeresis may also keep it for aesthetic purposes: ⟨Chloë⟩, ⟨Zoë⟩, & ⟨Brontë⟩ look strange written as ⟨Chlo·e⟩, ⟨Zo·e⟩, & ⟨Bront·e⟩.

Alternatively, if we still wished to avoid confusion with umlaut, we could allow a single dot above to act as diaeresis (note that these do not render correctly on all devices):

• ⟨Noėl⟩, ⟨Boȯtes⟩, & ⟨nȧive⟩ or ⟨naïve⟩ for the loanwords;
• ⟨Chloė⟩, ⟨Zoė⟩, & ⟨Brontė⟩ for the personal names.

By (incorrect) analogy with di-aeresis, perhaps we could call the single dot an aeresis?

Acronyms, Abbreviations, and Initialisms

Currently, abbreviations and acronyms are marked in many ways.

• Common abbreviations with letters missing in the middle of a word often use an apostrophe: ⟨don't⟩, ⟨can't⟩, & ⟨wouldn't⟩ shorten not; but there's also ⟨let's⟩, ⟨it's⟩, & ⟨I'd⟩.
  • A few abbreviations use the apostrophe at the start or end of a word, though these are usually archaic or "grandfathered in" terms. Consider, for example, ⟨o' clock⟩ and ⟨'tis⟩.
• For Latin abbreviations, full stops are most common: think ⟨e.g.⟩, ⟨i.e.⟩, & ⟨etc.⟩.
• The use of full stops has been extended to most abbreviations, so we get ⟨U.K.⟩, ⟨E.U⟩, & ⟨U.N.⟩, but also things like ⟨trig. substitution⟩ or ⟨calc. 1⟩. However, in particular for abbreviations using initial letters, it is also common to leave the full stops out, giving ⟨UK⟩, ⟨EU⟩, & ⟨UN⟩.
• Finally, a few abbreviations (which seem to come from legal jargon?) use slashes — for example, ⟨a/k/a⟩ for "also known as" and ⟨w/⟩ for "with".

We leave the common abbreviations using apostrophes alone, since they are so well-established we can't realistically change them. However, we can use the interpunct in places where the full stop would otherwise have been!

We will first make a distinction between acronyms and initialisms here. Both are abbreviations made by the initial letters of a name or phrase, but they differ in pronunciation:^[4]

• Acronyms are pronounced like words, such as ⟨NASA⟩ /nɑsɑ/ or ⟨laser⟩ /leɪzər/.
• Initialisms are pronounced letter-by-letter, such as ⟨UK⟩ /juː keɪ/ or ⟨CD⟩ /siː diː/.

Given that we've already established the interpunct will split pronunciation of a word, we can simply write acronyms without any – so ⟨NASA⟩ and ⟨laser⟩ remain unchanged – while writing initialisms with interpuncts – giving us ⟨U·K⟩ and ⟨C·D⟩. We can even write abbreviations that mix the two paradigms: ⟨JPEG⟩ becomes ⟨J·PEG⟩ since it's pronounced "J peg" /d͡ʒeɪˈpɛg/!

Notice that we did not include a final interpunct for ⟨U·K⟩ or ⟨C·D⟩, since these are already pronounced correctly when spelled in that manner. However, if we wish to extend the system to single-word abbreviations like ⟨trig.⟩ then we must leave the final interpunct explicit to mark the abbreviation, giving ⟨trig·⟩ and ⟨calc·⟩. For the sake of aesthetics, one may wish to drop these when further punctuation follows; ⟨trig:⟩ instead of ⟨trig·:⟩.

Of course there always remain edge cases. Some abbreviations omit a bunch of letters, like ⟨Rly⟩ for "Railway", but look ugly as ⟨R'l'y⟩. Others like ⟨w/⟩ are pronounced neither as "double-u" (the letter's name) nor like "wuh" (the letter's standalone phonetic value), but instead just the full word "with". I will leave the choice whether to denote these as ⟨Rly·⟩ and ⟨w·⟩ to the reader.

Precedent

The interpunct being to split pronunciation (or do something similar) is not unheard of! Here are a few related uses:^[6]

• It is used in Catalan to separate two l’s when they are pronounced as [lː] instead of the usual [ʎ] (like tortilla): e·g, ⟨Paral·lel⟩ metro station in Barcelona.
• It is used in Occitan and Franco-Provençal to indicate graphemes pronounced differently than expected. Occitan's use is nearly identical to my suggestion: e·g, they have ⟨s·h⟩ for [s.h] and ⟨sh⟩ for [ʃ].

Appendix

Thanks for reading, and have a nice day!