Hello,
I’m taking the liberty to open a new thread dedicated to the topic Christine just started on the “dictation practice” thread, to keep the two separated. I hope you won’t mind, Carlos.
So Christine was saying:
“What would really interest me is an update of the Sénécal: my version is a lot older than yours and I find very convenient all the prefixs and suffixs. For example, wouldn’t it be nice to have the prefix ‘hydro-‘ to make ‘hydrogène’, ‘hydrophyle’, ‘hydravion’, ‘hydrodynamique’…? There are niceties that would help for the legibility and the speed…
Shorthand is a matter of convention. We are not so many to use French Gregg: I think we could agree on new rules.”.
About hydro-, why not maybe simply use the dot that theoretically stands for aspirated h? Since it is seldom used if at all, maybe it could represent hydro-?
I was also intrigued by your remark that French articles and prepositions (le, la, les, des, de la, du, etc.) take up a lot of space. And I was wondering: I can’t see what existing smaller symbol could be hijacked to write these, however it occurred to me recently that Gregg doesn’t use a whole ellipse that (to my untrained eye, correct me if I’m wrong) seems readily distinguishable from the others already in use, I mean this one:
There’s at least 6 new curves (large, medium and small for each side of the ellipse) that could be used in there, of which 4 would be smaller than our current L and D…
Maybe these are preposterous ideas but I thought it can’t hurt to mention them anyway and see what you think?
This is a good post. I'm interested in knowing what things you would update in the system.
The disjoined e (same as incl-) has been used for hidr- in Spanish, so that could be used for hydr- in French as well. This comes from the English equivalent, in which a disjoined broken a circle has been used for hydr-.
For the de la, du, des, you can use the old trick of eliminating the prepositional phrase and write the two words closer together. For example, in the phrase respect de la personne you eliminate the de la and write respect and personne closer together that you would normally do (almost like touching each other). You will be saving space and strokes. I use this a lot when I write in Spanish (not only with de la, but also with del, de los, and de las, which can take longer to write than in French!). Another expedient that you can use is to write the two words connected by the prepositional phrase together as one outline without the prepositional phrase if the joining is easy to make and the words are not that long (that is, write it as a phrase). I don't really think you need to create another symbol for those prepositional phrases.
Hello,
For 'hydr-', actually, I have a soft spot for 'id/'… 🙂
Wouldn't using the little circle for 'hydr-' be a bit confusing, as you says, it is already used by 'incl-'?
For '-gramme', Aymeric suggested it was old-fashioned but there are many words: dcode says there are 187 words ending by this suffix, some of them not very used anymore, that's right but you have all the mesure units… and 'progamme'.
The only problem with suffixes is that creates verbs that are difficult to conjugate… like 'formuler' would be if the suffix '-ule' was used. So it is more for nouns, maybe for adverbs anyway…
Eventually, I didn't understand your proposition with 'prepositional phrases'…
And I have a personal dislike for 'tout le monde': 't' crossed by a 'm' would have my favor… 🙂
I'm not aware of conflicts with using the little circle for both incl- and hydr-. However, in the first edition of Sténographie Gregg, the author used a disjoined o-hook for hydro- (since hydro- is related to eau). I think that’s also clever.
This is what I meant by the omission of the prepositional phrases:
Oh, I see now for the phrases, thanks. Like 'aussitôt que possible'… The 'que' is dropped. Yes, it makes sense for usual phrases that makes distinct forms.
I do things like this in Spanish Gregg all the time — I drop que, those del forms, word and verb endings that are not needed, etc., all because by context one understands what is being written. And above all, phrase, phrase, phrase! With Gregg, you need to use phrasing and abbreviations much more in Romance languages than in English because the words are longer. It makes the writing more efficient and quicker for sure!
Thanks for the article, Aymeric, by the way…
🙂
Another useful innovation suggested by Carlos based on Spanish Gregg: using the -tion ending to transcribe not only -tion/-sion, but also -ction/xion (basically the ks-ion sound) as in annexion, connection (connexion in French) and the like.
Thanks Carlos!
This is more about DJS, I have no idea if Senecal already has a solution for it, but in DJS the mini CH dowstroke for is only for -tion. Yet in French (and I’m sure in English too) there is a huge number of words ending in -sation/-sition, some of which are very common (mondialisation/globalization, accusation, organisation, localisation, généralisation, stabilisation, déstabilisation, utilisation, réalisation, sédentarisation, visualisation, polarisation, stigmatisation, etc. then acquisition, transition, transposition, opposition, composition, and so on).
Would it be possible to use a disjoined -tion stroke on top of or under the end of the root to express -sation and -sition, which would spare an S and a circle? Do previous series already have something for that?
I’m noticing that there are many words in -lisation as well. Could we use the disjoined -lité L and add a -tion to it to express -lisation?
Yes, Aymeric, for my part, it was the '-lisation' ending that annoys me the most. There is nothing special in the Sénécal for this and neither in the English Anniversary version. And I find this ending too complex… But I would be more radical: just a disjoined -tion suffix… 🙂 (shorter are forms, better they are, in my opinion)
Organisation, in the Sénécal, is a brief form : 'o-g' and words like 'imposition', 'composition' have a special ending: 'p-o-tion' ('position' is even written 'p-o-tion').
🙂
Thank you Christine. Well I was thinking the disjoined -tion could be kept for -(V)sation/ (V)sition, which is why I suggested disjoined L+TION for -lisation. Although this would maybe create a conflict with the -al/-uel rules.
I’m intrigued about imposition, position etc. in Sénécal. On what grounds do you determine if "sition" is going to be shortened to -tion as in imposition, composition and position? Did Sénécal just take random roots and decide that all their compounds would fall under one specific rule, but other roots wouldn’t?
No. You should read the English Anniversary manual to understand this: it all started with the suffix "-pose" written as p-o, which leads to "-position" as p-o-sh. Sénécal just translated that to French so it became "-poser" and "-position." The -pose suffix (-poser in French) was eliminated from Simplified and later series. (That's why you find it so cumbersome to write those words in DJS.)
About -sation/-zation, write those words without the a circle and it becomes much easier. The a was inserted in Anniversary and later series. I don't think it's necessary in French, to be honest. There is no need for a special new disjoined ending that would stop your writing, when just eliminating the intervening vowel solves your problem.
By the way, transition is just disjoined t-tion in English Anniversary, so it cannot be written simpler than that — just remove the redundant e circle.
(I may sound like a broken record, but maybe I should ask again: did you finish the manual?
)
Thanks Carlos, yes I did hallelujah! about two weeks ago. I’ve started Vitesse progressive (with my mum, whenever she says she has free time, I send her the little rule reminders at the beginning of each chapter and we transcribe a few letters together), we finished lesson 4 today. Doing it with her makes the marketing letters slightly less excruciating but I’m now thinking of just sticking to the "perfectionnement technique" paragraphs and picking texts from online sources to transcribe together and compare notes.