Before you begin
The sounds
This prelude needs one short sitting. After that, everything in the primer is Phi.
The vowels
Phi distinguishes five vowels. In careful reference pronunciation, each has the same target wherever it occurs:
| Letter | IPA | First approach |
|---|---|---|
| a | /ä/ | jaw open, tongue low and central, lips unrounded |
| e | /e̞/ | Spanish mesa, held pure |
| i | /i/ | machine |
| o | /o̞/ | Spanish poco, held pure |
| u | /u/ | flute |
The a row uses a mouth position because English keywords move with the accent. Open the jaw comfortably and keep the tongue low near the centre, without rounding the lips.
"Held pure" describes the careful form. English often glides a vowel, so note drifts towards "no-oot." A Phi vowel keeps one quality from start to finish. Accents may shift the exact quality, but the five contrasts stay distinct and adjacent vowels remain separate syllables.
The consonants
Ten consonants, h k l m n p r s t w, are all close to their English sounds. Three refinements can grow with practice: t and n touch the teeth rather than the ridge behind them, while r is a light tap as in Spanish pero. Four more sounds are written with two letters each:
| Written | Sound |
|---|---|
| ph | a soft f made with both lips, like blowing out a candle gently |
| th | as in think (never as in this) |
| sh | as in shade |
| wh | an airy w, as in the old-fashioned which (w with breath in it) |
ph is one sound, never a p followed by an h. The same for the other three.
Syllables and the dots
Most Phi syllables begin with a consonant or one of the two-letter sounds and end in a vowel. A lone vowel may form a syllable only after another vowel in hiatus. The language has no closed syllables. This primer marks breaks with dots when a word first appears: mi · a, lo · pi · a, mi · she · ko. Say every dot-separated piece. mia is two syllables (MI-a), not an English "mya."
Stress
Stress the second-to-last syllable, always: lo · PI · a, mi · SHE · ko, si · LA · wo. One rule, no exceptions, like everything else in this language.
The one instruction
Read aloud, and give each word its full shape. A beginner may need to go slowly; a fluent speaker need not. Give enough attention to keep every vowel distinct and the utterance present to its listener. If haste blurs the sentence, begin it again. If it does not, let the occasion set the pace.