Santiago Creole - Writing System

Writing System

The only writing system officially recognized by the authorities in Cape Verde is called ALUPEC. In spite of having been officially recognized by the government, the ALUPEC is neither officially nor mandatorily used, instead used only by enthusiasts.

In spite of being the only system officially recognized, the same law allows the use of alternative writing models, “as long as they are presented in a systematic and scientific way”. As not all users are familiarized with ALUPEC or the IPA, in this article a slightly different system will be used to make it easier for the reader:

  • The sound will be represented in an etymological way (“s” when in Portuguese is “s”, “ss” when in Portuguese is “ss”, “c” when in Portuguese is “c”, “ç” when in Portuguese is “ç”) instead of ALUPEC always “s”.
  • The sound will be represented in an etymological way (“s” when in Portuguese is “s”, “z” when in Portuguese is “z”) instead of ALUPEC always “z”.
  • The sound will be represented by “tch” instead of ALUPEC “tx”.
  • The sound will be represented in an etymological way (“x” when in Portuguese is “x”, “ch” when in Portuguese is “ch”) instead of ALUPEC always “x”.
  • The sound will be represented in an etymological way (“j” when in Portuguese is “j”, “g” when in Portuguese is “g”) instead of ALUPEC always “j”.
  • The sound will be represented in an etymological way (“c” when in Portuguese is “c”, “qu” when in Portuguese is “qu”) instead of ALUPEC always “k”.
  • The sound will be represented in an etymological way (“g” when in Portuguese is “g”, “gu” when in Portuguese is “gu”) instead of ALUPEC always “g”.
  • The nasality of the vowels will be represented by an “m” after the vowel, when this vowel is at the and of the word or before the letters “p” and “b”. In the other cases the nasality will be represented by the letter “n”.
  • The words will always have a graphic accent. This will be an overwhelming use of accents, but it is the only way to effectively represent both the stressed syllable and vowel aperture.
  • To show an elided vowel in certain variants an apostrophe ’ will be used.

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