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S

2 Writing and pronunciation

Esperanto uses Latin alphabet with 28 letters:
A B C Ĉ D E F G Ĝ H Ĥ I J Ĵ K L M N O P R S Ŝ T U Ŭ V Z
a b c ĉ d e f g ĝ h ĥ i j ĵ k l m n o p r s ŝ t u ŭ v z

The letters are pronounced in the following way:

  • c is pronounced [ʦ], roughly as ts in hats,
  • ĉ [ʧ] ch in church,
  • ĝ [ʤ], g in geography,
  • ĥ [x], ch in Scottish English loch, ch in German Bach, j in Spanish Juan
  • ĵ [ʒ], s in vision,
  • ŝ [ʃ], sh in ship,
  • ŭ is used in diphthongs, e.g., is pronounced [aʊ], as ow in how.
  • The pronunciation of the other letters is the same as the pronunciation of the same letters in IPA. Note that j is pronounced as y in yes.

Six letters – ĉ, ĝ, ĥ, ĵ, ŝ and ŭ – are unique to Esperanto. The diacritical mark over the first five letters is called cirkumflekso (circumflex); the diacritical mark over u is called hoketo (hacek). There are two main alternatives to these diacritical marks:

  1. To use the letter h instead of the circumflex and omitting the hacek: ch, gh, hh, jh, sh, u.
    This is the official alternative, which was proposed by Zamenhoff. The advantage is that the transcribed words are closer in spelling to their etymological sources (and are thus easier to learn by speakers of those languages): shishe, shipoship, chambroroom (chambre in French), automobilocar, EuropoEurope. A disadvantage is that the conversion from this transcription to the alphabet with diacritical signs is not trivial and cannot be done on the level of letters. There are few roots like ekshibici, ghett, where sh and gh does not stand for ŝ and ĝ. In addition, of course, there is no difference between u and ŭ.[3]
  2. To use the letter x instead of the circumflex and the hacek: cx, gx, hx, jx, sx, ux.
    This alternative is not official, but is widely used on the web and in electronic texts. The advantage is that there is a direct mapping between this transcription and the alphabet with diacritical marks – the letter x is not used in Esperanto. The disadvantage is that the spelling looses some of its similarity with the corresponding words in the Western languages.

The pronuntiation of ĥ is hard for speakers of many languages. It is also very rare. There is a tendency to replace it (ĥemio = kemiochemistry, teĥniko = teknikotechnique). There is even a rule that any ĥ after r can be replaced by k in both the spelling and pronunciation (e.g., arĥitekto = arkitektoarchitect, arĥeologo = arkeologoarcheologist).


[3] In my opinion, this ambiguity is not very problematic. There are not many roots where the pair ch, gh, etc. does not stand for a single sound. More ambiguities can be created by word building, when an h-initial morpheme is attached to added to a morpheme ending in c, g, etc. (there is no such an affix). However ambiguity produced by wordbuilding is so common in Esperanto, that this does not increase it by any significant amount.