Westsprak

At the moment this is basically the same as my 'version' of Folkspraak, but the idea behind this is not a language with evenly balanced German, Dutch, English and Scandinavian influences, but a compromise between English and German, with Scandinavian and Dutch as arbitrators, and probably with more phonetic spelling always preferred. At first reading that might sound rather unegaliterian, but it's based on pragmatism; i.e. the far larger number of speakers of German and English than the other languages and the similarity of Dutch in many respects to German.

Phonology and orthography

Summary

My preferred phonology can be summed up as this:

• Long and short versions of /a/, /e/, /i/, /o/, /u/ (and possibly /y/)
• The diphthongs /au/ and /ai/, and the sort-of-diphthong /iu/. The diphthongs are really just combinations of the other vowels - i.e. they contain no new/other sounds.
• English/German consonants with /ʃ/ and /x/, no /θ/ or /ð/, /w/ as an alternative to /v/

My preferred orthography can be summed up as this:

• 'Classical Latin-style' vowels and consonants plus <w>/<v>, <h>/<ch>, <sh>/<sch> for /w/, /x/ and /ʃ/ (difficult to decide, as Latin didn't have an extra letter for /w/ and didn't have the /ʃ/ and /x/ sounds)
• Vowels are short if unstressed or if followed by two or more consonants.
• As well as the unstressed syllables in polysyllabic words, certain groups (articles, interrogatives, prepositions, demonstratives, monosyllabic pronouns) monosyllabic words are considered 'unstressed', and thus do not need two consonants to mark a short vowel

Full Table

Phoneme	Orthography	Pronunciation (IPA)	Proto-Germanic origin	Example word	Meaning of word
Short vowels
/a/	aCC (C=consonant) or unstressed non-terminal	[a], [ɑ], [æ], [ɐ]	Mostly /a/	mann	man
/e/	eCC or unstressed, <e> followed by <g> (alternative prono.)	[ɛ], [e] is acceptable, [ə] when unstressed	i-muated /a/, dimunition of other vowels	et	it
/i/	iCC or unstressed non-terminal	[ɪ], [i] acceptable	/i/ mostly	in	in
/o/	oCC or unstressed non-terminal	[ɔ], [ɒ], [o] acceptable	/u/ with a-mutation, /a/	frost	frost
/u/	uCC or unstressed non-terminal	[ʊ], [u] acceptable, and possibly also [ʏ] if /y/ is not a separate phoneme	/u/ without mutation	uss	us
/y/	yCC or unstressed non-terminal	[ʏ], [y] acceptable	/u/ with i-mutation	rygg	back (ridge is cognate)
Long vowels
/aː/	aC stressed, terminal a	[aː], [ɑː], [ɐː] (poss. [æː], although could cause confusion with /a/ for American English speakers)	/æ/, sometimes /a/	sprak	language, speech (latter is cognate)
/eː/	eC stressed, terminal e	[eː], [ei], [ɛː] etc.	/e/ usually	breke	to break
/iː/	iC stressed, terminal i	[iː]	/eu/ usually	dip	deep
/oː/	oC stressed, terminal o	[oː], [ɔː], diphthong of /ou/ type	/u/, /a/, /au/	over, so, bom	over, so, tree (beam is cognate)
/uː/	uC stressed, terminal u	[uː]	/oː/	gud	good
/yː/	yC stressed, terminal y	[yː], N.B. Could be merged with /iː/, allowing [yː] as an alternative pronunciation for /uː/	i-mutated /oː/ and /eu/	gryn, dyr	green, expensive (cognate is dear)
Diphthongs
/au/	au	Diphthong of type /au/	/uː/	aut	out
/ai/	ai	Diphthong of type /ai/	/iː/	main	my, mine
/iu/	iu	[ˈiu], [ˈiːu], [iˈuː]	/euw/, /euhw/	niu	new
Consonants
/p/	p	[pʰ], [p]	/p/	help	help
/b/	b	[b]	Initial /b/	better	better
/f/	f	[f]	/f/	fader	father
/v/	v	[v]	Non-initial /b/	have	to have
/t/	t	[tʰ], [t]	/t/, initial /θ/ except in pronouns and articles	ting	thing
/d/	d	[d]	/d/, non-initial /θ/ and initial /θ/ in pronouns and articles	de	the
/s/	s	[s], [z]	/s/	wese	to be
/k/	k	[kʰ], [k]	/k/	kysse	to kiss
/g/	g	[g], [ɣ], [j] after a (us. palatal) vowel acceptable, although <eg> must either have a long /e/ or be clearly [ɛj] to avoid confusion with /eː/	/g/	gud, sege	good, to say
/x/	ch/h	[x], [ç], [hʲ]	Non-initial /x/	licht/liht	light
/h/	h	[h]	Initial /x/	hand	hand
/ʃ/	sch/sh	[ʃ]	/sk/	schall/shall	will, shall
/j/	j	[j]	/j/	jung	young
/w/	w, possibly v	[v], [ʋ], [w] - just [v] if written "v"	Initial /w/ or /xw/	wat/vat	what
/m/	m	[m]	/m/	milk	milk
/n/	n	[n]	/n/	nit	not
/ŋ/	ng	[ŋ], [ŋg]	/ng/	singe	to sing
/r/	r	[r]ˌ [ʁ]ˌ [ɹ]ˌ [ʀ]	/r/	rod	red
/l/	l	[l]	/l/	land	land

Pronouns

The pronouns are as follows :

Person	Nominative	Accusative and dative	Genitive
1st singular	ig	mi	main
2nd singular	du	di	dain
3rd singular	hi/si/et	him/hir/et	sain/hir/ets
1st plural	wi/vi	us	usser
2nd plural	ji	iu	iuer
3rd plural	de/dé	dem	der

Verbs

Verbs do not conjugate for person apart from "wes(e)" (to be) which has three present forms - "iss", "ar" and "bi". "iss" is probably best recommended for singular, and "ar" for plural, with "bi" being an option for first and second persons if you find "iss" jarring (as I do slightly). Use of any of these three for any person is totally correct though, as is use of "wes". The past is "was" or "war", again with "was" perhaps best used for singular and "war" for plural, but usage of either for any person is fine. The past participal is "wesen".

The past and past participal of regular verbs are identical and are formed with <-d> or <-t> (or <-ed> if the verb ends in <d> or <t>).Many common verbs have an optional 'strong' (i.e. ablauted, and thus irregular) form which is usually different in the past perfect and past participal. It is perfectly legitimate to use the regular form of all verbs though, even "wes(e)" (to be) if you want, and thus all that is required of the learner is to passively understand the irregular past tenses. Examples of strong verbs are as follows (present -> past -> past participal):

swimm -> swamm -> swummen (optionally "swimmd" instead) ...means "to swim"

find -> fand -> funden (optionally "finded") ...means "to find"

se -> sa -> sen (optionally "sed") ...means "to see"

raid -> red -> ridden (optionally "raided") ...means "to ride"

et -> at -> eten (eted) ...means "to eat"

flig -> flog -> flogen (fligd) ...means "to fly"

giv -> gav -> given (givd) ...means "to give"

A slight exception in that the irregularity is not due to ablaut is "hav(e)" (to have) which is "hadd" or "havd" in the past and past participal. Another is "wes(e)" (to be) which is "

Articles

The definite article is <de>, pronounced /də/ (or /dɛ/ or /deː/ if stressed), and the indefinite article is <en> pronounced /ən/ (or /ɛn/ or /eːn/ if stressed).

Adjectives and adverbs

As there's no gender or case system, adjectives are not affected by what they describe, so "de gryn haus" and "en gryn waiv" (the green house, a green woman/wife). Adverbs do not need an extra "-lig" suffix like "-ly" in most UK English, so "ig ga snell" (I go quickly) not "ig ga snellig". Both "snell" and "snellig" are correct, but there's no need for the "-lig" suffix.

Word order

Word order is really flexible and largely down to the speaker. Subject-verb-object order is normal really, and should come naturally to most speakers as this is the default/basic order in the Germanic and Romance languages and in Chinese. You're more than welcome to say "ig de fud et" instead of "ig et de fud" (I eat the food) if you really want to or for artistic purposes as the meaning's still utterly clear though! For questions one can use S-V-O order and raise your voice at the end or add ", ne?", or you can use V-S-O order with raising your voice, so "et ig de fud?". You can of course not raise your voice, but beware this may mean the sentence is taken as a mere statement as VSO order is OK for statements too!

Prepositions etc.

Here are some common prepostions and other little words and their meaning:

• "in" means "in"
• "up" or "upan" (also "upán", "up-an" - said /u'pan/) mean "on"
• "bai" or "baisaid" (also "baisáid", "bai-said" - said /bai'said/) means beside - "besaid" might be more natural, although less immediately clear for non-English speakers
• "av" means "of"
• "fron" means "from"
• "aut" means "out"
• "turch" means "through"
• "over" means "over" or "above"
• "under" means "under" or "below"