The Evolution of Spelling and Pronunciation in Turkish: Insights from Istanbul Turkish
Many languages are often praised for their phonetic spelling systems, with Turkish and Spanish being frequently cited as examples of languages with almost perfect 1:1 mappings between sound and letter. However, have pronunciation and spelling in these languages remained stable over the past 400 years? Or have they undergone significant changes?
The Modern Turkish Alphabet: A Century-Old Reform
The modern Turkish alphabet was adopted in 1928 and designed to correspond as closely as possible to the speech of educated Turks, known as Istanbul Turkish - a blend of the city's historical linguistic influences.
Regional Accents and Pronunciation Variations
Like any language, Turkish pronunciation can vary based on regional accents. For instance, people in the northwest of the country might drop their aitches, leading to small discrepancies between spelling and pronunciation. This can be more pronounced in highly accented regions, such as the Black Sea coast, where the word gidelim (let's go) might be pronounced as cidelum (jid-e-lum).
Official Spelling vs. Pronunciation
Official Turkish spelling does not take into account common contractions and informal speech. For example, the first-person optative form of a verb typically ends with -aym, but it is often shortened to -ayp (a phonetic representation of "ipeem" rather than "eye-um"). Similarly, the affectionate form of address abi (big brother) is almost always pronounced as apee rather than its official spelling aabey.
Subtle Pronunciation Differences
Despite the close alignment between Turkish spelling and pronunciation, there are a few subtle differences that are not always reflected in the written language. For example, the word kalpten (from the heart) does not follow the typical vowel harmony rules and is instead pronounced with a slight glide from "a" to "e", similar to English with a posh accent. This can be observed in some other Arabic loanwords as well.
Challenges Faced by Other European Languages
European languages, such as Hungarian, have adopted the Latin alphabet, which is lacking many of the phonemes found in their native languages. Hungarian, in particular, once had an alphabet that used every phoneme, but it was banned and almost abolished by the first Christian king, Stephen. The current system requires adaptations for certain sounds using symbols like CH c, SZ sz, ZS zh, and diacritical marks over vowels for various modifications, such as á, é, etc. (See: Old Hungarian script - Wikipedia).
Conclusion
The relationship between pronunciation and spelling in Turkish and other languages shows that even languages with seemingly perfect phonetic mappings can still evolve and show signs of divergence. These differences can be attributed to factors such as regional accents, official spelling rules, and the complexity of phonetic systems.