#Spelling alphabet words driver#

That’s when you need the Italian spelling alphabet. Phone call in Siena || creative commons photo by Duccio MoonĮven if you’ve got this or a similar pronunciation cheat-sheet in front of you when you need to call a taxi or make reservations at a trendy restaurant, however, M still sounds an awful lot like N over the phone. Y – i greca or ipsilon (ee GREH | kah or EEP | see | lon).W – doppia v, which means “double V” (DOHP | yah voo or vee).J – i lunga, which means “long I” (ee LOON | gah).Those five letters have their own pronunciations, too: The other letters – J, K, W, X, and Y – aren’t in the Italian alphabet, although you’ll see them used all over the place in words that have been introduced from other languages or sometimes regional dialects.

There are only 21 letters in it, as follows (with pronunciations in parentheses): A (ah) I’ll get to the spelling alphabet in a moment, but first you need to know the Italian alphabet itself – and yes, it’s different than the English one. Which is why there is something called the Italian spelling alphabet, or Italian phonetic alphabet. “S as in Sam,” I say, followed by, “P as in Paula.” In Italian, though, “Sam” and “Paula” won’t cut it. My last name is such that I have to spell it out over the phone all the time at home. Once you’ve managed to convince the person on the other end of the line that you really, really need them to speak more slowly, the next hurdle is one you’re probably not prepared for: Spelling. Having said all of that, sometimes travelers in Italy – including me – find it necessary to get on the phone. Some of it is physical, since Italians speak with their entire bodies, but most of it is due to just how rapidly Italians talk. It’s not even that I rely on reading lips – I’m certainly not staring at the driver’s face when I’m in the back seat of the cab.

#Spelling alphabet words driver#

I will happily start a conversation with my taxi driver just to keep the linguistic gears in my brain oiled, but I will do almost anything to avoid making or receiving a phone call in Italian. The overwhelmingly positive responses always seem out of whack with my meager attempts at speaking Italian, but it sure is a confidence boost that keeps me coming back for more.Įxcept, that is, when it comes to talking on the phone. Getting a short – but coherent – sentence out to a taxi driver or shop keeper sometimes means getting praised as if you’ve just recited Dante from memory. One of the things I love most about traveling in Italy is how gracious Italians are when you fumble through a few words of their language.

In the French language, a single ‘t’ at the end of a word may not be pronounced so it is spelt with two.Alfabeta || creative commons photo by Martin Abegglen For example, “Alfa” is chosen over “Alpha” to ensure correct pronunciation, as is “Juliett” with two t’s. In the 1950’s the NATO version was developed to account for language discrepancies and pronunciation problems. The first internationally recognised phonetic alphabet was created by the International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO). As you can see from a sample of the phonetic alphabets in use by the British armed forces below, there were favouritisms with first names, places and food. They are still in regular use today, especially S for sugar and F for Freddie.Īll official organisations communicating verbally created their own version of letter recognition. This was especially the case during wartime with the transmission of map grids or locations was a matter of life and death.īecause of their prolific use during the wars, phonetic spelling became part of normal parlance in society, especially when speaking over the telephone. When the communication was verbal only – such as over a radio –clarity was key. With technological advancements in the ability to transmit the human voice, a way of communicating similar sounding letters such as ‘T’, ‘B’, ‘C’ and ‘M’ & ‘N’ needed to be invented. But how did the phonetic alphabet all start?Ĭommunication at a distance has been accomplished by many means over the centuries, including visual signals like flashing lights and signals by flag, or sound signals like whistles, bells or more recently, Morse Code. We often use the phonetic alphabet to make the pronunciation of similar-sounding letters such as S and F distinctively clear to those we’re speaking to. One thing we need to get right when taking an order is details such as postcodes and product codes. But where did all those “S for sugar” terms come from?Īt Drainfast, we spend a lot of time talking to our customers over the phone. Ever heard, or had a phone conversation like that? Of course you have.