How To Write a Sign Language Part 3: Parameter Alphabets

 Part 3: Parameter Alphabets

How To Write a Sign Language

Whether you are new to sign languages or a native signer who has signed your entire life - you probably haven't heard about sign language writing systems. Spoken languages around the world have writing systems so surely sign languages can too? Well, many have been tried and used in brief corners of the world but none have been widely adopted by Deaf communities.

I recommend these resources if you want to learn more about all of those attempts and their histories:
But in this mini-series of posts I want to explain the different types there are so that you, intrepid future sign language writer, may better understand the options and pick which to learn or make.

Last post in this series I talked about Projectional Systems. This post I will talk about Parameter Alphabets.

Fair warning this one is LONG, indepth, and full of jargon. There is just so much to cover that to make it shorter would be to miss out important information. I want to show the entire breadth of sign language alphabets. I have tried my best to keep it easy enough to follow for non-linguists also :)

Part 3: Phonetic Writing <= You are here                            

    Alphabets, Syllabaries and Other Phonetic Writing

As I discussed in Part 1: Logographies, the Latin alphabet came from Heiroglyphs. The letter <A> used to be an ox or bull with horns. But how? Why?
Image Source: Evolution of the Alphabet Poster – UsefulCharts

Initially, it was that the hieroglyphs were used to mean "sounds like...". So the word for "ox" was " 'alp", so using the ox symbol meant "sounds like 'alp".

This got loaned from language to language, first becoming Proto-Sinaitic, then Phoenician then Greek then Latin. Through this copying the letters lost the associations they once had - so "A" became just a sound, and was no longer linked to "ox" at all.

It also branched out into many different alphabets along the way, such as Norse Runes, Hebrew and Arabic amongst many more. Latin itself was adopted by many languages across Europe and the world, and is the very same writing system that is used in English. Thus alphabets come in many forms.

But what is an alphabet?

The word "alphabet" is used in two ways. In a general sense it is used for any writing system which writes the sounds of a language. Another words for this are "phonetic writing systems". This applies to most languages, such as Spanish where each letter always represents a sound. English is weirder - because it's writing system is only semi-phonetic, and the spelling depends on the history of the word. However at its core the letters still represent sounds, even if not in a 1:1 way.

Not all sound-based writing is the same. There are; 
  • True Alphabets - writes both consonants and vowels as separate letters, like Latin
  • Syllabaries - writes whole syllables like "ka" as one letter, like Japanese.
  • Abjad - writes only consonants, with no vowels or only optional vowels, like Arabic and Hebrew.
  • Abugidas - writes consonants, then vowels are written as additional modifiers, like Devanagari (Hindi & Sanskrit).
All of the above are "alphabets", but not all are "true alphabets".


In Arabic the vowel marks are optional,
they are not used the majority of the time.
It also uses a consonant root system
whereby consonants make up the core part of a word
and vowels (and sometimes other consonants) are added
to make up specific other words.


    Parameters - Sign Language Phonetics

This is the part many people get confused, because sign languages don't use sounds. How can they have "phonetics", "phon-" means sound?

Well the equivalent of phonetics in sign languages are parameters. We still call it "phonetics" by analogy, because it works a similar way, but it needs you to learn a few concepts.

While there is some debate about the finer details, the most common model is the HOLME model:
  • H - Handshape - the shape the hand makes with the fingers.
  • O - Orientation - the direction the hand (palm, fingers, etc) are pointing.
  • L - Location - the place the sign is in space or on the body.
  • M - Movement - the direction and way the hand moves.
  • E - Non-Manual Features / Markers / Signals / Expressions (called E for "expression") - what the face and rest of the body does.
Adapted


So based on this:
  • A True Alphabet would be one where each parameter is noted as individual letters (to the best of the ability of the designer, with the knowledge available about sign language linguistics at the time).
  • A Syllabary would be one where multiple parameters are grouped together into single symbols, especially if centred on the movement as that is often considered the syllabic core signs.
  • An Abjad would be one where some parameters are written, whilst others remain unwritten (at least, most of the time). This applies specifically to HOLM. E is considered a separate case, which I will explain below*.
  • An Abugida would be one where one parameter is the base, and other parameters modify that base.
*Notably I wouldn't consider lack of expression (NMFs) to be enough to consider a system an abjad. Expression is somewhat akin to emphasis, intonation or tone in spoken languages. All spoken languages use tone, intonation and emphasis in some way - some as part of their words, some as part of their grammar and some purely as personal affectation - but very few writing systems mark it. Those that do often employ very different strategies tailored to that specific language's needs. 

Similarly expressions are used differently in different sign languages. Some, such as ASL, only use expressions grammatically and as personal choice. Others such as BSL use mouthing to differentiate between signs (e.g. NEPHEW vs BATTERY). As such, so long as the writing system can differentiate minimal pairs (words with only one parameter difference) with HOLM (but no E), I would still consider it still a True Alphabet.

Importantly all of said systems are linear, rather than projectional. This means they are written in sequence and can be read as such, rather than location in 2D space impacting meaning. An example like Korean is still linear in this example because there is a correct order to write and read glyphs, it's not freeform or highly 2D.

You could consider SignWriting or ASLwrite forms of Alphabet or Syllabary or Abugida if you want, but projectional systems break the known categories so will be ignored.

Before continuing I need to talk about one last concept.

    Featural vs Arbitrary, Iconic vs Symbolic

Most alphabets are arbitrary. That means that the shapes of letters have no relationship to the sounds they make. They make those specific sounds because of the history up to this point.

But then there are iconic and featural systems, which overlap a lot and people get them confused. Korean is the key example.


As you can see Korean letters resemble shapes of the mouth - making them iconic and similar letters share similar shapes, making it featural. People get these confused because Korean is both, but there are non-iconic featural writing systems, such as Canadian Aboriginal Syllabics. 


These are featural because similar sounds share a similar letter, but NOT iconic because the shapes of the letters are ultimately (to my knowledge) symbolic (random).

    Sign Language Alphabets & More

So, finally I can get to the alphabets. I think it would be best go go in order and show how one attempt affected the next! There are way too many different system to get into every single one, so I will be going over only those I consider notable.

In the case of arbitrary (non-featural) and symbolic (non-iconic) I will not note it because that is the global default.

Fair warning - this next section contains 12 different parameter alphabets because people often feel the need to make their own either in ignorance of, or because they can do better than, other attempts.
Image Source: xkcd: Standards

This can be annoying - as it feels as if perhaps it would have been better had we just picked one, stuck to it, and honed it over time. But on the flip-side - each is unique in some ways and something new can be learned from each of them, even the ones you dislike!

Mimographie
Featural Iconic Semi-Syllabary 
(1825) 

The second earliest form of sign language writing system (bar Handtalk Pictographs), this was made in the Institution Nationale des Sourds-Muets à Paris, the birthplace of Deaf Education. It was made by Roch-Ambroise Auguste Bébian, one of the first hearing teachers of the deaf to become fluent in French Sign Language (LSF) and a strong advocate of it.

Analysis of this script is made harder by the fact that the main document about it is written in French, much of it handwritten. Perhaps one day I would love to translate this into English and make a modern day font for the writing system!

Handshape and Orientation are combined into single symbols, which are rotations of one-another. Location and movement seem to be individual letters. Location seems to primarily be bodyparts. Expressions (NMFs) are also present as the exclamation-mark style characters.

I can't quite discern the whole of the order, but it appears to be Location, then Handshape with Orientation for both hands, then Movement, then Expression. Thus the basic order is L[HO]ME, but I am not sure if what the deeper nuances are, nor how strict this is.

    Categorisation & Review

It is a good example of a featural and iconic script, where the letterforms are intended to resemble the shapes and orientations of the hands. In terms of status:
  • H & O - these are merged into a single symbol.*️⃣ 
  • L - present✅
  • M - present✅
  • E - present ✅
  • Basic One-Hand Order: L[HO]ME
  • Complex Two Hand Order: L[HO]¹[HO]²ME (uncertain)
  • Syllabary
    • Featural
    • Iconic
I'd argue that Mimographie is a Semi-syllabary. That is to say some letters act like syllables, others like true alphabet letters. A true sign language syllabary would go further than this, perhaps combing L and M or similar.

Praise: This occupies a historic place, despite it being largely forgotten. I appreciate a good attempt, even if said attempt did not take off. It also likely represents the earliest phonological analysis of sign languages, which resulted in something very similar to the parameter analysis.

Criticism: The biggest issue I have with this system, and attempt overall, is that it relies so much on being able to read the French portions to get it. More diagrams and demonstrations would be good. It's hard to criticise without further information. As far as I can tell, it also seems to be lacking in handshape information.

    Kinemics (1960)
        Alphabet, probably?

Kinemics is the dark horse of the sign language alphabet family. Made by La Mont West Jr to document "Sign Language of the North American Northern Plains Tribes", which likely means Handtalk.


Image Source: west_1960.pdf

This system used typewriter characters, largely ones from the IPA. Zrajm (linked way above) said about the writing system:

Symbols are borrowed from both the Latin alphabet and other, phonetic alphabets. There is no correspondence between a fingerspelling and the symbols used—instead West assigns symbols by analogy the consonant charts used for spoken languages letting the place of articulation (labial, alveo-dental, prepalatal, palatal etc.) stand in for hand placement, and when writing hand shapes, also which fingers unfolded/salient.

For example, the symbol ‹k› is described as ”hand extended, but relaxed, ulnar edge (little finger or right edge) active and salient”—including not only handshape, but also which part of the hand is active/salient in its use.

It seems to have been entirely forgotten by history. I only learned about it via Zrajm's website!

    Categorisation & Review

This also predates modern parameter analysis, but arrives at something similar. As far as I can tell it's non-featural and definitely non-iconic. I think it is an alphabet but I cannot be sure. Perhaps if someone had the patience to read the entire document and summarise it they might have a better answer.

Praise: It seems to successfully analysis the phonology of sign languages and independently verifies the theory that sign languages are phonemic. 

Criticism: The biggest issue I have here is that the documentation is utterly impenetrable. That somewhat makes sense as it is attempting to describe a language, not the writing system, but it is a major barrier. The whole thing being written on a typewriter with no images makes it very hard to discern precisely what the author is talking about most of the time without very intense reading.

    Stokoe Notation 
        Semi-Iconic Alphabet 
(1960)

William Stokoe is a key figure in the history of sign languages. He was one of the first people to linguistically analyse ASL and used Stokoe Notation to do it!

The Stokoe system was initially made with a modified typewriter, as such most symbols are reused symbols that can be found on a typewriter, although some appear drawn.

Image Sources: Sign Language Structure: An Outline of the Visual Communication Systems of the American Deaf, 3.9 Signed language notation – Essentials of Linguistics, 2nd edition

This is the birthplace of modern parameter analysis. While it called them other terms (DEZ = Handshape, TAB = Location, SIG = movement and orientation) it has all the elements.

Handshapes each have a separate letter. locations are defined as locations on the body - with a single neutral space location. Movements and orientations are both absolute meaning they describe directions away-from, towards, left, right, up and down of the signer. It is sometimes stated that Stokoe lacks a way of writing Expressions (NMFs) but this is incorrect! It does have expressions, but only 3 - and they are rarely used.


Image Sources: Stokoe notation - Wikipedia, 1. A sample sentence represented in Stokoe Notation System: "the woods,... | Download Scientific Diagram

Glyphs are arranged in a mostly-linear structure, with some super-script and sub-script letters. Sometimes you will see glyphs stacked on top of one-another but this does not seem to be an essential part of the system. Additionally dots and lines above and below letters are sometimes used. Location is placed first, followed by handshape followed by the superscript movement and subscript orientation. Thus the basic order is LHᴹₒ In cases with two hands each hand appears to be indicated separately. Thus the complicated order would be L1H1ᴹ¹ₒ₁L2H2ᴹ²ₒ₂. This appears to be very strict.

As such I believe that Stokoe is a true alphabet. Some letters are iconic, like the arrows (orientation and movement) as well as the bodypart locations. But even this iconicity is limited.

Stokoe was highly successful for a while - with dictionaries published in ASL and BSL at least. Additionally apparently one person has their name on their birth certificate in a modified form of Stokoe Notation (apparently meaning "Smile"). But momentum petered out, partially due to the complexity of the system preventing it from being adopted in every-day use, in addition to a desire to explore other systems arising.

    Categorisation & Review

  • H - present✅
  • O - present, shares a set of characters with M, written as subscript.✅
  • L - present✅
  • M - present, shares a set of characters with O, written as superscript.✅
  • E - present, but under-specified and under-utilised.✅
  • Basic One-Hand Order: LHᴹₒ
  • Complex Two-Hand Order: L1H1ᴹ¹ₒ₁L2H2ᴹ²ₒ₂ (strict)
  • Alphabet 
    • Semi-Iconic
    • Non-Featural
At the time the importance of expressions (NMFs) was not well understood. I would consider Stokoe Notation to be an alphabet once again because all parameters were present to the best of Stokoe's ability.

Praise: Another one which is historic in the development of sign language writing systems. It represented a leap forwards in the linguistic analysis of sign languages.

Criticism: The choice of symbols that Stokoe makes results in it being quite hard to write as technology has progressed. Aesthetically it also looks quite confusing. Like I mentioned above, I believe the complexity of the system prevented it from being adopted into broader use within the Deaf community. Conversely, I don't believe it provides an adequate way to express some of the more advanced sign language grammar - such as classifiers, which makes writing longer passages in it difficult.

On perhaps a broader level, I think it loses something that sign languages value - spatialness and iconicity. Abstracting down to a linear sequence of arbitrary and symbolic characters means we lose a lot of what makes a sign language feel like a sign language - the way signs look like what they mean is lost. This critique is true of many of the writing systems from this point forwards, especially ones that aim to be used outside of an academic context (which was attempted somewhat with Stokoe, such as the creation of dictionaries).

    Bergman Notation
        Semi-Iconic Alphabet
(1977)

Created as an offshoot of Stokoe Notation, this orthography was honed in order to effectively notate Swdish Sign Language (Svenskt teckenspråk - STS). It has found decent success within STS acadmia and is even used within the online Swedish Sign Language dictionary.

Image Source: test - Svenskt teckenspråkslexikon - Stockholms universitet

Categorisation & Review

  • H - present✅
  • O - present✅
  • L - present✅
  • M - present✅
  • E - absent❌
  • Basic Order: HOLM
  • Alphabet 
    • Semi-Featural
    • Semi-Iconic
As such I would still consider this an alphabet, especially because I don't think it the system considers E to be phonemically necessary to distinguish minimal pairs. I can't quite tell because the documentation is in Swedish and I am automatically translating it. It is more iconic and featural than Stokoe, but still only partially so.

There isn't a whole lot to say on this system that doesn't also apply to Stokoe. I mostly included it to show how Stokoe affected later systems with offshoots of said system appearing in places you wouldn't expect.

The fact that it has been further honed by use with a specific sign language does give it an advantage over Stokoe. Given that, hopefully it's more in line with modern theories on how said sign language works.

    HamNoSys (Hamburg Notation System) 
        Featural Iconic Alphabet 
(1984)

According to the DGS Korpus website, HamNoSys exists within the "Stokoe" tradition of phonetic transcription systems. However, it does away with almost all of the glyphs Stokoe himself invented, and instead creates its own featural iconic glyphs. As implied by the name, it was originally created by the University of Hamburg, in Germany.

Image Sources: Structure of HamNoSys Notation system | Download Scientific Diagram, PPT - Signs for the future PowerPoint Presentation, free download - ID:5108051

Handshapes recieve individual letters - but there are also ways to modify these with diacritics to produce new handshapes. There is both body-locations and some more detailed neutrals space locations. Movement and orientation are both absolute, meaning that they show directions towards, away-from, left, right, up and down from the signer. It seems like NMFs have only been added in later iterations and are under-developed - mostly reusing glyphs already present for locations and movements.

The order of parameters is seems to be broadly handshape, orientation, location then movement - linearised from left to right. Some letters "drift" upwards and downwards but these aren't considered modifiers to any baseline. Where expression is included, it seems to go on the start, as does a mirroring mark. Thus the basic order is EHOLM. Where both hands are used doing different things, the parameters are noted in the same location as the other hand. As such the two complicated order is: [H¹H²][O¹O²][L¹L²][M¹M²].

HamNoSys has found a decent amount of success in academia - both in sign language studies and within gesture research. It is also in general more prevalent in the EU than anywhere else with a lot of work on German Sign Language (Deutsche Gebärdensprache - DGS) being done in the system. There are also some projects which use HamNoSys to programme virtual avatars to make signs.

It aims for maximal detail - breaking down signs into all their relevant parameter information. It does not aim to be a practical writing system as such, but instead a tool for academia.

Categorisation & Review

  • H - present✅
  • O - present✅
  • L - present✅
  • M - present✅
  • E - present, but under-developed.✅
  • Basic One-Hand Order: EHOLM (strict)
  • Complex Two-Hand Order: E[H¹H²][O¹O²][L¹L²][M¹M²]
  • Alphabet 
    • Featural
    • Iconic
As such this is clearly an alphabet.

Praise: It is seemingly one of the most comprehensive transcription systems available. The move away from being language specific like Stokoe was also helps it be more widely useful, and its iconic featural nature makes it somewhat more intuitive. 

Criticism: This is the first system for me to hit what I call the sprawling word problem. As you can see, even simple signs like "ME" have 6 or 7 characters. Signs like "NAME" sprawl even more across the page. Stokoe managed this by using sub- and super- script, though you can detect it even there and in Bergman - a need to write half a dozen individual symbols for even a simple sign.

This is less of a problem for HamNoSys because it is not trying to be a writing system but instead a transcription system. However I still think this is a problem. The longer and more sprawling any word is, the more difficult it is to process. This makes sense for complex signs, which would be the equivalent of long words - but if a system unnecessarily inflates the size of words then it becomes an impediment. 

    Signfont 
        Featural Iconic Alphabet 
(1987)

Signfont is an obscure writing system. I can find very little about it anywhere. I hear that it was used in the early days of computerisation. The handbook seems to state that it was made in Sandiego and more than 40 Deaf and hearing researchers contributed.
Image Sources: ASL Font: Ways to Write ASL, English/ASL Glossary, SignFont, Architect: Final Version Signfont Handbook. : Salk Inst. for Biological Studies, San Diego, CA. : Free Download, Borrow, and Streaming : Internet Archive

While being historically niche, it is quite linguistically interesting as it doesn't quite follow the standard HOLME parameter model.

Handshapes are given individual letters. Movements are absolute (although use ipsilateral-contralateral instead of right-left). Locations are locations on the body. It also has a full suite of Expressions (NMFs) of its own, mostly those that act as grammatical markers. But orientation is different.

 Instead of Orientation it uses Contact Regions or Action Areas - which are parts of the hand such as palm, back of the hand, ulnar (blade), heel and radial (thumb-side). These are then stated in relation to the location. 

Let's look at an example of TRUE vs TELL in ASL:
Image Source: 5 Parameters of ASL "TRUE" v.s. "TELL"

Instead of giving the orientation as an absolute value, Signfont would tell you which part of the finger touched the chin before moving. In the case of TELL the back of the index finger. In the case of TRUE the radial side of the index finger touches the chin.

Using Spellings found on the Signfont Website

This encodes the same information as the standard HOLME model. In discussions with friends we have taken to calling this HALME (A for "Action Area"). Interestingly according to some studies on the topic of sign language phonology, this may in fact be more accurate than an absolute orientation. 
The order for parameters seems to be a relatively simple HOLME, but this becomes flexible in complicated signs. I have found at least one sign which uses an order H¹A¹L¹M¹M²H²L², shown below:
ANALYSE (ASL)

I have also found H¹ A¹ H² A² M¹ M² H³ A³ M³, shown below:
BITE (ASL)

Categorisation & Review

  • H - present✅
  • O - replaced with A (action area / contact region)*️⃣
  • L - present✅
  • M - present✅
  • E - present✅
  • Basic One-Hand Order: HALME 
  • Complex Two-Hand Order: Flexible, including;
    • H¹A¹L¹M¹M²H²A²L²E
    • H¹ A¹ L¹ H² A² L² M¹ M²
  • Alphabet 
    • Featural
    • Iconic

Other than the peculiarity with the O, the system seems largely a standard parameter thoery. I would still consider it a true alphabet - as all parameter information is present as separated letters within this "HALME" system. 

Praise: The aesthetic of this system provides something far more language-like than most previous examples. Whether this was the intention of the creator(s) or not - it is a demonstration that such a thing is possible while retaining a significant degree of featuralness and iconicity. Plus the way that orientation is handled is fascinating, and good if it closer resembles how the phonology of sign languages actually operates.

Criticism: The system is somewhat ugly and sprawling. It has the sprawling word problem mentioned above with HamNoSys, and here it is more of an issue because the system is attempting to be a full writing system that you could theoretically write whole longer texts in if you so chose.

    ASLphabet 
        Featural Iconic Abjad
(1992)

ASL-phabet is a simplification of Signfont. It attempts to keep things much simpler by limiting the number of letters down to 32: 23 handshapes, 5 locations and 5 movements. This is argued to be a more manageable number.

Additionally the system is iconic and featural, especially with the handshapes.





Image Sources: Graphemes | ASL 4 at TSU, The Hunt for The Perfect Sign Language Writing System (© 2025 Zrajm), GIMonographVol.1No.1

I have seen it use randomly at least once in the wild in the modern day:

Image Source: Anyone can tell me is my kid (grade 1 Deaf school) did her work correctly? : r/asl

I have never heard about this system making big waves, but I have come across it a number of times in odd places. As such I am honestly very unsure of what reception and cultural impact it had.

Ironically, despite being called an alphabet - this system may be more accurately considered an abjad. It has no way of writing either orientation (O) nor NMFs/expressions (E). As such it can only write H, L and M. And this doesn't seem to just be a case where other glyphs are reused in a different way to display orientation (as with Stokoe) nor do Expressions seem to play any part.

This can be demonstrated with listed homographs in GIMonographVol.1No.1:
The above case shows an example where both hands differ in terms of orientation and the way that contact occurs between the hands differs. Despite this both signs are written the same within ASLphabet.

This is not an unusual feature of ASLphabet either, homographs exist for other parameters too:

Homograph indicating lack of distinction between similar handshapes
 
Homograph indicating lack of distinction between directions of movement

The latter two are not evidence towards this being an abjad, as alphabets can also group similar but different sounds into a single letter. This is called "underspelling" or "underspecification".

However the lack of differentiation for orientation would be without a convincing argument that orientation is in fact not phonemic within the sign language in question (which would contradict standard parameter theory). Compare this to Signfont which makes orientation part of the location via the contact areas / action areas - ALSphabet just doesn't write the orientation.

The order seems to be a pretty simple HLM, with two handed signs the order seems to be H¹H²LM. I don't quite know where secondary locations or movements would go in this schema. As far as I can tell, this order is quite strict.

I unable to find any longer texts written in the system, which is a shame because it really would be quite cool to see what this would look like longer than individual words.

Categorisation & Review

  • H - present✅
  • O - absent❌
  • L - present✅
  • M - present✅
  • E - absent❌
  • Basic Two Hand Order: HLM 
  • Complex Two-Hand Order: H¹H²LM (strict)
  • Abjad
    • Featural
    • Iconic

The complete lack of orientation and (to a lesser extent) expressions is why I categorise this an abjad. 

Praise: The use of fewer, very iconic letters definitely gives it an advantage over some other systems.  It definitely makes it cleaner (avoiding the sprawling word problem), and likely easier to learn and memorise than some other systems.

Criticism: It being an abjad presents clear issues - where two signs can be homographs. This could potentially get very confusing, very fast. Additionally, I struggle to understand how anyone would write complex signs and classifiers with this system - surely it simply does not present enough information to do so?

Additionally in it's current iteration is just kinda ugly. I know that is a shallow criticism, but it is also one that is fixable with minor changes such as a font. Additionally I believe that confining this system to a strict linear alphabet hurts it as you must process one medium-long stream of characters together as one sign. But this may be a skill issue on my part. More concretely - the prevailance of homographs could be an issue - or maybe not. Many languages get away with it. Lastly I don't see how this system would handle more advanced signs and grammar such as classifiers, especially as I cannot find any longer texts written in the system.

Here is an example of how I might modify ASLphabet to look better in my opinion:

ASLphabet with Korean like Stacking
and Roman style Serifs - sketch by me

ELiS
Featural Iconic Alphabet
(1997)

Escrita das Línguas de Sinais (ELiS) is a LIBRAS writing system made in response to Sutton Signwriting. It is linear and alphabetic instead of projectional like SignWriting. Additionally it is iconic and featural, however the chosen aesthetic (largely square - all letters a similar size) abstracts this iconicity somewhat.

It follows a standard HOLME pattern for the most part (absolute movement and orientation, body-part locations), except the handshape which is denoted by the position of each finger:
Image Source: Elis

Additionally, Expressions (NMFs) are considered part of movements which is somewhat unusual. They are largely anatomical rather than purely grammatical, with descriptions such as "open mouth" and "tongue out" - only "negative headshake" and "positive head shake" are more transparent in their grammatical use.

Image source same as above

The basic order of ELiS follows is HOLME, however interestingly for two handed it places the non-dominant hand first: H²H¹O²O¹L²L¹M²M¹E.

I am, unfortunately, unable to find any longer texts in ELiS.

Categorisation & Review

  • H - present✅
  • O - present✅
  • L - present✅
  • M - present✅
  • E - present✅
  • Basic Order: HOLME 
  • Two Handed Order: H²H¹O²O¹L²L¹M²M¹E (strict)
  • Alphabet 
    • Featural
    • Iconic
As such, it is clearly an alphabet.

Praise: ELiS is one of the best looking sign language alphabets available. It's committment to an aesthetic and the way that aesthetic fills up the space it is given look very good in my opinion. It also does a decent job at representing different parameters in an intuitive way without being too confusing

Criticism: But as with HamNoSys it runs into the long word problem. This is perhaps understandable in cases like SISTER which are a compound sign of FEMALE+SIBLING in ASL, but there are other examples which start to sprawl across the page with clear need for it. I believe this is perhaps due to the commitment to absolute linearity - rather than considering other options.

SLIPA
Semi-featural Alphabet
(2003)

I've been salivating in anticipation for this one. While not my only motivation, talking about SLIPA within the context of other writing systems has been a big one keeping me going.

"Sign Language International Phonetic Alphabet" is a system created by David J. Peterson - who is famous for creating the Dothraki and Valyrian languages in the Game of Thrones TV show in 2009. He is also a co-founder of the Language Creation Society. But a few years earlier he took a crack at his own sign language writing system.

The intended goal of this system is to provide a method of transcription that can be useful for the creation of constructed sign languages. DJP states that he based it on the work of David Perlmutter, who has done extensive research into ASL's phonology. These are two important facts for later.

It exclusively uses regular Unicode characters.  
 




This writing system follows the H-LME parameter model, likely based of Perlmutter's own work (although DJP does not make clear which parts of his system were inspired by what). But where it differs is in the orientation. From his own website:
  • Q: So, I see place, movement, handshape, and...hey, where's orientation?
  • A: Those familiar with a signed language, or with the literature about signed language, will undoubtedly notice the lack of a section devoted to orientation. How can this be, when orientation is said to be so direly important to all signed languages? Well, it bes, because there is no separate marker for "orientation" in SLIPA. Instead, orientation is handled in many ways. For example, the way the hand faces, or how it's bent, is handled with diacritics on handshapes symbols. Whether the hands face a particular P or face away from a particular P are handled by diacritics on the P symbols. And the path and direction of movement are all handled with movement symbols. Thus, orientation falls directly (though rather clunkily) out of the system already presented. To try to come up with a separate set of symbols for "orientation" would be far too unwieldy, and would turn out to be even more complex than the system I came up with, in my opinion. However, if someone can think up a system that treats orientation separately from place, movement and handshape, I'd be anxious to see how it works.
The orientation as a part of handshape is the following:

Based on the table above, you can see that there are three orientations, and then four levels of, well, bentness, for lack of a better word. Bendyness, maybe. Anyway, to account for this, we need a simple set of diacritics. Note that these diacritics aren't necessary, and in some cases may overlap with the place diacritics. The same is true of IPA diacritics. The possibility of overspecification and redundancy, though, is better than not having enough specificity. So, if you have a handshape, [K], it can have one of four degrees of bendyness, based on the above list. They are as follows:

(38)

  • For an unbent wrist: u
  • For an bent wrist: b
  • For an very bent wrist: v
  • For wrist bent backwards (hyperextended): h

I think this is nice a system: All labials. Now there are three degrees of orientation. Basically, these degrees can be defined as "facing away", "facing towards" and "facing sideways". Thus, we can have the following:

(39)

  1. Facing away: (a)
  2. Facing towards: (t)
  3. Facing sideways: (s)

So, for ASL K and P, you have the following:

(40)

  • ASL "K": [Ku(a)]
  • ASL "P": [Kv(a)]
This is similar to a regular Orientation in other HOLME systems - but with orientation specified anatomically rather than in an absolute sense. 

The orientation as a part of location (which he calls "place") is the following:

Additionally, since I'd rather have an overspecific system of which only a subset of the machinery is used than an inadequate system, I'm going to introduce another diacritic: f, for "faces". This diacritic can be used with the specifications above to indicate that the specified part of the dominant hand (or non-dominant hand) faces (but doesn't touch) the P in question. There are other ways to do this using methods described later on, but, again, I'd prefer redundancy to inadequacy. I'm not convinced that the method I describe below can handle everything, just as I'm not convinced that the f can handle everything. Hopefully with both of them, though, there's nothing that SLIPA can't handle. We'll see, though. Here's the spellout of the f diacritic:

(14)

  • Have Thumb Face P: f(th) or f(th)
  • Have Index Finger Face P: f(in) or f(in)
  • Have Middle Finger Face P: f(md) or f(md)
  • Have Ring Finger Face P: f(rn) or f(rn)
  • Have Pinky Finger Face P: f(pn) or f(pn)
  • Have Side of Hand Face P: f(sd) or f(sd)
  • Have Back of Hand Face P: f(bk) or f(bk)
  • Have Palm Face P: f(pm) or f(pm)
This is more like the "HALME" system, similar to Singfont's. Where orientation is given as a function of which part of the hand is facing where I guess it's nice for DJP to include the choice...

In terms of featurality and iconicity - it's clearly not iconic. But is it featural? On the one hand sometimes yes. The movements through space use a system whereby absolute spatial locations are combined with an under-line or over-line (still not sure if there is a meaningful difference there) to create a movement:

This could be considered featural as each letter is a separate feature that combines to create a single movement unit. Additionally handshapes can be made out of finger configurations, but this is rarely done.

On the other hand often it is not featural, and letters are chosen either at random, based on fingerspelling or based upon abbreviated English words. The majority of the system seems to me non-featural.

e.g. in [ch]-[cheek]
"c" and "h" don't mean anything separately
"ch" is based on the English word "cheek".

As such I can consider this semi-featural at the most. 

So to summarise, handshapes are either full letters per handshape or finger configuration. Orientation is split between a relative "action-area" like system and a more absolute anatomical system. Location is both body locations and neutral space locations. Movements is defined as motion through and between locations. Expressions (NMFs) also exist and are described in anatomical terms such as "eyebrows raised" and "lips taut".

I can't find a good clarification on the ordering of parameters, but I believe it to be a failry straightforward HᴼLᴬME. In examples of two-handed signs the examples I see are [Hᴼ¹Hᴼ²]LᴬME. As such I believe the complex two handed order to be similar to HamNoSys'. I am uncertain of if that is the correct placement of the expressions (NMFs).

Pretty much the only place I have seen SLIPA used is in DJP's own Kelenala Sign Language (KNSL) project - a constructed sign language of his own design. I occasionally see conlangers (those who construct languages) recommend the system to one another for transcribing sign languages... but rarely do I see anyone with any knowledge of sign languages or sign language linguistics endorse the system.

    Categorisation & Review

  • H - present, also has a method of specifying individual fingers ✅
  • O - present, as "anatomical" and "action-area-like" systems ✅
  • L - present ✅
  • M - present ✅
  • E - present  ✅
  • Basic One-Hand Order: HᴼLᴬME
  • Complex Two-Hand Order: [Hᴼ¹Hᴼ²]LᴬME (uncertain)
  • Alphabet 
    • Featural
    • Non-Iconic

As such this is an alphabet. It has some minor featural elements, but the majority of the system is not.

Before I can do a proper review I must briefly talk about the regular International Phonetic Alphabet. The IPA was invented by the International Phonetics Association in 1888 (and updated by them ever since) as a method of transcribing as many spoken languages as possible in a shared phonetic manner. It was based on the Latin script but has had some non Latin (primarily some Greek and Arabic) letters added over time. It has had contributions from many experts over over a century. In the Handbook they explain the following:

 (a) When two sounds occurring in a given language are employed for distinguishing one word from another, they should wherever possible be represented by two distinct symbols without diacritics. Ordinary roman letters should be used as far as is practicable, but recourse must be had to other symbols when the roman alphabet is inadequate.


(b) When two sounds are very similar and not known to be employed in any language for distinguishing meanings of utterances, they should, as a rule, be represented by the same symbol. Separate symbols or diacritics may, however, be used to distinguish such sounds when necessary.


International Phonetic Association (1995) Handbook of the International Phonetic Association: A quide to the use of the International Phonetic Alphabet, Cambridge University Press: Cambridge


As such the reason why /t/ and /d/ are different letters is not just vibes or technical difference in the sounds - but because there are "minimal pairs", meaning two words which you need to know the difference between them. For example in English "tug" (/tʌɡ/) and "dug" /dʌɡ/ - the only difference between these two words is the /t/ and /d/ sounds - so they get separate letters.

Additionally the IPA uses punctuation in a specific way, with full stops, colons slashes, square brackets etc having specific meanings.

Now for the review:

Praise: This system is largely functional. You can, if you learn it, theoretically represent many signs with it. The way that it handles orientation is genuinely interesting and perhaps something that other alphabets could learn from.

Criticism: IT IS NOT AN I.P.A!!!!!!!! 
  1. It is not made nor updated by the International Phonetics Association, nor experts in sign language. 
  2. It does not follow the methodology that the IPA uses. It is based on an analysis of a single sign language. 
  3. It's intended use is not for transcribing international sign languages. It is aimed at conlangers and creating new languages.
  4. And even its own goal of being only Unicode characters it fails at, given that the use of underline/overline and superscript requires formatting, which may not work across platforms. The way it uses brackets within a sign also makes it incompatible with standard IPA punctuation.
The system being called "Sign Language International Phonetic Alphabet" is a massive misnomer that misleads people in my opinion. DJP even acknowledges this:
  • Q: Is SLIPA a signed version of the written IPA?
  • A: No, it isn't. I used the IPA in the name simply because it's handy and memorable (and also because the system is international [i.e. intended to handle any sign language, not just ASL, for example] and phonetic). Other than the name, SLIPA has nothing in common with the written International Phonetic Alphabet devised by the International Phonetic Association.
Yes but most people aren't going to read that, are they? It is catchy BECAUSE it misleads people into believing it will be like the IPA!! Just call it something else, or follow a similar methodology to the IPA!!!! AAAAAAAAHHHHH!!!!!

Additionally the presentation is utterly abysmal. I understand that it is an early internet website, but it is my staunch belief that to teach a sign language writing system you NEED images and videos to show what you are trying to explain. It also requires a lot of close reading to parse what the author is saying.

I think it is confusing as a system. I can understand very little of it at a glance, unlike with other systems. I think to use it you would need to either have a lot of practice or constantly be checking what each bit means - and the website currently doesn't provide a quick way of doing so.

On a personal level I find the tone of the website to be grating. A hearing person who doesn't clearly have any connections to the Deaf community nor experts, stating quite firmly that the way he created is better than other systems created (by experts in the community and field) is irritating.

Lastly I think that there are many better options, which the creator himself suggested that we use if others are available.

//

However I that vent aside, I don't want to be too harsh on DJP himself. This was made by him before he was successful - and I don't begrudge an attempt. Even a failed attempt is one we can learn from. I WISH it was called literally anything else and that people who are ignorant of sign languages would stop recommending other people who are ignorant of sign languages.

ASLfont (& RSLfont)
Featural Iconic Alphabet
(2013)

ASLfont is another featural iconic alphabet. Instead of abstracting the handshape, this one simply uses little pictures of hands.

ASLfont follows a pretty standard HOLME parameter layout, with separate letters (or letter combinations) for each type of parameter. Although orientation, location and expressions all share a glyph set from which they are built for a consistent aesthetic.

Handshapes are all individual letters, orientation and movement are absolute, location allows for specification on the body but not in neutral space.



Image Source: ASL Font: Try It Now

The basic order seems to be LOHM, but for two handed signs it seems to be H²O²L²L¹O¹H¹M.

It has also been adapted to write Russian Sign Language, and this version is called RSLfont. Together the systems are sometimes called XSLfont or SLfont to make them language neutral.

    Categorisation & Review

  •  H - present✅
  • O - present✅
  • L - present✅
  • M - present✅
  • E - present✅ 
  • Basic One-Hand Order: LOHM
  • Complex Two-Hand Order: H²O²L²L¹O¹H¹M  
  • Alphabet 
    • Featural
    • Iconic

As such this system is clearly an alphabet.

Praise: This system is both intuitive and efficient. It doesn't have too many different characters and manages to keep them all quite easy to understand. I can even start to decode signs relatively quickly with the reference guide.

Criticism: But its biggest strength is also its biggest weakness. It is so intuitive because it is made up of little pictures of hands, which are notoriously hard to draw by hand. As such this can only ever really be used digitally unless heavily modified. Additionally I find the orientations, locations, and some of the expressions hard to remember and differentiate as the differences are in arrangement and thickness rather than form. Additionally the fact that these three types of parameters use variations of the same glyphs means that it can be a little confusing which is which at a glance.

Auswrit
Featural Iconic Abugida
(2022)

Auswrit is an obscure and abandoned writing system created by the youtuber LinguaPhiliax. The system was created as part of his attempt to learn Auslan and abandoned after he decided they didn't know enough Auslan to continue - instead endorsing ASLwrite. 

I have included this here not because it is particularly successful as a writing system but because it is an almost completely novel approach. An outsider, with minimal understanding of parameter theory's attempt. As such it it is one of the only examples of an abugida that I can find.

I call this an abugida primarily due to the extremely pervasive use of diacritics and addition of multiple glyphs to form a single combined characters / letters. Unlike projectional systems, however, these glyphs are not in freely paced anywhere on the page - there is a limited set of letters / characters the glyphs can form.

Notice in the below example how the same and different handshapes can be attached in specific patterned ways:
Image source same as above.

Another example is with locations and actions which, in cases where it makes sense, a location and action glyph will be combined to form a single characters - usually above or below:

Auswrit maintains a linear sequence while also showing quite a lot of the details of a sign very visually by doing. It is also interesting that even as an outsider the creator lands on something resembling HOLME parameter theory. 
Poses = Handshape & Orientation
Specifics = Handshape & Orientation
Location = Location
Action = Movement

As you can see, the order is hard to describe because it doesn't follow the same format as other alphabets. However I believe it would be accurate to describe the basic order as [HOᵖ][HOˢ]LM (where [HOᵖ] is the pose and thus broader, whereas [HOˢ] is the specifics and thus... more specific.

 The two-handed is very similar, it just being [HOᵖ][HOˢ]¹[HOˢ]²LM - as the rest of the system already accounts for one and two handedness within single characters. Where E would go within the system is unlcear, as expressions were never fully fleshed out. At one point it is mentioned E might be a part of the poses - while in another part it is mentioned that they might be a specific. As such either [EHOᵖ][HOˢ]LM or [HOᵖ][EHOˢ]LM. I will leave it out for now because E was never fully implimented.

My categorisation of Auswrit as an Abugida could be debated. It mostly still separates out different parameters, meaning it still acts like an alphabet much of the time. But even within spoken languages - "Abugida" is an in-between term - sometimes called a "alpha-syllabary" or "pseudo-alphabet". I am confident enough in saying that Auswrit is neither quite a True Alphabet nor a syllabary, but instead something in-between. 

   Categorisation & Review

  • H & O - Combined and broken down in a unique way*️⃣ 
  • L & M - Sometimes combined, sometimes separated *️⃣
  • E - present, but not fleshed out✅
  • Basic Order: [HO][HO]LM. 
  • Complex Order: [HOᵖ][HOˢ]¹[HOˢ]²LM
  • Abugida
    • Featural
    • Iconic 

Due to the above analysis and unique combination behaviour - I consider Auswrit to be an Abugida.

Praise: It's quite refreshing to see a complete outsider take a shot at sign language writing systems and come up with something quite fresh. I think that something can be learnt from Auswrit. The use of abugida-like features makes this system more compact than many other alphabetic systems, and in my opinion helps it to look good and be slightly easier to understand.

Criticism: However, I do think that the creator was right to move on from the project. As an Auslan learner, his understanding of Auslan is limited and thus his signing and system seems a little robotic. I also see no examples of more advanced signs or grammar such as classifiers. I see no example of testing it rigorously such as in a dictionary or longer text. As such I would recommend against learning this as your own main sign language writing system.  

SLDWS
(Sign Language Dictionary Writing System)
Featural Alphabet 
(2024)

The "Sign Language Dictionary" published in 2024 is an online written dictionary for sign languages, namely (currently) ASL and old LSF. It includes inputs from a number of different dictionaries, sometimes with multiple different transcriptions of the same sign - all written in their own hand crafted Latin-based writing system.

The writing system itself is not named, as such I (and my little group of sign language writing nerds) have taken to calling it the Sign Language Dictionary Writing System (SLDWS) or just SLD for short.

What current entries look like in the SLD.
"ase" = ASL
"fsl" = LSF, French Sign Language

Example Sentence

The eventual goal of the SLD.


Image Sources: https://www.sldictionary.org/eng/dictionary/cat, Sign Language Dictionary - Sentence Structure, Sign Language Dictionary - Entry Structure

But equally as interesting is how the writing system itself works. In short, each word can be broken down into chunks of letters. These chunks tell you the parameter in question.

Image Sources: Sign Language Dictionary - Writing System, SLD Parser

As multiple letters coalesce into a single parameter - this can quite easily be considered featural. Each letter is a feature, and the combined multigraph (the way that "th" makes a different sound to "t" is a digraph, multigraphs are the same concept but can be more than just two letters) is a single parameter. 

Movement is also interesting, as there are very limited movement markers: dash [-] which marks a single movement, double-dash [=] which marks reduplication (repeated movement) and tilde [~] describes semi-mirrored two-handed movement. Specifically it doesn't specify how the movement occurs, that is done by changing the parameters. Something like:
  • [parameter set number 1]-[parameters that have changed]
  • [Handshape][orientation][location]-[new location]
Or for a more concrete example:
  • bcóie=oi
  • [grabby hand][finger direction up, palm in][neutral space]=>[mouth]=>[mouth]
  • FOOD
This is in-line with the Movement-Hold theory of sign language phonology, where signs are made up of "Hold Segments"  which comprise of H + O + L and "Move Segments" which are just a change of parameters until the next Hold Segment, roughly analogous to a M parameter. This is usually displayed in a graph:


Image Source: Phonology - Asl linguistics
So handshape is indicated by showing finger configuration. Orientation is absolute. Location is both bodypart and allows for specification in neutral space. Movement is a change of parameters. All of these are more than one letter.

If anything this is a sub-alphabet because single letter parameters almost don't exist here. However, as I am unaware of any word to describe such a system, I shall be considering it a featural alphabet that is non-iconic.

SLDWS is also capable writing full sentences and even has some specialised punctuation with the aim of doing so. The concept of a sign language dictionary with definitions written in sign is fascinating and would be ground-breaking.

    Images Sources same as above

As shown above in the parser, the basic order is HOLM and the complex order is: H¹H²O¹O²LM. The order is extremely strict, as changing the order makes the words incomprehensible.

    Categorisation & Review

  • H - present✅ 
  • O - present✅ 
  • L - present ✅ 
  • M - limited, primarily handled by change of other parameterss*️⃣
  • E - absent (as far as I can tell)❌ 
  • Basic One-Hand Order: HOLM
  • Complex Two-Hand Order: H¹H²O¹O²LM
  • Alphabet
    • Featural
    • Non-Iconic 

As such I would argue that SLDWS is an alphabet. It teeters on the edge of being an abjad with its lack of Expressions and the way it handles Movement - but ultimately it does express M information in a unique way.

Notably it is featural, as it is made up of multigraphs whose component parts represent sub-parameter information, but is not iconic.

Praise: SLDWS is very technically impressive. It condenses quite a lot of information down into surprisingly few characters. It also uses the Latin alphabet, meaning it can be used easily with any system without any further fonts nor modification necessary. I have also heard from one learner that it is quite powerful in what signs it can describe - being able to handle surprisingly advanced sins and grammar.

Criticism: However I think that its barrier to entry would make it confusing for most people to adopt. While you could likely teach it to children from a young age and get decent fluency in it, I doubt a late adopter would be able to. Even the learner I know says that it takes them a significant amount of time to de-code what is being written. Many parts of it are highly technical - and while you could take shortcuts and write in a "slang" style - could that be done without compromising clarity?

Also, while not as bad as some other systems, it still sometimes suffers from the sprawling word problem. There are very few short words in the system, and any level of complexity can cause a word to balloon in size.

All this is to say I definitely think SLD is cool and something can be learnt from it, but I doubt that it is the final form of sign language writing that is likely to be adopted by the Deaf community.

Also... pick a name please so I can call your system something other thand "sign language dictionary writing system"...

    Digitisation

In the previous part I talked about the digitisation issues that projectional systems face. Linear alphabet systems face no such issue.

For systems like SLIPA, SLD and some modified forms of Stokoe - they use pre-existing characters. That makes them very easy to write digitally. You just type or find the correct characters and arrange them in the correct arrangements.

For all other alphabets - a font will usually suffice. A font is a programme that takes the letters and puts something on top of them. They are simple programmes and most apps and websites use them. They are simple to download and install.


However, there are still issues in how you type these writing systems. Some have custom keyboard lay-outs - but these are hard to learn. Ideally, if one system were to become popular, custom keyboards could be made (or stickers for current keyboards) that allow the person typing to see what letter they are typing. For touch screens, these are easier to code.

Alphabets with more complicated arrangements are harder to code into a font and keyboard, but not impossible. They require a bit more technical expertise to make - but would hopefully be not much harder for the end-user to use.

    Comparisons & Missing Options

In this post I have analysed the following systems:
  • Mimographie (1825) - Featural Iconic Semi-Syllabary: L[HO]ME
  • Kinemics (1960) - Alphabet, probably?: unsure
  • Stokoe Notation (1960) - Semi-Iconic Alphabet: LHᴹₒ (E rare)
  • Bergman Notation (1977) - Semi-Iconic, Semi-Featural Alphabet: HOLM (no E)
  • HamNoSys (1984) - Featural Iconic Alphabet: EHOLM
  • Signfont (1987) - Featural Iconic Alphabet: HALME
  • ASLphabet (1992) - Featural Iconic Abjad: HLM (no A, no E)
  • ELiS (1997) - Featural Iconic Alphabet - HOLME
  • SLIPA (2003) - Semi-featural Alphabet: HᴼLᴬME
  • ASLfont (& RSLfont) (2013) - Featural Iconic Alphabet: H-O-L-M-E
  • Auswrit (2022) - Featural Iconic Abugida: [HO][HO]LM (E incomplete)
  • SLDWS (2024) - Featural Alphabet: HOLM (no E)
This is, of course, a non-exhaustive list and is only a surface level analysis of each system. If you wish to dig down into any of the systems I have presented here, I suggest following some of the sources I have linked, or heading over to Zrajm's page.

It should be noted that even if systems nominally share the same HOLME or HALME parameter theory, it doesn't mean they work in the same way under the hood. For starters - I have noticed some patterns that differentiate how different alphabets display each parameter type.

For Handshape there are two main categories:
  1. Wholistic: Indicates the whole handshape as a single unit (usually a single letter) (most common)
  2. Finger-Configuration: Indicates the positions of the fingers individually (rare)
For Orientation there are three main categories:
  1. Absolute: Indicates the hand's orientation relative to the signer themself. (most common)
  2. Relative ("Action Area"): indicates the hand's orientation by showing the part of the hand that faces or makes contact with a location including neutral space. (rare)
  3. Anatomical: Indicates the hand's orientation by showing how the wrist is rotated. (rarest)
For Location there are two main categories:
  1. Body-Only: Only indicates location relative to the body - treat all neutral space as a singular area. (common)
  2. Neutral-Space Specification: Do the above, but also add in a system to allow specification of multiple locations in neutral space. (rarer)
For Movement there are two main categories:
  1. Absolute: Movement is defined relative to the signer themself. (most common)
  2. Parameter Change: Movement is defined simply as a change of parameter (rare)
Lastly, for Expression (NMFs) there are also two main categories:
  • Anatomical: Indicates what a specific part of the body is doing. (most common)
  • Grammatical: Indicates the meaning/function of said expression, rather than or complimentary to it's anatomical description. (rare)
But even within each catgery there are differences. Take a look at the following, which is TELL in ASL transcribed into Signfont, ASLfont, ELiS and SLDWS:

Red = Handshape
Yellow = Orientation
Black = Action Area
Blue = Location
Green = (contact)
Purple = Movement

Notice that even in a simple sign, fudging some of the spelling rules of some of the systems, the order of parameters swaps around - as does precisely which parameters are displayed and how. Furthermore - how detailed each parameter is varies greatly from writing system to writing systems - some aiming for maximum detail, others happy to underspecify by comparison - each often claiming to be an accurate transcription.

More-over, we have plenty of alphabets represented but few other systems. Only one system I would consider each an Abjad, Abugida or (Semi)-Syllabary. It would be interesting to see more examples of intentionally making something like these to see how it would turn out.

One interesting idea might be to make a syllabary based on adding together H+M and L+O. 

Another might be to make an abjad where both O an M are missing - instead M is implied by having multiple Ls and implying movement between them - in line with what some other systems do but taken to the logical extreme.

Lastly making an abugida where perhaps H and M are the base letters, and L, O and E are treated as diacritics that modify them might work well.

Additionally, Auswrit is one of the only examples to heavily use combing glyphs, letters and diacritics, which cool but a shame others seem averse to doing so. I would like to see a Korean-style alphabet, where letters are combined into blocks with fixed patterns, as with my mock-up sketch with ASLphabet:

Conclusions

In writing this I have gained a deeper appreciation for alphabets. Up until this point I had never felt satisfied by any alphabetic sign language writing system. They seemed complicated and difficult to process - like a step by step recipe rather than a word my brain could process quickly.

But now I have written this whole blog-post I now see the incredible work, time and consideration that went into each of these. Even the ones I dislike the most and criticise most heavily are still labours of love. And each has some new perspective to offer us.

We need to think about it's purpose. One of the more complicated and detailed systems (e.g. HamNoSys) may be a good option for academia, but would be too clunky to use for everyday use. If we want to use an alphabet for writing every day sign languages... I think we aren't there yet.

Of the options presented I think something to learn the most from in this regard is ASLphabet. The choice to make spellings simpler by missing out information and letting the reader guess from context could be a big leg up in efficiency over other systems that go for maximum detail. I think efficiency of this sort or similar is what would be needed if we were to ever aim for mass adoption.

Ultimately I am still not the biggest fan of sign language alphabets, nor a user of one. While perhaps technically possible, I think they strip away some of the visual-ness that is so important to sign languages. I have also yet to see classifiers done "well" in them, that is to say in a way that I see and understand as classifiers.

My heart lies with logographies and projectional systems - which retain that visual aspect far more clearly.

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  nasin toki pi luka pona  open ni li nasin mi taso. mi la, ona li pona lon toki. ijo tan ona li ike tawa sina la, o ante e ona  lon nasin sina. nasin sina en nasin mi li ken ante. luka pona li ken ante lon luka ante. (cw: o sona e ni - toki moku li lon) nanpa ale:   nanpa wan - nimi kule en pi  nanpa tu - la  nanpa tu wan - nimi ijo en nimi pali nanpa tu tu - nimi poka en nimi poka pali nanpa luka  - o nanpa luka wan - a en mute nanpa luka tu - ala nanpa luka tu wan - toki pi wile sona nanpa luka tu tu - nimi luka ‘SEME’ nanpa luka luka - tenpo nanpa luka luka wan - nimi nimi nanpa luka luka tu - nimi ijo mute en nimi pali mute nanpa luka luka tu wan - nimi lili nanpa luka luka tu tu - nanpa nanpa luka luka luka - nimi pali tawa nanpa luka luka luka wan- luka ijo
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Native Speakers pi toki pona li lon ala lon?

 Native Speakers pi toki pona li lon ala lon? This lipu is written in a toki tonsi of Eng and Toki Pona.    A recent drama has sprung up around if there are truly any native speakers of TP. I will paraphrase in order to avoid furthering the drama as mi wile ala wawa e utala. mi wile taso toki e ona. I have permission from jan Kekan San to share their side of things. To set the scene; for a number of years a person of the name jan Elike that has claimed multiple times that ona are raising jan lili kili ona with a number of languages including toki pona such that ona are The First Native Speakers pi toki pona . ona are quite young as of right now - and have not grown up yet enough to toki lon kulupu pi toki pona - but perhaps in years to come ona might be some of the most fluent people among us. jan Alonola's discussion with jan Elike  (Eng) lipu tenpo nanpa soweli - toki tawa jan Elike (mama pi jan lili pi toki pona)  (TP) One thing jan Elike toki'd was that ona'...
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luka pona li seme?

luka pona li seme?   mi kama sona e toki pona la, mi lukin e toki ni: "toki pona li jo e toki luka. ona li toki pona luka". ni li pona a tawa mi tan ni: mi jan pi kute meso (kute mi li lon taso li pona ala). tan ni la, toki luka li pona tawa mi. mi sona e toki luka pi ma Pitan. taso mi lukin e toki pona luka la, mi pilin e ni: ona li pona ala. tan ni la, mi ante e ona. taso ante mute li kama. toki sin li kama. ni li luka pona.   toki pona en luka pona li sama ala sama? ona tu li ante li toki ante.  nimi li sama. nimi 'li' en nimi 'e' li lon ala, taso nimi ante ale li lon. nimi ante li ken weka lon wile pi jan toki. taso nasin toki li ante mute.  kin la, luka ijo li lon! luka pona en toki pona o ante tan seme? toki pona li toki uta. ni la, ona li kepeken mute e nasin toki pi toki uta. nasin toki pi toki uta en nasin toki pi toki luka li ante. mi la, luka pona li pona tawa toki pi toki luka.   jan ante o luka pona sama anu seme?   ala! jan li ken jo enasin ...
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