hi, im having a discussion with my professor about some english phonetics. the word 'drive' is written out as / draɪv / but when i and my other american classmate say it, we say it / ʤraɪv / my british teacher felt that when he said 'just' and 'drive' it was not the same initial sound, but to me and my classmate they were. his may have been ever so slightly more palatal in 'drive', so more like / dʑ / but definitely not / draɪv /. same with words such as 'track' and 'chair'. during an TEFL course i took one time, my also british teacher then had the same views as my current teacher. the /d/ is being influenced by the / r / i assume because the tip of the tongue wants to point up when saying it, and therefore changing the position of the tip of the tongue in / d/ to the more affricate / ʤ /.

what is going on? why do IPA transcribers write it as /dr/ when clearly its not being prnounced like that. as an english speaker, i've never heard anyone actually literally say 'drive' as /drive. why do my teachers feel that they are saying it like that, when they clearly aren't.

EDIT: i did a spectrum analysis of me saying 'chair' and 'try' and the initial sound is definitely almost 100% the same

Hello, everyone! I heard a lot of times one thing that you, native speakers, pronounce for instance the word 'try', not like 'tr' sound, like 'chr' sound. The same thing with the word 'drive', where you pronounce it like 'jr'. Okay, but my question is about the next. "I hate you" - you will add 'ch' sound between 'hate' and 'you'. "Cause you wanna..." - you will add 'j' sound between 'cause' and 'you'. I guess, you got me. My questions:

1. How often do you use it? I heard some people don't do that but the most biggest part of people do.
2. Do you add 'ch' sound in the next? "With you"
3. I heard some people add 'j' sound between 'do' and 'you' - "Do you wanna go?". How often do you add that sound here?

In studying about the Proto Indo European language, as well as other languages, there seems to be many words (or perhaps word roots rather) which end in a plosive consonant that is aspirated, sometimes even labialized or palatalized. How can this possibly be pronounced without a vowel to follow afterwards? Take for instance the word "*gerbh-", one of my initial guesses is that the secondary articulatory feature (the aspiration in this case) is not pronounced in the root, however is once a suffix with a vowel is added.

I've been looking for something like this, and I've found very little information on the subject. there's a decent amount of info on the Slavic languages developing palatalization, but I can't find any resources about the loss of a palatalization distinction. is something like that uncommon?

Hi! Tikorši is my first somewhat "good" conlang, so I'm very happy to show you some major features of it's phonology. I'm really looking forward to see some feedback, especially criticism about how naturalistic or logical some things are. Hope you'll enjoy it!

Syllable structure

Tikorši has a pretty simple (C)V(A)(C) syllable structure. In stressed position, C can be any consonant, V can be any vowel, A stands for (non-lateral) approximant. The coda consonant can be any sound except voiced stops or fricatives.

Consonants

Allophones:

/n t d s z ɾ l/ are dental [n̪ t̪ d̪ s̪ z̪ ɾ̪ l̪]

/n/ becomes [ŋ] before velars

/ɲ/ is realized as [j̃] before fricatives and optionally word finally

/t d k g/ become [ts dz kʲ gʲ] before /e i/

/k g/ are lenited to [ç~ɕ  ʝ~ʑ] before /y/

Cluster of /tʂ/ is realized as an affricate [t͡ʂ]

/ʂ ʐ/ aren't strongly retroflexed

/x ɣ/ are palatalized to [ç ʝ] before /e y/

/x/ might glottalize to [h] in coda

Clusters of /k/ and /x/ might be pronounced as [k͡x]

Cluster of /lɾ/ is realized as [r]

/l/ is a velarized [ɫ] before back vowels

/ʋ/ is realized as:

• [v] initially before front vowels
• [ʋ] initially before back vowels
• [ʋ~w] medially, with [w] mostly around back vowels
• [ʋ~w~∅] word finally

Voicing assimilation plays an important role. If there's an obstruent in the code, the next obstruent also must be voiceless, eg. šip (hair) + gaveset (forehead) = šipkaveset (eyebrow)

If there's an obstruent in the coda and the following sound is a sonorant, the obstruent is allophonically voiced, but it's not represented in the orthography, eg. lešnë [ˈleʐnə] (help n.)

Sections of two same consonants are prohibited and must be broken with an epenthetic vowel, usually a short /ə/. Phonetically though, double consonants often appear due to assimilation, as in talosši /'tɑlosʂi/ (flowery) being pronounced as [ˈtɑloʂːɨ].

*more under Vowel length

Vowels

/y/* and /ɒ/ occur only in stressed syllables

Vowel clusters are not allowed so if two vowels collide, they are separated by either /j/ or /ʋ/.

Allophones:

/æ/ is generally pronounced as [ɛ̞] but it's t

Hello Tengwar fans!

For Spanish, currently we have this mode proposed in 2006 by the Lambenor Linguistic Institute. Not long ago I decided to study it (what a quarantine does), and while I think that this method works fine, I had some ideas to tweak it a little bit in the most useless way.

First and foremost, I decided to write the Lambenor mode in a modern way (the webpage is from 2006, and to my tastes it is not aesthetically pleasant). Second, I discussed with myself some decisions taken in the method. Many I like, some I dislike, and I propose some "solutions". Third, and this is the most useless part, I took the original Lambenor mode plus Tolkien's idea of témar and tyeller and phonemes plus the Spanish phonology and tried to propose a Spanish phonetic Tengwar mode.

The Spanish version of this document can be found here. An English version translation with examples in Spanish can be found here.

Lastly, I would like to say that none of this is aimed at non-constructive criticism of the work made by the Lambenor, and least of all, undervalue it. All of this was born out of geekness and boredom in a quarantine. Of course, I am open to constructive criticism to improve these documents!

Cheers!

For anyone who used a real animal or group of animals as a base for your conlang, how did you decide on your phonetic inventory? How did you know you had enough sounds for the language to work? I ask because I am trying to make a language for a canid species in a book I’m planning, but I am moderately terrified that I am forgetting a sound… or that what I have won’t be enough.

I have been interested in the topic of palatalization a lot.

A year or so ago, I heard the creator of Interslavic talking about the dialects of IS used by different actors in The Painted Bird. For example, in this movie, he said that the priest is using the less-palatalized version of IS to sound more serious and educated while the common men use more palatelized style and sound "softer".

He is certainly not alone who sees this thing that way. I have it similar.

Perhaps it's because of the church or Latin, but when I hear street pronounced as shtreet etc. it sounds unpleasant/lazy/uneducated to me. I know, it's not right, but I feel it that way, what ever the cause for this feeling may be - but the perception is there and I evaluate it as an unpleasant dialect.

Also, if we observe people like Richard Dawkins, he prefers to say species like spiesies and not speshies. And there are more examples like that when, especially with the sh sound.

Is this perception of less palatalization = more education universal or not?

Or is this only associated with certain language families?

If you could recommend some studies or if you are studying this yourself and can chime in, that would be great.

Hi! Which would you consider to be the most "phonetic" languages. Languages that, generally, you speak the same you write.

A good example could be Spanish and a bad example would be French, for example.

Thank you and... sorry if I didn't spell something well! :)

The International Phonetic Alphabet Keyboard(2005 revised edition)

Missing some symbols? Apply Doulos SIL font

Consonants (Pulmonic)

BilabialLabiodentalDentalAlveolarPostalveolarRetroflexPalatal Velar UvularPharyngealGlottalPlosivepbtdʈɖcɟkɡqɢ ʔ NasalmɱnɳɲŋɴTrillʙrʀTap or FlapⱱɾɽFricativeɸβfvθðszʃʒʂʐçʝxɣχʁħʕhɦLateral fricativeɬɮApproximantʋɹɻjɰLateral approximantlɭʎʟ

Where symbols appear in pairs, the one to the right represents a voiced consonant. Shaded areas denote articulations judged impossible.

Consonants (Non-Pulmonic)

ClicksVoiced implosivesEjectivesʘBilabialɓBilabialʼExamples:ǀDentalɗDental/alveolarpʼBilabalǃ(Post)alveolarʄPalataltʼDental/alveolarǂPalatoalveolarɠVelarkʼVelarǁAlveolar lateralʛUvularsʼAlveolar fricative

Vowels

📷FrontCentralBackCloseClose-midOpen-midOpeniyɨʉɯuɪʏʊeøɘɵɤoəɛœɜɞʌɔæɐaɶɑɒ

Where symbols appear in pairs, the one to the right represents a rounded vowel.

Other Symbols

ʍVoiceless labial-velar fricativeɕʑAlveolo-palatal fricativeswVoiced labial-velar approximantɺAlveolar lateral flapɥVoiced labial-palatal approximantɧSimultaneous ʃ and xʜVoiceless epiglottal fricativek͡p t͜s
◌͡◌ ◌͜◌

Affricates and double articulations can be represented by two symbols joined by a tie bar if necessary.

ʢVoiced epiglottal fricativeʡEpiglottal plosive

Suprasegmentals

ˈPrimary stressˌSecondary stressˌfoʊnəˈtɪʃənːLongeːˑHalf-longeˑ◌̆Extra shortĕ|Minor (foot) group‖Major (intonation) group.Syllable breakɹi.ækt‿Linking (absence of a break)

Diacritics

Diacritics may be placed above a symbol with a descender, e.g. ŋ̊

◌̥Voicelessn̥d̥◌̤Breathy voicedb̤a̤◌̪Dentalt̪d̪◌̬Voiceds̬t̬◌̰Creaky voicedb̰a̰◌̺Apicalt̺d̺ʰAspiratedtʰdʰ◌̼Linguolabialt̼d̼◌̻Laminalt̻d̻◌̹More roundedɔ̹ʷLabalizedtʷdʷ◌̃Nasalizedẽ◌̜Less roundedɔ̜ʲPalatalizedtʲdʲⁿNasal releasedⁿ◌̟Advancedu̟ˠVelarizedtˠdˠˡLateral releasedˡ◌̠Retractede̠ˤPharyngealizedtˤdˤ◌̚No audible released̚◌̈Centralizedë◌̴Velarized or pharyngealizedɫ◌̽Mid-centralizede̽◌̝Raisede̝(ɹ̝ = voiced alveolar fricative)◌̩Syllabicn̩◌̞Lowerede̞(β̞ = voiced bilabial approximant)◌̯Non-syllabice̯◌̘Advanced Tongue Roote̘˞Rhoticityɚa˞◌̙Retracted Tongue Roote̙

Tones and Word Accents

LevelContoure̋or˥Extra highěor˩˥Risingé˦Highê˥˩Fallingē˧Mide᷄˦˥High risingè˨Lowe᷅˩˨Low risingȅ˩Extra lowe᷈˧˦˧Rising-falling↓Downstep↗Global rise↑Upstep↘Global fall

So I'm beginning a Vulgar Latin course and, of course, we're starting off with phonetic shifts from Classic Latin. It's extremely difficult to follow what the teacher describes for the generalized palatalization that happened and even more for Gallo-Romance palatalization, mainly because there appears to be no pattern and it's more like "that's just the way it kinda happened".

Are there any fixed patterns to which consonants will evolve into specific palatalized counterparts?

I am not military, just a regular civilian. Over the last few years there has been an uptick in business conducted by phone vs in person for me (and probably a lot of you too!), and a lot of in-person communication done through masks and plexi barriers. I found myself constantly repeating my name and email 2/3 three times on calls because “N” sounds like “M”, etc. To add an extra layer of annoyance, my name is a variation on a common name with one letter changed, and my last name isnt common either so I’d never get away with being Joe Smith where people could sort it out on their own. I was using stand-in words at the beginning, but that didn’t work as well.

Fed up, I printed, cut out and pinned the phonetic alphabet on my desk, wrote out my email in same, memorized it in a day and now I save myself and the person on the other end of the phone a bunch of irritation. Comes in really handy talking through masks too. Now work emails come in when they’re supposed to and I’m not repeating myself like a parrot all damn day long.

Hey y'all!

This post is an update post to this post, posted yesterday. I used a lot of the feedback in the comments on the previous post, and before moving forward with the process, I wanted to update y'all on what I've done with the feedback. A large portion of the comments were concerning my (in hindsight) frankly appalling lack of correctness with my phonology, which will be the focus of this post.

Once again, I'll put my main questions at the top and relevant links at the bottom.

• Is my consonant list 'up to code', so to speak?
  • If not, which pieces are weird?
• Does my new syllable plan of separating the Pulmonic consonants, Vowels, and Affricates into categories for syllable variants make sense?
  • If not, what have you found works for you and what would you suggest?

The original phonology looked like this:

https://preview.redd.it/xi1e3qn5sof71.png?width=497&format=png&auto=webp&s=6d82d82c0451e09502fc04cd3e54e7c569eae534

Yeah, I know, it's pretty ugly. And that's with just a day more research that I know that.

The updated phonology is large enough on the sheet that it can't fit into a screenshot, so that's a win in my book.

What I did with this new set is what I probably should have done first:

• Copy the entire IPA consonant table into the spreadsheet
• Have a sounds page open
• Listen to each consonant
• Highlight the ones that I like
• DON'T delete the rest, just in case.

My final list of consonants looks like this:

Pulmonic List

Affricate List

My list of vowels is improved too:

Vowel List

All in all, I think this is much better and am pretty happy with the variety in my lists.

This next piece is where I haven't done a whole lot of research into, so it could definitely be askew. My last update so far is the syllable system. As you can see with the screenshots above, I have a Pulmonic list, an Affricate list, and a Vowel list. My current plan is to develop syllable structures based on these three groups, f

I have made “Dhÿr” pronounced /çə/ and “Yaeddh” pronounced /jɛ:/ :)

I‘m an italian-american who grew up in Northern NJ, alongside about a million other IA’s.

I never heard anyone say WHORE like they do in Sopranos 😂 particularly Chrissy & Ralphie. I try to pronounce it myself and i’m no where close.

Best phonetic spellings? I’ve seen a few posted on this subreddit, I read them aloud and still can’t seem to get it right!!

Proto Amurian is a language that was spoken in the Amurian Islands (time and date unclear). It featured the following phonology;

- */ɹ u/ were compressed rounded. This is because of the species' lip structure.

- */p t c k q/ are all aspirated.

- */β/ did not occur before */u/, and */j/ did not occur before */i/.

- *[x χ] were allophonic to the approximants of the same POA */ɰ ʁ/, and occured when the approximants did not follow another consonant.

- *[ə] was allophonic to */a/ in unstressed syllables.

- All obstruent consonants, and the trill, have geminate articulations analyzed as consonant clusters.

As time went on, the uvular segments */ɴ q ɢ ʁ/ began to cause vowel shifts.

Words beginning with any uvular segment, ex */ʁibi/ *[χibi]**, "leaf", would have their */i u*/* vowels gain a [+RTR] feature, shifting them down to */e o*/* respectively. The root */ʁibi/ becomes */ʁebe/

Word-medial "fortis" uvulars */q ʁ/ (proto */ʁ/ considered fortis due to fricative realization) would also trigger [+RTR] spread, but not necessarily across the entire word. ex */juqi/ *[juqi] would have the */i/ vowel, but not the */u/ vowel become [+RTR]. The root */juqi/ "sky" becomes */juqe/. A root like */naɢi/ however, as it lacks a fortis uvular, would be unaffected.

Uvular segments */q ɢ/ debuccalize over time, both becoming /∅/ in the modern day. */ɴ/ merges with */ŋ/, and */ʁ ɰ/ also merge into one */χ/, realization variable between *[χ ~ ʁ] (notated with */χ/ because the approximant realization become less common).

Sequences of */ɹa/ soften, the */a/ phoneme taking its weakened schwa realization. The */a/ drops entirely, leaving a syllabic */ɹ/. This new semivowel */ɹ/ then dorsalizes, becoming */ɥ y/ (recall the compressed rounding), with an alveopalatal POA (ie that of [ɕ]).

Coronal fricatives */s z/ palatalize before */i j/, becoming *[ɕ ʑ].

Palatal plosives */c ɟ/ affricate to */tɕ dʑ/, which de-palatal

No one uses the NATO phonetic alphabet unless they're very engaged with the English language, so I started listening to how people gave serial numbers, and this is what I came out with. It skews very old-fashioned, but I love that, truth be told.

A - Anton

B - Bertha

C - Cäsar

D - Dieter

E - Emil

F - Friedrich

G - Gustav

H - Heinrich

I - Ida

J - Julius

K - Konrad

L - Ludwig

M - Martha

N - Nordpol

O - Otto

P - Paulus

Q - Quelle

R - Rudolf

S - Siegfried

T - Theodor

U - Udo

V - Victor

W - Walther

X - Xanthippe

Y - Ypsilon

Z - Zeppelin

A few crazy examples I know of:

1. The Dinka language contrasts the dental stops and nasal /n̪ t̪ d̪/ from the alveolar stops and nasal /n t d/.

2. The Ewe language contrasts bilabial fricatives /ɸ β/ from labiodental ones /f v/.

3. Multiple languages in the Balkans including Albanian and Hungarian contrast palatal stops or affricates /c ɟ ~ c͡ç ɟ͡ʝ/ from palatoalveolar affricates /t͡ʃ d͡ʒ/.

4. Many Caucasian languages contrast velar fricatives /x ɣ/ from uvular ones /χ ʁ/.

5. Also amongst Caucasian languages are some that contrast the epiglottal stop /ʡ/ from the glottal /ʔ/.

6. And who can forget South Slavic languages like Serbo-Croatian (Bosnian) that contrasts palatoalveolar sibilants and affricates /ʃ ʒ t͡ʃ d͡ʒ/ from alveolopalatal ones /ɕ ʑ t͡ɕ d͡ʑ/.

To all redditors who evolve their language from a proto language:

What is the very first sound change you have decided to implement in your language? Was it a big change or a small one? did you add phonemes or remove some? And did you put a lot of time into your decision or did you decide on the fly?

I'm torn as to what the first sound change for my proto language should be. I feel that if I remove sounds, I could have just created my proto lang without those sounds. So, probably adding sounds. Maybe a form of palatalization. But that on the other hand feels too small-scale because it only affects a handful of words.

Hoping to get some insight from fellow conlangers.

She thinks the “fauxnetics” we all make fun of (like “FOE-net-ticks”) actually make sense to the layman vs. the multitude of unfamiliar letters in IPA that one would need to learn, compared to using smaller words/syllables that laypeople are already familiar with as a guide to pronunciation.

She thinks it’s stupid to make fun of these transcriptions because using IPA is unknown & inaccessible (typing-wise) to most people, & therefore impractical.

Thus, she says our mocking of it makes us pretentious.

What say you, r/fauxnetics?

Edit: thank you all for your replies. I have learnt quite a bit about NATO alphabet I didn't know before and I've realised, the reason it confuses me is because I haven't really used it before and I now know why people use it. I also realised I may have been a bit too harsh on NATO and I may try to learn it properly in the future.

NATO phonetic alphabet is using the word Alpha instead of the letter A and Bravo for the letter B and so on.

When used to explain a letter close to each other like S and C then I can understand adding it on as extra information if it is asked for, but some people use it to explain every word without even a warning, just saying snake alpha tent for the word sat.

Which contradicts how I use whole words, because I use whole words to speed up the spelling process. So if I say it is spelt the word alpha then the word bet, you should get the word alphabet.

The only letter that may need the NATO phonetic alphabet is the letter c, because it can sound like s. But you can just emphasize s and whenever a c sounds like an s, you know it is not an s, because it is not emphasized.

I work a customer service job, and my boss asked me if I grew up with someone who was former military because he has heard me use the NATO phonetic alphabet before. When I told him no, he asked what triggered me learning it and when I said an Archer episode, he thought I was joking, lol.

vovolili l-allo raro?

Ok! I finally made an extensive phonetic outline for one of my conlangs. It’s here in an 11 (!) page PDF linked in the comments :D

In my own notes it’s referred to as L2, but to post on reddit i’ve been using the term Loaïnna - actually a borrowing from another conlang of mine, meaning “our language”. Strange that an endonym would be a borrowing, but I like the vibe, so it’ll do for now.

Loaïnna (or L2) is based of off Spanish. This is because I am familiar with Spanish, it offers a very clean phonology to work from, and the atmosphere of this imaginary world is very Iberian.

However, I’m most interested in allomorphy - when related word forms are obscured. For this I’ve researched Navajo and Old Irish (yes I know). I’ve taken creative liberty to nudge the Spanish verb from a standard synthetic typology into an agglutinative and, in some ways, polysynthetic one. So although you can successfully transpose Spanish vocabulary into L2 using the changes listed in the doc, the grammar introduces novel elements inexplicable through sound changes alone.

An example:

yò-de#dá > ìwði#ðá > ìwjiðá (eoïdá) “I give you”

yò-no-de#dá > ìwnuði#ðá > ìwnði#ðá > ìwnniðá (eonnedá) “I don’t give you”

yò-de-lo#dá > ìwðilu#ðá > ìwðlu#ðá > ìwdluðá (eodlodá) “I give it to you”

Here regular sound changes obscure the form of the word de, 2.SG.OBJ (Spanish te). Fun right?

Verbs evolve to have three principal parts, often warped by syncope, lenition and assimilation:

amá - ama - amlá (amar, ama, amará)

adeoná - aivina - aivinlá (adivinar - adivina - adivinará)

aoitá - avita - avirhá (abitar - abita - abitará)

And a few auxiliary verbs tucked in before the verb stem:

tù-me-bàs#amár > ðùmivàs#amá > ðùjmvàs#amá > ðujmmazamá (doimmasamá = tú me vas a amar)

There is an S-mutation and an N-mutation, with similar origins as the Celtic mutations:

nos#tomámos > nut#tumámu > nuttumám (nottomam = *nos tomamos) S+T=TT, etc

yò-no#bá > ìwnuvá > ìwnvá > ìwmmá (eommá = yo no *va) N+B/V=MM, etc

Scroll to the last page of the PDF for a full phonetic inventory, but highlights include the introduction of a full set of voiceless and labialized liquids /ɬʷ//ɾ̥ʷ/ etc due to the erosion of unvoiced plosives.

Anyway !! Check it out. This is also my first post on Reddit and first time really sharing a conlang, so thanks for checking it out <3

*Also wasn’t exa

LOL NOT SLEEPING, SPELLING (typo) I’m writing a short essay for college apps and I’m talking about pronunciation of a schools name (Bowdoin), I want to put the name in as the phonetic spelling of the name like: “BOH-din”, or “boʊˈdɔɪn” but I can’t really decide which way will illicit the reader to realize that that is 100% definitely the phonetic pronunciation.

Btw because the portal I’m using won’t allow me to italicize it I can’t do that.

I am looking for a website with chinese phonetic etymology but all I can find is etymology of characters. I am specifically looking for examples of [y]-final words deriving from this process, which I'm told exists for some etymologies: [ut]->[yt]->[y].

Thanks

So what I mean by palatalization, is the changing of the /t͡s/, /k/, /t͡sʰ/, /kʰ/, /s/ and /h/ into /t͡ɕ/, /t͡ɕʰ/ and /ɕ/ before /i/ and /y/ from what I know Cantonese and Min doesn’t have this , while at Guan and Wu have undergone it, but I am not so sure about the other Sinitic languages like Hakka, Xiang, Gan etc.

So does anyone know if they have underwent it?

Wiktionary says that -ward is only stressed in toward: https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/-ward#English. Why is this?

Every language enthusiast I know studies regularly languages and is constantly trying to practice, take courses, watch foreign movies etc...I know that some people are more "phonetically" gifted and can learn to pronounce more easily. But for grammar, vocabulary and everything else, I've never met anyone who told me it came naturally to them.

Almost universally the Slavic languages (bar Bulgarian and Macedonian) lack definite articles, largely thanks to their robust case systems. However, amongst the (fictional) Baltic branch, their most prominent feature is the development of definite suffixes. Whether influenced by Swedish or simply the result of the same forces that produced a similar system in Bulgarian remains a linguistic mystery.

As with all the Slavic languages, Morzak has three grammatical genders and a distinction between plural and singular noun forms. It should also be noted that unlike virtually all other Slavic branches, Baltic never developed the animacy distinction in masculine nouns. Only traces of the historical case system still exist, fossilized in literary expressions and religious texts, a situation similar to Dutch. Their colloquial usage is largely non-existent. The surviving two cases, the nominative and accusative, remain reflected both in the definite suffixes and the noun forms themselves:

The definite suffixes themselves:

~nominative~

кошка відіть ме = (a) cat sees me

кошката відіть ме = the cat sees me

кошкі відіть ме = cats see me

кошкіти відіть ме = the cats see me

~accusative ~

я віжу кошку = I see (a) cat

я віжу кошкуту = I see the cat

я віжу кошак = I see cats

я віжу кошакти = I see the cats

These suffixes developed from the Proto-Slavic demonstrative *tъ, cognate with Russian тот and Polish ten.

This alphabet was developed specifically for the military to make clear communication over radio and avoid confusion.

Once you get used to it, you will find yourself to be quicker at spelling and understand spelling, as you will not need to find a work that start with letter you are planning to spell.

Does anyone remember a playthrough on YouTube where all the Rookies had names that were essentially the NATO Phonetic Alphabet (Alfa, Bravo, Charlie, etc.) and then the country they represented? Like a name for a rookie would be Brazil Juliet (or maybe Juliet Brazil)? After they got to I believe sergeant rank or maybe squaddie did they actually get a name. I don't remember the guy who did the playthrough, but it's always been a memory of early XCOM of mine. Also, I don't remember if the playthrough was just EU or if it was also Long War.

If anyone else remembers this playthrough, please link to it, for the nostalgia!