IPA HISTORY
In 1886
A group of French and British teachers lead by the French linguist Paul Passy
Formed what in the future would be known as the International Phonetic Association
Their original alphabet
Was based on a spelling form for English known as the Romantic Alphabet
The alphabet has undergone a number of revisions during its history
The one of 1888 was the based for all the future revisions
The most significant was presented at the IPA Kiel Convention in 1989
The first official version of the IPA was released in 1888
After the formation of the International Phonetic Association.
The main goal
Was to create a set of phonetic symbols to wich different articulations could be applied
IPA offers
Over a hundred and sixty symbols for transcribing speech
The sound values of modified Latin letters
Can be derived from those of the original letters
The letters chosen for IPA are meant to harmonize with the latin alphabet
Most letters are either Latin or Greek
There are letters that are neither Latin nor Greek
This system uses a set of symbols to represent each distinct sound
Of the human spoken language
They intented to help people to acquire realistic pronunciations of foreign languages
The IPA has also conducted examinations in phonetics since 1908, awarding Certificates of Proficiency in English, French, or German phonetics