# Congress Spelling System

The Congress Spelling System (Malay: Ejaan Kongres) is a spelling reform of Malay Rumi Script introduced during the third Malay Congress held in Johor Bahru and Singapore in 1956. The main characteristics of the system are the use of symbols in the Americanist phonetic notation, going by the dictum of one symbol for one phoneme, and the new proposition in the writing of diphthongs.
The innovation was originally intended to replace the Za'aba Spelling and ultimately to become a standard orthography in the Malay speaking world, but did not seem to gain acceptance in general. It was deemed impractical for use by the masses, and certain graphemes proposed by the system were not represented in the common typewriters at that time. Even then, certain groups, particularly those affiliated to the Literary Movement 1950, used the Congress graphemes for diphthongs in their own publications.

## Background

In the 1950s, two different orthographies were used in the Malay-speaking world, namely the Republican Spelling System in Indonesia and Za'aba Spelling in British Malaya and Borneo. The Za'ba Spelling System, introduced in 1933, was the improvised version of the earlier orthography introduced by the British scholar, R J Wilkinson. Similarly in Indonesia, the Republican Spelling System was introduced in 1947 to replace the older Dutch Van Ophuijsen Spelling System.
The third Malay congress held in Johor Bahru and Singapore from 16 to 21 September 1956, seek to unite these two different orthographies into a single system. The new orthography, was envisioned to be a better and practical system, which is simplified and using standardized methods of spelling, and emphasized more on the use of Malay phonology system. During the congress, two proposal papers concerning the new orthography was presented by Literary Movement 1950 and Malay Language Association of University of Malaya. Literary Movement 1950, proposed a system already in use by their writers, largely based on Fajar Asia orthography introduced during Japanese occupation in 1943. Malay Language Association of University of Malaya generally rejects the use of digraphs and vehemently promotes the Indonesian spelling elements. A consensus was reached during the congress, and the new orthography was later named Ejaan Kongres (the congress spelling').
In 1957, the Congress Spelling System was published for the first time by Dewan Bahasa dan Pustaka in its language leaflet, DBP bilangan (1), with the title Kaedah Baharu Ejaan Rumi Bahasa Melayu (menurut keputusan Kongres Bahasa dan Persuratan Melayu III) (Malay for 'New Methods of Rumi Spelling of Malay Language (based on the decision of Congress of Malay language and letters III)').

## Reception

The Congress Spelling System did not seem to gain acceptance of people in general. The reason was that it was not practical for use by the ordinary people and certain graphemes proposed by the system were not represented in the typewriters. Even then, certain groups, particularly those affiliated to the Literary Movement 1950 used the Congress graphemes for diphthongs in their own publications. This group even reverted to the Wilkinson style of writing the vowels in closed final syllables which was, similar to the Republican style in Indonesia.
Since the Malay sections of publishing houses were mainly manned by members of the Literary Movement 1950 or their sympathisers, the Movement's style of spelling seemed to gain a widespread currency through published works. In the meantime, the schools and the government publications were still using the Za'aba or the school system of spelling. Hence, the public became confused as to which system to follow. Language usage outside the precincts of the school reflected a state of confusion in the minds of the people in the spelling of their language using the Rumi script. It was not unusual to find several systems used in a short passage in the print media not to mention in individual writings.
The state of confusion was ended with the introduction of New Rumi Spelling in 1972, that finally united the different orthographies of the Malay-speaking world into a single system.

## The system

In the third Malay Congress of 1956, a total of 16 resolutions were made for orthography, 2 resolutions for phonetics, and a resolution for Jawi alphabet. The list of letters agreed upon for the new orthography are as below. It consists of 20 traditional Malay consonants ⟨b⟩, ⟨c⟩, ⟨d⟩, ⟨g⟩, ⟨h⟩, ⟨j⟩, ⟨k⟩, ⟨l⟩, ⟨m⟩, ⟨n⟩, ⟨ŋ⟩, ⟨ñ⟩, ⟨p⟩, ⟨q⟩, ⟨r⟩, ⟨s⟩, ⟨š⟩, ⟨t⟩, ⟨w⟩, ⟨y⟩ and consonants ⟨f⟩, ⟨q⟩, ⟨v⟩, ⟨x⟩ for adopted sounds from foreign languages.
    Congress Spelling Rumi alphabet Uppercase Latin alphabet ABCDEFGHIJKLMNŊÑOPQRSŠTUVWXYZ Lowercase Latin alphabet abcdefghijklmnŋñopqrsštuvwxyz IPA phonemes a b tʃ d e and ə f g h i dʒ k l m n ŋ ŋ o p q r s ʃ t u v w ~ks j z

### Schwa

The Congress Spelling also consists of 6 vowel sounds represented by 5 letters; ⟨a⟩, ⟨e⟩, ⟨i⟩, ⟨o⟩, ⟨u⟩, with ⟨e⟩ representing both /e/ and /ə/ sounds. It differed markedly with Za'aba spelling that differentiates /e/ and /ə/ sounds with letters ⟨e⟩ and ⟨ĕ⟩ respectively.
    Za'aba spellingCongress spellingIPAMeaning bĕrhematberhemat/bərhemat/being prudent mĕngganggumeñgañgu/məŋgaŋgu/disturb mĕrdekamerdeka/mərdeka/independence tĕntĕratentera/təntəra/soldier

### Choice of graphemes

The principal feature of Congress Spelling is the representation of a phoneme with a grapheme or a single letter only. Thus, it rejects the use of digraphs commonly found in the earlier orthographies.
    Za'abaCongressIPAZa'aba exampleCongress exampleMeaning chc/tʃ/chichakcicakgecko ngŋ/ŋ/ngangaŋaŋaopening widely (for mouth or door) nggñ/ŋ/tunggutuñguwait shš/ʃ/shishašišashisha

### Diphthongs

The Congress also made a new proposition in the writing of diphthongs. Whereas the Wilkinson and the Za'aba systems had ⟨au⟩, ⟨ai⟩ and ⟨oi⟩, the Congress system suggested ⟨aw⟩, ⟨ay⟩ and ⟨oy⟩.
    Za'abaCongressIPAZa'aba exampleCongress exampleMeaning auaw/au̯/kalaukalawif aiay/ai̯/tiraitiraycurtain oioy/oi̯/boroiboroypot-belly

### Morphemes

A fixed rule for the choice of vowels for morphemes in disyllabic words were established in the Congress Spelling. In the event that the morpheme of the first syllable uses vowels ⟨e⟩ and ⟨o⟩, the morpheme bound to the final syllable must use vowels ⟨e⟩ and ⟨o⟩. On the other hand, if morpheme of the first syllable uses vowels other than ⟨e⟩ and ⟨o⟩, the morpheme bound to the final syllable must use vowels ⟨i⟩ and ⟨u⟩.
This Congress rule contradicts with the old Za'aba spelling that concentrate more on the native Malay phonology rather than using the existing theories and linguistic techniques. In Za'aba spelling, for any final syllable that ends with letters ⟨k⟩ or ⟨h⟩, the morpheme bound to it must use vowel ⟨e⟩ instead of ⟨i⟩, with the exceptions given to diphthong ⟨ai⟩. Conversely, for any final syllable that ends with letters other than ⟨k⟩ or ⟨h⟩, the morpheme bound to it must use vowel ⟨i⟩ instead of ⟨e⟩, with exceptions given to first syllable using vowels ⟨o⟩ or ⟨e⟩, thus vowel ⟨e⟩ must be used instead.

#### Final syllables that end with letters k or h

    Za'aba spellingCongress spellingMeaning alehalihto move letehletihtired balekbalikto return chantekcantikbeautiful Exceptions to words with diphthong ⟨ai⟩ Za'aba SpellingCongress spellingMeaning naiknaikto increase baikbaikgood raihraihto gain

#### Final syllables that end with letters other than ⟨k⟩ or ⟨h⟩

    Za'aba spellingCongress spellingMeaning nasibnasibfate katilkatilbed kutipkutipto pick pasirpasirsand Exceptions to open syllables with vowel ⟨o⟩ and ⟨e⟩ Za'aba spellingCongress spellingMeaning deretderetrow leherleherneck bogelbogelnude

### Phonemes for hamza and ayin

Malay written in Jawi script generally utilizes both Arabic letters ⟨ء⟩ and ⟨ع⟩, in addition to letter ⟨ق⟩, as glottal stops which transliterated in the old Rumi orthographies with apostrophes ⟨'⟩. The Congress spelling are in agreement that Rumi phonemes for both letters are similar. However, due to differing opinions among the participants, the Congress spelling did not produce any resolution on the use of both phonemes, and opened the issue for public interpretations. The congress nevertheless, proposed four resolutions concerning hamza and ayin.
1. The phonemes shall not be represented by any grapheme when it become onset of first morpheme. For example,
    Jawi spellingZa'aba spellingCongress spellingMeaning عادل'adiladilfair عالم'alamalamnature علماء'ulamaulamascholar
2. The phonemes shall be represented by letter ⟨k⟩ only if they become the coda of the last morpheme. Example as follows
    Jawi spellingOld spellingCongress spellingMeaning تيدقtida'tidakno أنقana'anakchild دودوقdudo'duduksit
3. The phonemes shall be represented by either letter ⟨k⟩ or ⟨'⟩, if they become the coda of the first morpheme. Example as follows
    Jawi spellingCongress spellingAlternative spellingMeaning معلومmaklumma'luminformed موءمينmukminmu'minbeliever باءيقbaikba'ikgood
4. To avoid confusion, the apostrophe ⟨'⟩ can be used to represent phoneme of glottal stops only if it become onset for non-first morpheme. Therefore, ⟨مسئله⟩ (Malay Jawi for 'problem') should be spelled as ⟨mas'alah⟩ in Rumi, not ⟨mas-alah⟩, ⟨masaalah⟩ or ⟨maskalah⟩.

### The letter ⟨h⟩

There are a total of four resolutions concerning the letter ⟨h⟩ in the Congress Spelling System.
1. If the /h/ sound becomes the onset of the first syllable, it can be either maintained, removed or replaced with ⟨'⟩.
    Congress spellingAlternative spellingMeaning hala'aladirection hadap'adapfacing hulu'uluupstream hujan'ujanrain
2. If the /h/ is in between two similar vowels, the letter ⟨h⟩ must be maintained instead of using ⟨'⟩
    Congress spellingWrong spellingMeaning bahanba'aningredient leherle'erneck bohoñbo'oñto lie
However, if the /h/ is in between two different vowels, the letter ⟨h⟩ can be either removed or maintained
    Congress spellingAlternative spellingMeaning mahumauwant jahitjaitto sew tahuntaunyear
3. For similar sounding words that carry different meaning, both rules of maintaining and removing ⟨h⟩ are applied to differentiate their meaning.
    Congress spellingMeaningCongress spellingMeaning tahutofutauto know bahushoulderbausmell harusshouldaruscurrent
4. For letter ⟨h⟩ that becomes a coda for morpheme, it must be maintained
    Congress spellingWrong spellingMeaning lemahlemaweak tanahtanasoil bolehbolecan teduhteduto shelter rahsiarasiasecret mahkotamakotacrown
Exceptions are given to Malay words that derived from foreign words. Therefore, ⟨sekolah⟩ ('school') can also be spelled as ⟨sekola⟩ and ⟨Eropah⟩ ('Europe') can also be spelled as ⟨Eropa⟩.

### Hyphens

The use of hyphens commonly found in the old spellings, is discontinued in the Congress spelling except in three conditions; reduplication, compound words and for line breaks. Malay affixes like di-, ke-, ter-, -kan, -an, and particles like -lah, -tah, -kah, and -nya are no longer hyphenated, but combined with the words.
    Za'aba spellingCongress spellingMeaning bila-kahbilakahwhen apa-lahapalahwhat a
The hyphen remains in use between components of reduplicated words, like menari-nari ('keeps on dancing') and rumah-rumah ('houses'). However, for compound words like setia-usaha ('secretary'), jawatan-kuasa ('committee'), kerja-sama ('teamwork'), exceptions are given to compound words that already firmly embedded like matahari ('sun'), purbakala ('ancient'), and tanggungjawab ('responsibility').

### Adoption of Indonesian spelling

The Congress Spelling vehemently promoted the Indonesian Republican Spelling System, which in certain words, are deemed in harmony with the original pronunciation.
    Za'aba spellingCongress spellingMeaning ayerairwater keranakarenabecause wanguangmoney ertiartimeaning hairanhéranastonish kurniakaruniagift kelmarinkemarinthe day before yesterday ia-ituyaitunamely