All Things Linguistic

IPA vs English Orthography Rap Battle

I found this video via estifi and it’s pretty great but I kept expecting that it would turn out to be the background beats to a more epic rap battle of the alphabets. When that didn’t happen, I wrote one. Behold.

You people wanna write a word  
You people wanna write a sound
Well your alphabet’s absurd
So you people goin’ down! 

You wanna write interdental fricatives
In your English orthography
But you can’t tell voiced from voiceless
In your ridiculous typography

Yo, I’m the kinda writing system
Y’always wished you had in school
Yo, you’ll never need a spelling bee
‘Cause I don’t break no rules

Yeah ‘cause I’m the IPA
And all my symbols are unique
Your Latin alphabet’s so tiny
I’ve got all of that plus Greek! 

You still sing your ABCs? 
Hah, well you won’t get so far
Yo, my vowels are a trapezoid
You rip off twinkle little star 

You put an accent on café?
And you say that’s diacritic-al?
I got two types of tone markers
Well now you’re just dia-pitiful 

K, I think I’m getting gloat-y
And you know that’s not my wish
Imma go play with my ghoti
Oh wait I mean my FISH