Units of broad transcription are phonemes.

Each phoneme is a symbol for a gesture or a set (combination) of gestures

• that recurs in many words
• that contrasts with other recurring sets

The order of phonemes symbolizes contrastive aspects of gestural organization.

Symbols are represented between slashes /.../.

e.g.,

Annotation Principles

(1) Each distinctive oral constriction gesture is annotated by a distinct symbol.

e.g., vs.

(2) The ordering of symbols represents the order in which the the corresponding gestures (or sets of gestures) reach their targets.

e.g.,

(3) When a distinctive Laryngeal or Velic gesture overlaps an oral constriction gesture, a single symbol is used for the gestural combination.

 

Examples of mapping between phonemes and combinations of gestures

(4) A single symbol is used for distinctive combinations of tongue and lip gestures for vowels.

e.g., /but/