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Notation

The notation of DI began (in the 1970s) as a type-writer friendly notation using UPPER CASE letters for prominent syllables, lower-case letters for non-prominent syllables, underlining for the tonic syllable, and lines up or down for high and low key and termination. Symbols for the tones were given in letter form, with ‘p’ for proclaiming (falling) tones, and ‘r’ for referring (rising) tones.

American English

DI is useful for transcription of all accents of English.

Transcriptions

Transcribers are trained through a process of standardisation with recordings and with other transcribers. There is a simple notation to learn: but the main task of is learning to relate the categories of DI to the particular characteristics of the recordings being transcribed. Some of these issues are mentioned in the first five chapters of Phonology for Listening.