zoophona is unlike natural languages, in that it does not have a specific set of speech sounds. instead, it is based on a system of rhythm, with each word being made up of a pattern of consonants and vowels. this allows the speaker to use any noises they want to speak the language, typically animal noises.
for example, the word for 'animal, person, or living being' is cvvc, where c represents any consonant and v represents any vowel. this means that the words woof, meow, and zoop all mean the same thing! the word for 'say, talk, or language' is cvcv, and so the name of the language zoophona literally means 'animal language'. in this series of lessons, dog noises will be used for examples.
with so few words, their meanings are intentionally broad and may be somewhat vague. for example, both humans and non-humans animals are referred to using cvvc, unless you need to specifically specify that someone is a human. in this case, the compound word cvcv cvvc can be used, meaning 'talking animal'. however, this can also be used to refer to any animal that can communicate.
syllables consist of a vowel, which may have a consonant before, or after it. two consecutive consonant or vowels can either be pronounced as a cluster of two sounds, or a single sound held for twice the length. stress may be placed on any part of the word without affecting its meaning.
when written using the latin alphabet, words are always written with lower case letters except for loan words which have the first letter capitalised. full stops end declarative sentences, exclamation marks end interjections or commands, question marks end questions, and commas are used to link phrases.
