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Is there a way to unambiguously convey that the "th" in a word should be voiced, like in the word "the", but without using the International Phonetic Alphabet (or any non-alphabetic characters)?

Example: If I want to show the correct pronunciation of the proper name Umelmehey in this fashion, I can write "uh-MEL-mah-hey".

If I want to show that a word, e.g. "lather", should be pronounced so that it rhymes with laser (meaning one who lathes), and there is no word that rhymes with it, how can I do that?

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    There is none! The most popular digraph using only ASCII is "dh," but it will likely be unfamiliar to most readers and prone to being pronounced as just /d/.
    – herisson
    Commented Mar 23, 2017 at 16:13
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    Can you use "LAY-ther to rhyme with BAY-ther"?
    – Yosef Baskin
    Commented Mar 23, 2017 at 16:17
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    Your example of "lather" (one who lathes) does have a rhyme: "bather".
    – Mark Beadles
    Commented Mar 23, 2017 at 16:18
  • Thanks @MarkBeadles. I should clarify that the word I'm trying to represent is not "lather" and I think "laser" sufficiently rhymes with that, er, word. The word I'm trying to convey the pronunciation for is a made up proper noun, so I didn't want to confuse the question.
    – Dynrepsys
    Commented Mar 23, 2017 at 16:23
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    Could you give us the proper noun you want help with?
    – Yosef Baskin
    Commented Mar 23, 2017 at 16:41

2 Answers 2

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This list of pronunciation respelling systems on Wikipedia gives a good idea as to what's used in various systems.

Here is a screenshot (irrelevant rows removed):

IPA1 IPA2 APA NOAD AHD RHD WBO MECD DPL DPN TBD NBC MWCD COD4 POD Cham SD AB Dictcom BBC Wikipedia¹ Wikipedia² Examples//θ θ θ ᴛʜ th t͡h th th th th th th th th th th th th th th th th//ð ð ð ᴛʜ th th̸ th th th t̷h TH th: th dh th dh TH dh th dh dh dh

So, /θ/ (unvoiced th) is usually written as "th", while /ð/ (voiced th) has more variation:

  • "dh"
  • underlined t̲h̲
  • capitalized TH
  • italic th
  • various strikethroughs (th̸, t̷h, TH)
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The American Heritage Dictionary uses:

  • 'th' for unvoiced th /θ/
  • 'th' (italicized) for voiced th /ð/.

Reference (PDF).

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    And others used barred th and unbarred th, for the voiceless and voiced, respectively. American dictionaries are much worse than IPA and not anywhere as consistent or usable. Plus, nobody ever gets good at any of them, so they're hopeless if you want to be clear to everybody. There is no substitute for IPA for that.
    – John Lawler
    Commented Mar 23, 2017 at 16:58

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