Script - Visible Speech

Visible Speech is a constructed alphabet designed to represent the articulatory positions and movements of the vocal tract, rather than abstract sounds. In the Unicode Script property, its value identifies characters used for this phonetic notation system, which was developed by Alexander Melville Bell in the 19th century. This script includes distinct symbols for lips, tongue, and jaw placements, as well as modifiers for voicing and nasality. The Script value helps software distinguish these glyphs from other writing systems, enabling correct rendering and text processing, such as font selection and line breaking. It also supports scholarly work in historical phonetics and the digital preservation of linguistic documents that employ Bell’s system.