Latin alpha (majuscule: Ɑ, minuscule: ɑ), script a, or single-story a is a letter of the Latin alphabet based on one lowercase form of a, or on the Greek lowercase alpha (α).
Usage
Although |ɑ| is normally just an allograph of ⟨a⟩, there are instances in which the two letters are distinguished:
Mbo (?): but not Akoose, though it does have phonemes /aa/ and /ɑɑ/;[4] nor Bakaka.[5]
in some languages, the script-a form (also called literacy form) of the letter ⟨A a⟩, with the lowercase much like the IPA ⟨ɑ⟩, is used and should not be confused with the Latin alpha ⟨Ɑ ɑ⟩ of the GACL; for example, in Muyang, the literacy ⟨A a⟩ represents an open-mid central unrounded vowel but it is not ⟨Ɑ ɑ⟩; the Latin alpha is not used.[6]
In typography, it is sometimes referred to as the single-story a, to distinguish it from double-story a.
In Cameroon languages, ⟨Ɑ ɑ⟩ must look like the classical lowercase Greek alpha to better differentiate it from the letter a in script form.
In Unicode, "Latin alpha" () and "Latin script a" () are considered to be the same character, which has an uppercase and a lowercase form and is referred to as "Latin letter alpha".
^HEDINGER, Robert (2011). "Akoose". Retrieved March 17, 2013. Among the short vowels the two a-sounds and the two o-sounds are in complementary distribution and therefore do not have to be distinguished in the orthography. However, there is a problem in the long vowels where the two pairs of sounds distinguish between distinct words. Up to now they have not been distinguished and it seems this doesn't cause any problem to readers.
