science

Merrill Shorthand

Merrill Shorthand is a science topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand Merrill Shorthand rather than just read about it. In short: Merrill Shorthand is a shorthand system invented by Albert H. Merrill, published in 1942.

Key takeaways

Merrill Shorthand belongs to science; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect Merrill Shorthand to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of Merrill Shorthand from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

Merrill Shorthand is a shorthand system invented by Albert H. Merrill, published in 1942. The system is described in Merrill's book as "A shorthand system built on an original principle of connecting consonant-indicating positions by vowel-indicating curves and straight lines." The system differs from Boyd's Syllabic Shorthand, which is another system which attempts to use a syllabic basis, in a number of ways:

While both Boyd's and Merrill's system use differently shaped strokes to represent different vowels, Boyd's has different terminators for different vowels; Merrill uses five different basic lines: deeply curved (upward and downward), shallow curved (upward and downward) and straight. Consonants in Boyd's system are shown, in the main, by orientation (horizontal, vertical, or 45° from those directions) and direction of writing. In Merrill, they are shown by position above, below, or on the writing line; also, in Merrill a syllable such as "lad" which starts and ends with a consonant is written on a slant which starts at the height associated with "l" and ends at the height associated with "d." This is the only situation in which strokes are made to slant. Merrill, unlike Boyd, resembles Pitman shorthand in using dark "shaded" strokes to represent certain (mainly voiced) consonants, as opposed to others (mainly unvoiced). The vowels are grouped into five sets:

Deeply curved, upward (inverted-u-shaped): load, but. More shallowly curved, upward: bead, bid. Straight: bawl, hot, fat. Shallowly curved, downward (u-shaped): bed, made. Deeply curved, downward: use, moon, good, fine. (Oddly, in all but the last case, the vowels grouped together sound somewhat similar; however, the last group has three similar sounds, but a fourth very unlike the others.) The consonants are grouped into three sets, "left," "right," and "extreme right." The extreme right consonants are used only to end syllables, not to begin them. When a right consonant begins a syllable, a space is put before it which is absent when the consonant is in the left group. The ending consonant of the syllable controls how far rightward the stroke that represents the syllable is extended: thus "lad" is a straight line from the highest position to the writing line, only slightly rightward, while "lawn" has a stroke that runs between the same heights, but with a larger forward dimension. The positions are as follows:

The parenthesized entries are represented by shaded strokes.

A later edition was published in 1945 under the title "Merrill's Modernized Shorthand."

References

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with Merrill Shorthand

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what Merrill Shorthand claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In science, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to Merrill Shorthand before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about Merrill Shorthand ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of Merrill Shorthand

In research: Merrill Shorthand appears in science research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses Merrill Shorthand in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: Merrill Shorthand is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics Shorthand systems, Writing system stubs, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for Merrill Shorthand outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study Merrill Shorthand in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what Merrill Shorthand means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain Merrill Shorthand out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is Merrill Shorthand in simple terms?

Merrill Shorthand is a shorthand system invented by Albert H. Merrill, published in 1942.

Why does Merrill Shorthand matter?

Because it connects several science ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study Merrill Shorthand?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on Merrill Shorthand.