5. The method of claim 2 , further including representing the phonemes of the second language and the candidate mapping phonemes of the first language as phonetic category vectors, whereby a vector representative of phonetic categories of each phoneme of the second language is subject to comparison with a set of phonetic category vectors representative of the phonetic categories of the candidate mapping phonemes in the first language.
5. The method of claim 2 , further including representing the phonemes of the second language and the candidate mapping phonemes of the first language as phonetic category vectors, whereby a vector representative of phonetic categories of each phoneme of the second language is subject to comparison with a set of phonetic category vectors representative of the phonetic categories of the candidate mapping phonemes in the first language. 8. The method of claim 5 , comprising selecting the phonetic categories from one or more of: (a) two basic categories of vowel and consonant; (b) a category diphthong; (c) vowel characteristics unstressed/stressed, non-syllabic, long, nasalized, rhoticized, or rounded; (d) vowel categories front, central, or back; (e) vowel categories close, close-close-mid, close-mid, mid, open-mid, open open-mid, or open; (f) consonant mode categories plosive, nasal, trill, tapflap, fricative, lateral-fricative, approximant, lateral, or affricate; (g) consonant place categories bilabial, labiodental, dental, alveolar, postalveolar, retroflex, palatal, velar, uvular, pharyngeal, or glottal; or (h) other consonant categories voiced, long, syllabic, aspirated, unreleased, voiceless, or semiconsonant.