Originally posted by FMF You're clearly missing the point. Or perhaps you are uncomfortable with it. When someone argues that "many British speakers of English have a broader vocabulary than Americans" does it make you feel a little bit defensive - or something - about your own culture?
Why do you say "many British speakers" but then "Americans"?
Show me the Brit that has a broader vocabulary than I do.
Originally posted by Teinosuke A boy who is bidden to spell "debt", and very properly spells it "d - e - t", is caned for not spelling it with a "b" because Julius Caesar spelt it with a "b".
George Bernard Shaw
Should English spelling be reformed to make it more consistent and phonetically accurate?
Your example ignores the root of the word debt which would be the accounting term debit, so although the b is silent it is meaningful when written.
What bothers me is the caning. Bad enough that the little rascal has to write it 50 times.
Originally posted by Teinosuke A boy who is bidden to spell "debt", and very properly spells it "d - e - t", is caned for not spelling it with a "b" because Julius Caesar spelt it with a "b".
George Bernard Shaw
Should English spelling be reformed to make it more consistent and phonetically accurate?
Originally posted by normbenign Your example ignores the root of the word debt which would be the accounting term debit, so although the b is silent it is meaningful when written.
What bothers me is the caning. Bad enough that the little rascal has to write it 50 times.
So the question then becomes whether the etymological information provided by that silent "b" is sufficiently useful to be worth preserving confusing irregularities of spelling.
Bernard Shaw died in 1950, so the caning was a long time ago.
Originally posted by Teinosuke A boy who is bidden to spell "debt", and very properly spells it "d - e - t", is caned for not spelling it with a "b" because Julius Caesar spelt it with a "b".
George Bernard Shaw
Should English spelling be reformed to make it more consistent and phonetically accurate?
phonetically accurate for whom?
ask 4 people from Essex, Somerset, Yorkshire and Surrey
how to pronounce bath and you will get
barf, barrth, bath and barth.
Originally posted by AThousandYoung Doesn't matter which standard. Pick one. British, why not. It's their language.
How can a language belong to anyone? Calling the language "English" is just a name. It could be called American or neo-anglo-saxon or qwerty. And as for a British Standard English ... I've never come across such a thing. The OED always gives alternative regional pronunciations and usage and also dialect words.
As a teacher I am well aware of the difficulties of teaching reading and writing and maybe there are some small anomalies we can get rid of but major changes NO.
Originally posted by wolfgang59 How can a language belong to anyone? Calling the language "English" is just a name. It could be called American or neo-anglo-saxon or qwerty. And as for a British Standard English ... I've never come across such a thing. The OED always gives alternative regional pronunciations and usage and also dialect words.
As a teacher I am well aware of the diffic ...[text shortened]... and writing and maybe there are some small anomalies we can get rid of but major changes NO.
Originally posted by wolfgang59 How can a language belong to anyone? Calling the language "English" is just a name. It could be called American or neo-anglo-saxon or qwerty. And as for a British Standard English ... I've never come across such a thing. The OED always gives alternative regional pronunciations and usage and also dialect words.
As a teacher I am well aware of the diffic ...[text shortened]... and writing and maybe there are some small anomalies we can get rid of but major changes NO.
I agree. Minor tinkerings would be fine - for instance, I think it would be entirely reasonable for us to start writing "thro" and "tho" instead of "through" and "though", as a lot of writers were doing in the eighteenth century. But I think any attempt at a major restructuring might prove both controversial and counterproductive. Although, I suppose the sum total of lots of minor tinkerings over time might end up being a major tinkering.
Originally posted by AThousandYoung Doesn't matter which standard. Pick one. British, why not. It's their language.
Another issue is that spelling doesn't serve only to illustrate sound, but also makes other connections. Someone pointed out earlier in the thread, I think, that the "ph" at the beginning of "photography" indicates its Greek derivation, an indication lost in Spanish where the cognate word is spelled with an "f".
That may sound like a pedant's complaint. But consider too that words related in meaning may actually sound rather different to each other in speech. "Photography", with its muted first syllable and strong second-syllable stress, is pronounced "fuhtogruhfee", while "photograph", with its first-syllable stress, is more like "foatuhgraf." And in the short form "photo" has a distinct long vowel both times, "foatoa". So genuinely phonetic (fuhnetik?) spelling would often obscure the connections in meaning between related words.
Indonesian is a 'see it, read it, sounds like it's written, write it like it's said, no messing about' language. Makes it relatively easy to learn.
The only irregularity is a remnant from the bygone Dutch imperial age: "oe", pronounced 'oo', once used in the place of "u"; nowadays we write Kupang [city in West Timor], once spelt "Koepang"; Suharto - the 'New Order' spelling, as opposed to Soeharto, the valid spelling when he was born which was, incidentally, technically 'banned' by his regime in around 1974.
Originally posted by AThousandYoung It is broken. It makes it harder to teach people to read and write.
Harder than what/when?
Harder for who/whom?
Students of other generations managed to learn it. Is this not just another step in dumbing down society? Is that not what governments and tv executives want?
Does little Jimmy need help because the language is broken, or society is broken. Little Jimmy couldn't give a toss in class, so let's make it easier for the grunt to pass state literacy tests.