Re: English diglossia

en memo 2003:01:30 03.21.11 gogo (pm), John Cowan graffii:

>Peter Clark scripsit:
>
>>         None, really. I've heard the arguments and I just don't buy them.
>>The plain and simple fact is that English dialects have diverged on such a
wide
>>scale that it would be impossible to invent a phonetic system to cover all
>>of them.
>
>Very true, hence RI is not a phonetic system.
>
>>         No offense to the supporters of English spelling reform, but
>>it's a lot like auxlanging in my mind; interesting in theory, but annoying,
futile, and
>> pointless in real life. I have no problem with toying with different
>>scheme (much like the ideal auxlang discussion, rather than the usual
flame-fest),
>> but hypothetical simulations are as far as these proposals are ever going
>>to get.
    Never say never. Noah Webster (1758-1843), American lexicographer,
proposed many spelling reforms of many individual words that are now taken
for granted - especially in America. Of course, not _all_ Webster's ideas
were taken to.
    With the continuing spread of English-dominated Globalism, trade-names
with deviant spellings and the non-standard Englishes in Pop Culture,
"reformed" words like _thru_ and _kwik_ are spreading - at least informally.
    Granted, naturally, this is a gradual process and not a deliberate
language planning scheme... but ya gotta start sumwherez ;) "every initial
action has undetermined, unforeseeable effects..."

John Cowan graffii:
>Probably true, but I like them for the same reason I like making up auxlangs.
>Spelling reform is a species of engelanging.
    Yepyep. But what then is mangalanging? Engelanging taken to a seriously
whimsical extreme 0_o?

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