USAGE: English spelling reform`

Nik Taylor wrote:

> YES!  That was my point exactly.  A spelling reform would sever American
> and British orthography, even if both sides happened to choose the exact
> same conventions.
Actually, the number of phoneme-level differences is small, mostly
/A/ vs. /&/ and a variety of idiosyncratic ones.  Regularized Inglish
uses a few differences in spelling, some of which simply preserve
the existing Webster-vs.-Johnson differences.  (Reg.Ing. is by design
conservative.)

> I won't.  But what about my kids, who only learn New Spelling?  Unless
> someone goes "translates" an old book, they're cut off from that.
If you learn to read this (in American Reg.Ing.):

        Foarscore and seven years ago our faathers braught forth
        on this continent a new nation, conceeved in liberty, and
        dedicated to the propozition that aul men ar created equol.

        Now we ar engaged in a greit civil wor, testing whether that
        nation, or eny nation so conceeved and so dedicated, can long
        endure.  We ar met on a greit battlefield ov that wor.  We hav
        cum to dedicate a portion ov that field az a final resting-place
        for thoze hoo here gave their lives that that nation might liv.
        It is aultogether fitting and proper that we shood do this.

        But in a larger sense, we cannot dedicate -- we cannot consecrate --
        we cannot halloe this ground.  The brave men, living and ded,
        hoo struggled here, hav consecrated it far abuv our poor power
        ot add or detract.  The wurld will little note nor long remember
        whot we say here, but it can never forget whot they did here.
        It iz for us, the living, raather to be dedicated here to the
        unfinished wurk which they hoo faught here hav thus far so nobly
        advanced.  It is raather for us to be here dedicated to the greit
        task remaining before us -- that from this onnord ded we take
        increased devotion to that cauze for which they gave the last
        fooll mezure ov devotion; that we here highly rezolv that theze
        ded shall not hav died in vain; that this nation, under God,
        shall hav a new birth ov freedom; and that guvernment ov the peeple,
        by the peeple, for the peeple, shall not perish from the erth.

How hard is it going to be for you to read the British Reg.Ing. version,
which I will not spell out in detail but which uses "advaanced", "taask",
and "laast"?

And indeed, how hard will it be to read the original?  Not very, I submit.

> Ah.  Well, I sort of agree.  However, _igh_ *does* have a useful,
> *consistent* function as a way of indicating /aj/.  It helps, IMO, to
> have preserve distinctions between words like "write" and "right".
I agree.

> -ugh has no consistent function, and so it makes sense to drop it.
The Reg.Ing. rule "'gh' does not affect the pronunciation" is very simple.
Here are the Reg.Ing. spellings of words that are currently spelled with
"-ough":

/Aw/: bough, plough (or plow), slough, sough, doughty, drought (all unchanged);

/ow ~ @w/: do (for "dough"), tho, altho;

/Vf/: enuff, ruff, tuff, chuff, sluff (for "slough" meaning "shed skin");

/of/: coff, troff;

/O/: baught, braught, faught, aught, saught, thaught, wraught, naught;

/u/: thrue, bruam (for "brougham"), slue (for "slough" meaning "marsh");

/ok/: hock (for "hough");

/@ ~ ow/: burro, thurro, furlo;

/Vp/: hiccup.

--

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