Re: Advanced English to become official!

On Sunday, April 3, 2005, at 12:43 , Thomas Wier wrote:

> I thought I should give a response to this because Pascal
> can't just go on stating falsehoods about the English
> language and linguistics in general without some response.
> However, as most of us are already aware, Pascal seems
> incapable of critical reception to his work without launching
> into vitriolic ad hominem attacks, as evidenced today by
> his attack on Joe, and thus any response of his to this
> I will not honor with a counterresponse.
Quite - which has made me hesistant to respond to this thread. But, like
you, I feel some things Pascal has said do need comment:
[snip]

>>> -Curious: Why did you use "ae" for schwa, rather than "a",
>>> when you use "a" for carrot [V]?
>>
>> I chose this to distinct between normal a and schwa. The carrot
>> [V] is just a short a, so I wrote it as such.
This is demonstrably incorrect. In no dialect of english that I am aware
of (but then I've only been a native English speaker for 65+ years) is [V]
  just short a. Why the heck would IPA have separate symbols for [V] and [a]
  if they are the same?

In fact _many_ British varieties of English actually pronounce /&/ as [a],
like the short a in German 'Mann' - it is not the same as [V]. The phoneme
/V/ is actually pronounced with a variety of sounds ranging from [V] to [U]
  in Britain.

> In most dialects of English, including the English spoken by most
> nonnative speakers whose use you value so highly, there is no
> phonemic distinction the carrot [V] and the schwa [@].
Something we've debated more than once on Conlang. In RP of the SE England
_curry_ & _furry_ do not rhyme; /V/ and /@/ are not the same. But they are
in many dialects, including some Brit ones. I think a spelling reform
designed for _all_ English speakers should indicated the widest phonemic
inventory - and, of course, Pascal's scheme falls down badly in that
respect.
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On Sunday, April 3, 2005, at 01:20 , Christian Thalmann wrote:

> --- In conlang@yahoogroups.com, "Pascal A. Kramm" <pkramm@A...> wrote:
>
>> Well, then go and create your own spelling reform, rather than talking
>> someone else's work bad just because he's a "German".
>
> Sheesh, as if there hadn't been enough reform proposals
> already.
Quite so - it's like the auxlang market: supply far exceeds demand.

> Heck, even I've done two of those in my early
> conlang days.
Yep - I produced dozens of different English spellings reforms throughout
my teens and into my early twenties. I suspect most of the anglophone
members on this list have done so at some time or other.

> I'll have to agree with the general opinion that the
> proposed spelling is suboptimal for the needs of the
> English language.  You neglect several important phonemic
> distinctions, and some choices (like |ei eu| for [ai oi])
Spelling /Qi/ as _eu_ is about as counter-intuitive as one could get! The
traditional _oi_ is near to the actual IPA representation - and, I think,
is the way most non-anglophones would also expect it to be represented.

> appear to have no other motivation than to make it look
> like German.  In this light, the name "Advanced English"
..is a misnomer.

Would a spelling reform of German, based on a faulty analysis of German
phonology, the ignoring of "difficult" sounds (e.g. "We will not
distinguish between ü & u because they both 'sound the same'") and the
incorporation of some English eccentricities like spelling _mein_ as
'mighn' rightly be called "Advanced German"? I think not.
==============================================

In any case, how is English spelling reform Conlanging? Aren't there any
lists anywhere for those who want to investigate or propose English
spelling reforms?

Ray
===============================================
http://home.freeuk.com/ray.brown
ray.brown@freeuk.com
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Anything is possible in the fabulous Celtic twilight,
which is not so much a twilight of the gods
as of the reason."      [JRRT, "English and Welsh" ]

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