Re: Language changes, spelling reform (was Conlangea Dreaming)

On Wed, 11 Oct 2000, Robert Hailman wrote:

> Yoon Ha Lee wrote:
> >
> Not me, that's for sure. All I know about Korean is that the writing
> system isn't really a syllabary, but it looks like one, and that Korean
> is spoken in Korea.
It's pretty alphabetical, but it isn't quite arranged linearly.  :-p

I have no idea what my conscript looks like to others, though I'd love to
hear from anyone who wants to venture opinions.  Like Korean, it's a
syllabically-arranged *alphabet* but it probably looks like logographs or
something funky from a distance.

Korean also is apparently spoken by Koreans living in Russia, China, and
Japan.  But it isn't exactly a popular language by world standards.

> I try to be well informed, but at the end of the day there are some
> things I know nothing about.
Goes for all of us...:-p

> > > Ah. I find it odd that speakers of languages such as Korean would accept
> > > these spelling reforms, but when a spelling reform is proposed for
> > > English, it's laughed at. I happen to like the current English spelling,
> >
> > Why is it odd?  <puzzled look>
>
> The odd thing is that the language that could (arguably) have the most
> use for a spelling reform is the one where it's least likely to happen.
Could be.  I dunno--I find I'm used enough to the spelling that it
doesn't bother me, and most of the time it amuses me.  I'm sure foreign
learners of English would like it, though.

> > I have no idea how I read English, just that it happens.  I can read up
> > to 1000 pages in a day (if all I do is read--if I'm also doing classes
> > and homework, 400-500 is more typical) so I do read very rapidly, but I
> > can't tell you how exactly it happens.  I do find that I don't process by
> > words, but by phrases or chunks of words.  The one time I took a reading
[snip]
> >
> That's pretty fast! I wish I could read anywhere near that fast. The
> only way I know I read by word recognition is that my eyesight isn't too
> great, and I find I can usually read from the board without being able
> to make out individual letters, and also in my own handwriting, the
> letters tend to run together somewhat, but I can still pick out words by
> their overall shape.
Fast reading has a few downsides...among other things, I run out of books
in the summer so quickly it isn't even funny.  <wry g>  (This was a
problem in Korea because the school library was closed during the summer....)

My eyesight is completely horrible.  My hand blurs some 6 inches from my
face when I'm not wearing glasses, but usually when I'm reading I hold
the book close so I don't have to guess.  For reading road signs, though
I have to resort to shapes and contours and guesswork (mostly guesswork
when unfamiliar names of cities and streets occur--things like Vly
Street).  That and a boyfriend with 15/20 vision.  <grumble>

> > I have had no respect for reading-speed tests ever since.  :-p
>
> I could see how that could happen.
>
> I have little respect for all types of tests, I never have.
Hate 'em myself, but I've never been able to convince anyone to let me
*not* take them.  Thankfully I've got the general GRE over with, and the
math GRE will be over with soon.  Exams in grad school sound like they
hurt, though....

YHL