These guys don't approve a spelling reform but try to make one at their own. They're nerds.
You got it, Ronaldo. Good for you, buddy.
You got it, Ronaldo. Good for you, buddy.
spelling reform
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It's not a question of approving spelling reform, it's a question of caring about it.
And I just don't care.
And I just don't care.
http://comment.independent.co.uk/letters/article359783.ece
Published: 24 April 2006
English language needs reforming
Sir: Those who are adepts in the literacy skills necessary for active participation in society are often the most blind to the need for reforming our spelling system, while those who are without these skills tend to blame themselves.
Being an aggregate of about four European spelling systems English, with its contradictory rules and sub-rules, its extensive lists of irregular words and silent letters, takes years to learn, as correspondents to your letters page have pointed out. Anyone under the illusion that English orthography is systematic or easy to learn could usefully source the ideas of Benjamin Franklin, Charles Darwin, G B Shaw, Mark Twain and others.
In comparison with the regular and reformed European languages, English is eccentric and archaic. It has at least 11 ways to get the sh sound and 14 ways to make the -er sound at the ends of words; most and post rhyme with toast but are spelt like cost. In fact there are a ridiculous 600-plus different ways to make the 44 or so sounds in English: compare this to the 33 letter combinations in Italian. No wonder so many of our children are struggling.
Most modern European languages are the products of reforms: Finnish and Spanish seemed to have been reformed once a century (since the 18th century) and Italian started in 1610.
English, a world-language with the richest of vocabularies and the advantage of a simple grammar, is a shambles when it comes to spellings. It is overdue for a clean-up. Anglophone societies, with their high rates of prison incarceration and illiteracy, will go on incurring great costs while spelling remains in its dysfunctional state.
NIGEL HILTON
LONDON SE19
Published: 24 April 2006
English language needs reforming
Sir: Those who are adepts in the literacy skills necessary for active participation in society are often the most blind to the need for reforming our spelling system, while those who are without these skills tend to blame themselves.
Being an aggregate of about four European spelling systems English, with its contradictory rules and sub-rules, its extensive lists of irregular words and silent letters, takes years to learn, as correspondents to your letters page have pointed out. Anyone under the illusion that English orthography is systematic or easy to learn could usefully source the ideas of Benjamin Franklin, Charles Darwin, G B Shaw, Mark Twain and others.
In comparison with the regular and reformed European languages, English is eccentric and archaic. It has at least 11 ways to get the sh sound and 14 ways to make the -er sound at the ends of words; most and post rhyme with toast but are spelt like cost. In fact there are a ridiculous 600-plus different ways to make the 44 or so sounds in English: compare this to the 33 letter combinations in Italian. No wonder so many of our children are struggling.
Most modern European languages are the products of reforms: Finnish and Spanish seemed to have been reformed once a century (since the 18th century) and Italian started in 1610.
English, a world-language with the richest of vocabularies and the advantage of a simple grammar, is a shambles when it comes to spellings. It is overdue for a clean-up. Anglophone societies, with their high rates of prison incarceration and illiteracy, will go on incurring great costs while spelling remains in its dysfunctional state.
NIGEL HILTON
LONDON SE19
http://comment.independent.co.uk/letters/article360134.ece
'Rules' of spelling
Sir: Nigel Hilton (Letters, 24 April) is wrong in assuming that English spelling and grammar require mastery of a vast number of abstract "rules". Anyone who is comfortable with the language will confirm that their facility is based scarcely at all on learning more than a few such "rules". Rather, it is almost always the product of an appetite for reading from an early age. One does not learn to ride a bicycle by committing the laws of physics to memory.
DAVE RICHARDS
UCKFIELD, EAST SUSSEX
'Rules' of spelling
Sir: Nigel Hilton (Letters, 24 April) is wrong in assuming that English spelling and grammar require mastery of a vast number of abstract "rules". Anyone who is comfortable with the language will confirm that their facility is based scarcely at all on learning more than a few such "rules". Rather, it is almost always the product of an appetite for reading from an early age. One does not learn to ride a bicycle by committing the laws of physics to memory.
DAVE RICHARDS
UCKFIELD, EAST SUSSEX
Och..well..... I reckon Claire-Marie has a point about the spelling....but the rest of it? I see that she comes from ever so proper Tunbridge Wells.....now why does that not surprise me? Isn't that the home of the legendary "Disgusted"? She sounds to me like a lassie who would do best to stay there among the Pantiles.
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