Word division in American dictionaries

[Rudolph C Troike]

Fred Tarpley some years ago did a very revealing comparison of hyphenation
practices in American dictionaries. I don't know where it was published,
as I heard him give it at a conference in East Texas. It is worth
accessing if available.
        I suspect that the genesis of the insistence on the practice in
American as opposed to British dictionaries goes back to Noah Webster,
whose "blue-backed speller" emphasized "syllable division" for spelling
practice. The confusion between "syllable" in speech and writing is simply
a reflection of our historic confusion of these, which still reigns
supreme in American classrooms despite over 50 years of efforts by
linguists to change the situation.

        Rudy