Alternative spelling

[Tom Zurinskas]

From
http://entertainment.timesonline.co.uk/tol/arts_and_entertainment/books/article4922834.ece

Alternative Spelling for French

"In the most sweeping linguistic reform in France for centuries, Le Petit Robert, the nation's premier dictionary, has cast aside tradition to allow alternative spellings for thousands of words. Accents have become optional, consonants can be doubled on a whim and hyphens will float in and out of literary texts under the changes imposed by Alain Rey, the linguist responsible for the opus.

He says that the reform has been necessary to enable a rigidly codified language to move forward in a society of slang and multi-ethnic innovation. “We have to make spelling simpler,” he said. “It's too complicated and it's not surprising that schoolchildren have trouble learning it.”

In an attempt to ease their task in schools that continue to impose weekly dictations, he has included variable spellings for 6,000 of the 60,000 words in his dictionary, including many of foreign, and notably English, origin. Cameraman, for instance, can be written with or without an acute accent over the “e” in Le Petit Robert 2009, published this month. Manager can be spelt manageur and acupuncture can be turned into acuponcture."

My comment is that the world needs one alternative spelling for all languages.  See truespel book one for the truespel alternative spelling of 14 languages.  Of course it should be phonetic, English based (the lingua franca of the world), and it should be email and computer friendly.

If languages are considering alternative spellings, truespel is the solution, and it's so simple third graders can learn it an hour.  It can be used to teach phonemic awareness to children, accent reduction to ESL learners.  Basically it's the next killer ap.  All dictionaries should be rewritten with truespel phonetic guides.  All translation guides should be rewritten in truespel.  All teaching manuals should use truespel for phonetics.  Finally, complete integration.

tom z
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