I before E

[Herb Stahlke]

If I can equate "default" with "elsewhere," it seems odd that in this
case it's the marked EI, the form conditioned by a preceding <c>
and found in exceptions, that acts as the default.  I don't disagree
with your conclusion, but the behavior seems odd.

Herb
On Thu, Jun 25, 2009 at 1:59 PM, Arnold Zwicky<zwicky at stanford.edu> wrote:
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> Poster:       Arnold Zwicky <zwicky at STANFORD.EDU>
> Subject:      I before E
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>
> i've been comparing the American and British guidelines for IE vs. EI,
> using the amended version of the British guidelines i suggested in my
> last posting on the matter (in which EI is taken as the ultimate
> default).  as i said earlier, the British version usually given
> applies only to spellings of /i/ -- in which domain it works pretty
> well, with a relatively small list of exceptions:
>
> [in some varieties] either, neither; [for some speakers] leisure; [for
> some speakers] sheikh; seize; [for some speakers] weir; [for some
> speakers] weird; caffeine, casein, codeine, [when disyllabic] protein
>     (proper names, some examples:) Deirdre, Keith, Neil, Sheila
>
> as it turns out, taking EI to be the ultimate default does a lot of
> good work, since that covers a lot of exceptions to the American
> version.  it does pick up at least three exceptions of its own, with
> IE spelling a vowel other than /i/:
>   friend, handkerchief, mischief
>
> still, neither version covers a lot of territory, especially when you
> stick to reasonably common vocabulary, and both are fairly complex,
> with three clauses in each.
>
> arnold
>
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