AP: Spelling Bee protesters

[Mark Mandel]

It's not clear to me that phonological spelling would increase readability.
English is also less inflected than most other European languages, which
(WAG warning) may require more work of a reader to figure out the structure
of the sentence. And, as has been pointed out more times than I would like
to count, English has a LOT of homophones. With phonologically consistent
spelling these would become homographs as well, increasing the confusion.

m a m

On Fri, Jun 4, 2010 at 11:15 AM, Rick Barr <rickbarremail at gmail.com> wrote:

> There was a piece about English spelling in The Economist a few years ago.
> It may be this one, but its content is blocked so I couldn't double-check:
>
> http://www.economist.com/research/articlesBySubject/displaystory.cfm?subjectid=922074&story_id=E1_TTJNDRNJ
>
> It did say something relevant to this discussion, and it is that English
> takes longer to read than other European languages, precisely because of
> its
> hectic spelling. Of course, it is unthinkable to carry through an overhaul
> of English spelling. But the price paid in readability is something to take
> into account.
>
> -- Rick
>
>
> On Fri, Jun 4, 2010 at 10:23 AM, Joel S. Berson <Berson at att.net> wrote:
>
> > ---------------------- Information from the mail header
> > -----------------------
> > Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> > Poster:       "Joel S. Berson" <Berson at ATT.NET>
> > Subject:      Re: AP: Spelling Bee protesters
> >
> >
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> >
> > At 6/4/2010 04:47 AM, Tom Zurinskas wrote:
> > >In Finland there are no spelling bees.  Finnish spelling is simple,
> > >phonetic.  Simpler is better.
> >
> > But think of the fun they're all missing.
> >
> > Joel
>

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