Superfluous letters

[Gnug215]

The English alphabet is cluttered, and many words are not spelled intuitively.

We should fix this!

Or should we?

I've actually been thinking about this sometimes, and it came up in the chat just now.

So far, we've come up with a couple of suggestions:

Clearly, the "c" needs to go. It would be replased by "s" and "k" respektively.

We also konkluded that the "q" kould go. We are kurrently debating the "x", and are pretty sure it kould be thrown out, too.

We kwikly kame up with some eksamples that kould demonstrate the simplified spelling, but wondered if there was something we'd missed.

Kould we get rid of "c", "q" and "x"? Is there some word that we have no thought of that needs those letters?

We were having great fun with this, of kourse, but then Bluejay kame in with the voise of reason, asking what good this would do, and if it wouldn't kost a lot more than we kould ever gain from it.

I'm not really sure, but I suppose keyboards kould be around 1% smaller or so. That's gotta do something!

Any thoughts?

 

[bluejatheist]

Well this has been seen happening sort of. Such as American english dropping the u from Colour, or the dropping of the "ae" letter. Language will continue to evolve, and a gradual change will get the job done without costing money in terms of movements or efforts. English is noted for being a bastard child, the product of all sorts of elements taken from other languages, so it's not wonder it's complicated and has superfluous elements.

 

[Squawk]

The European Commission has just announced an agreement whereby English will be the official language of the EU rather than German which was the other possibility.

As part of the negotiations, Her Majesty's Government conceded that English spelling had some room for improvement and has accepted a five year phase-in plan that would be known as "Euro-English".

In the first year, "s" will replace the soft "c". Sertainly, this will make the sivil servants jump with joy. The hard "c" will be dropped in favour of the "k". This should klear up konfusion and keyboards kan have 1 less letter.

There will be growing publik enthusiasm in the sekond year, when the troublesome "ph" will be replaced with "f". This will make words like "fotograf" 20% shorter.

In the 3rd year, publik akseptanse of the new spelling kan be ekspekted to reach the stage where more komplikated changes are possible. Governments will enkorage the removal of double letters, which have always ben a deterent to akurate speling. Also, al wil agre that the horible mes of the silent "e"s in the language is disgraseful, and they should go away.

By the fourth year, peopl wil be reseptiv to steps such as replasing "th" with "z" and "w" with "v". During ze fifz year, ze unesesary "o" kan be dropd from vords kontaining "ou" and similar changes vud of kors be aplid to ozer kombinations of leters.

After zis fifz yer, ve vil hav a reli sensibl riten styl. Zer vil be no mor trubl or difikultis and evrivun vil find it ezi to understand ech ozer. Ze drem vil finali kum tru! And zen world!

 

[Duvelthehobbit666]

The European Commission has just announced an agreement whereby English will be the official language of the EU rather than German which was the other possibility.

As part of the negotiations, Her Majesty's Government conceded that English spelling had some room for improvement and has accepted a five year phase-in plan that would be known as "Euro-English".

In the first year, "s" will replace the soft "c". Sertainly, this will make the sivil servants jump with joy. The hard "c" will be dropped in favour of the "k". This should klear up konfusion and keyboards kan have 1 less letter.

There will be growing publik enthusiasm in the sekond year, when the troublesome "ph" will be replaced with "f". This will make words like "fotograf" 20% shorter.

In the 3rd year, publik akseptanse of the new spelling kan be ekspekted to reach the stage where more komplikated changes are possible. Governments will enkorage the removal of double letters, which have always ben a deterent to akurate speling. Also, al wil agre that the horible mes of the silent "e"s in the language is disgraseful, and they should go away.

By the fourth year, peopl wil be reseptiv to steps such as replasing "th" with "z" and "w" with "v". During ze fifz year, ze unesesary "o" kan be dropd from vords kontaining "ou" and similar changes vud of kors be aplid to ozer kombinations of leters.

After zis fifz yer, ve vil hav a reli sensibl riten styl. Zer vil be no mor trubl or difikultis and evrivun vil find it ezi to understand ech ozer. Ze drem vil finali kum tru! And zen world!

And thus we will speak german engish.

 

[Prolescum]

Nice, Squawk. :lol:

 

[Gnug215]

The European Commission has just announced an agreement whereby English will be the official language of the EU rather than German which was the other possibility.

As part of the negotiations, Her Majesty's Government conceded that English spelling had some room for improvement and has accepted a five year phase-in plan that would be known as "Euro-English".

In the first year, "s" will replace the soft "c". Sertainly, this will make the sivil servants jump with joy. The hard "c" will be dropped in favour of the "k". This should klear up konfusion and keyboards kan have 1 less letter.

There will be growing publik enthusiasm in the sekond year, when the troublesome "ph" will be replaced with "f". This will make words like "fotograf" 20% shorter.

In the 3rd year, publik akseptanse of the new spelling kan be ekspekted to reach the stage where more komplikated changes are possible. Governments will enkorage the removal of double letters, which have always ben a deterent to akurate speling. Also, al wil agre that the horible mes of the silent "e"s in the language is disgraseful, and they should go away.

By the fourth year, peopl wil be reseptiv to steps such as replasing "th" with "z" and "w" with "v". During ze fifz year, ze unesesary "o" kan be dropd from vords kontaining "ou" and similar changes vud of kors be aplid to ozer kombinations of leters.

After zis fifz yer, ve vil hav a reli sensibl riten styl. Zer vil be no mor trubl or difikultis and evrivun vil find it ezi to understand ech ozer. Ze drem vil finali kum tru! And zen world!

Hehe, that's ooold, and I knew about it when I made this thread.

But I'm actually being serious, although not suggesting anything as radical as this.

Mostly just getting rid of "c", "q" and "x".

I was asking people for examples of where these letters would prove to be indispensible, and as it turns out I kinda found one.

"Advice" as opposed to "Advise".

Does anyone have other examples?

 

[bluejatheist]

The European Commission has just announced an agreement whereby English will be the official language of the EU rather than German which was the other possibility.

As part of the negotiations, Her Majesty's Government conceded that English spelling had some room for improvement and has accepted a five year phase-in plan that would be known as "Euro-English".

In the first year, "s" will replace the soft "c". Sertainly, this will make the sivil servants jump with joy. The hard "c" will be dropped in favour of the "k". This should klear up konfusion and keyboards kan have 1 less letter.

There will be growing publik enthusiasm in the sekond year, when the troublesome "ph" will be replaced with "f". This will make words like "fotograf" 20% shorter.

In the 3rd year, publik akseptanse of the new spelling kan be ekspekted to reach the stage where more komplikated changes are possible. Governments will enkorage the removal of double letters, which have always ben a deterent to akurate speling. Also, al wil agre that the horible mes of the silent "e"s in the language is disgraseful, and they should go away.

By the fourth year, peopl wil be reseptiv to steps such as replasing "th" with "z" and "w" with "v". During ze fifz year, ze unesesary "o" kan be dropd from vords kontaining "ou" and similar changes vud of kors be aplid to ozer kombinations of leters.

After zis fifz yer, ve vil hav a reli sensibl riten styl. Zer vil be no mor trubl or difikultis and evrivun vil find it ezi to understand ech ozer. Ze drem vil finali kum tru! And zen world!

Hehe, that's ooold, and I knew about it when I made this thread.

But I'm actually being serious, although not suggesting anything as radical as this.

Mostly just getting rid of "c", "q" and "x".

I was asking people for examples of where these letters would prove to be indispensible, and as it turns out I kinda found one.

"Advice" as opposed to "Advise".

Does anyone have other examples?

Really and Rely?

 

[Lallapalalable]

Well this has been seen happening sort of. Such as American english dropping the u from Colour, or the dropping of the "ae" letter. Language will continue to evolve, and a gradual change will get the job done without costing money in terms of movements or efforts. English is noted for being a bastard child, the product of all sorts of elements taken from other languages, so it's not wonder it's complicated and has superfluous elements.

My thoughts exactly. With any luck, we'll be writing in 'text-script' in no time *(not sarcasm). I can push it further, and suggest that we bring back diacritical marks (or just bring them? I dont know the history of English all too well) in order to cut out several others, eg W and Y.

However, I do see the use in them, especially in determining the etymology and applying nuanced pronunciations (very helpful for improving your accents ;D ). Probably they will go the way of the ash tree, and be used only in transliteration and dictionaries.

 

[Gnug215]

Hehe, that's ooold, and I knew about it when I made this thread.

But I'm actually being serious, although not suggesting anything as radical as this.

Mostly just getting rid of "c", "q" and "x".

I was asking people for examples of where these letters would prove to be indispensible, and as it turns out I kinda found one.

"Advice" as opposed to "Advise".

Does anyone have other examples?

Really and Rely?

Well, at this point I'm specifically (spesifikally?) looking for examples with "c", "q" and "x".

 

[Noth]

The C

Using a 'c' in spelling rather than an 's' largely stems from and contributes to difference in pronunciation as well as well as the length of the spoken word.

In your example (/ig'za:mpl/) 'advise' is a longer word than 'advice' because the 'soft' s pronunciation of 'advice' shortens the i sound that comes before it. Conversely, the 'z' pronunciation of the s in 'advise' determines that the i sound is stretched/lengthened.

A c in spelling is never a z in pronunciation (if I'm wrong, please give me an example ), so rather than having all c's in spelling become k's or s's, you'd have to change a lot into zed's as well

The X

An x in spelling conforms to either a k and s combination in pronunciation, or a g and a z depending on whether it's followed by a consonant or by a stressed vowel sound. (There is an exception - /ik'sepʃən/ - I believe, but I can't recall which word).
Whenever it's followed by a stressed vowel sound (the stress is on igZAmpl), such as in 'example', the x is pronounced gz (and the e is pronounced as a short i). However when it's followed by an unstressed vowel sound, such as in buxom (stess is on BUX) or exorcism, the x is a ks in pronunciation: /'bʌksəm/ , /'eksəsizm/
If the x is followed by a consonant sound the role is similar to when it's followed by an unstressed vowel sound. It does not matter, in the case of consonants, whether this consonant sound (or rather, the syllable it begins) is stressed or not.
In both export and extortion the x is pronounced ks: /'ekspɔːt/ , /ik'stɔːʃən/

(Note, btw, that in the above example or 'exception' the c is the determining consonant which ensures it is pronounced 'ks' rather than 'gz', even though we might seem to think the 's' sound is already ingrained into the x. It is not. For reference, exempt, which has no c, has 'igz' in pronunciation: /ig'zempt/

All in all, you could say it's possible to change the x in spelling into a ks or a gz if you like, but you would then soon need to follow that by further additions and substractions

*edit: a minor exception I found is Xylene: /zaɪl'iːn/ in which the x is pronounced 'z' and not e.g. 'gz'

The Q

In short, similar to the x, the q is pronounced differently depending on the phonetic context of the word it's in, which part of the word it's in, whether it's at the beginning of a syllable or the end, etc. etc.

In continuation of the aforementioned (funny) sentiments it would be a "kwestion of whether to 'laik likÉ™' or not to 'like liquor' " xD :lol:

 

[Master_Ghost_Knight]

The c and q I can totally understand. However I do not agree on the X, but then again I come from a culture where X is pronounced completely different from that of English (closer to the sh as in should), in fact it falls on the same group as nh and lh (that should deserve their own character) but frankly I have never heard an English person being able to pronounce them even after allot of practice. R has also 2 distinct sounds conflated into 1 (one of them you know and use, the other I don't think you can pronounce it either). The other suggestions like Z to replace th is frankly absurd because they have different pronunciation, however th for t would not that much of a stretch.
The W would be redundant if you could just pronounce the U properly. Or whats up with "e" sometimes sounding like an "i" and and "i" sounding like a "y" which in turn sounds like ai?

Te initiative to make a klearer language iz komendable, I don't find language to bi sakred and it (sh)xould bi subjekt to revise in order to fulfill the roll ui ekspect from it, i.e. to provide a klear and eazi form of komunication and not bi konvoluted or prone to konfuzion. It mai apear stranje nou becauze iu are old sods not uzed to urite and read tis uai, but tere is noting fundamentali urong uid it.

 

[Case]

Taking a "naturally grown" language and trying to make it logical or even consistent is a sisyphus task.

But it would be an interesting challenge to create a language that is not only internally consistent, logical and unambiguous but also efficient (easily comprehensible).

 

[CommonEnlightenment]

Taking a "naturally grown" language and trying to make it logical or even consistent is a sisyphus task.

Ahh yes.....

But perhaps he will not go chasing after the rock. He will just sit atop the mountain and watch from a distance. Or perhaps he will 'chase' after the rock..... Only time will tell, I suppose.

 

[Laurens]

I think you can get by just using 'm'.

Mmmmmmmmmmmmm

Mmmm?

Mm

 

[Dean]

You could just more-or-less betwix* English with languages where pronunciation is a bit more easy, at least to some degree, such as Dutch.

While there is nothing inherently wrong with it,it looks from the introductory post that it's just an attempt to remove the 'silent characters (letters)' from English, which are pretty trivial, and not in any sense difficult to learn in my opinion. I just can't see much point to it. It becomes natural to one anyways, once you've been learning it for a sufficient amount of time ...

Languages evolve, so maybe it'll develop like this anyway ...
[showmore=But]I doubt it.[/showmore]

Also: some wider perspective.

*Neologism, meaning 'two' of something intertwined ...

 

[Lallapalalable]

I was thinking about this recently, and besides letters themselves there are a few other elements of English that I would approve dropping from the official set, one of those being capitol and lowercase letters. Why not have just one set of 26 letters/symbols? A lot of columns and web-related publications I have noticed use all caps in the headers, but when the need for a capitol letter arises they simply change the font size a step or two, i.e.:

WHEN THE HISTORIC AUTHOR GEOFFREY CHAUCER ATE BRUNCH IN LONDON, HE PREFERRED TO DO SO BEFORE A NUDE AUDIENCE OF STRANGERS*.

I could argue that we apply the same to lowercase and eliminate the capitol set, but doing it this way eliminates the need for extra space below the writing line that some letters need, like j, allowing just ever so slightly more letters per square foot (yes its a real measurement) than before. Couple that with fewer symbols to learn and thus less time spent in important developmental stages teaching kids to read and write, finally bringing us a future generation of geniuses who cure our ailments and design our space mansions. But that's a liberal estimate.

*not historically accurate

 

[tuxbox]

Well this has been seen happening sort of. Such as American english dropping the u from Colour, or the dropping of the "ae" letter. Language will continue to evolve, and a gradual change will get the job done without costing money in terms of movements or efforts. English is noted for being a bastard child, the product of all sorts of elements taken from other languages, so it's not wonder it's complicated and has superfluous elements.

That is because Noah Webster was a pretentious asshat.

 

[CEbbesen]

Clearly, the "c" needs to go. It would be replased by "s" and "k" respektively.

Why do you hate me?

 

[Visaki]

Why do you hate me?

B too. That letter is totally useless.