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Hackers, Spelling, and Grammar?
Strom Carlson asks: "Over the last few years, I've noticed that a surprisingly large number of native English speakers, who are otherwise very technically competent, seem to lack strong English skills. Mostly, this seems to manifest itself as varying degrees of poor spelling and grammar: 'definately' instead of 'definitely'; 'should of' instead of 'should have'; and I even see the names of products and companies misspelled from time to time. It baffles me that a culture so obsessed with technical knowledge and accuracy can demonstrate such little attention to detail when it comes to communicating that knowledge with others, and it baffles me even more that many people become enraged when you attempt to help them correct and learn from their mistakes. Do hackers and geeks just not care about communicating effectively? Do they not realize that a mediocre command of written English makes them appear less intelligent? Am I missing something here?"
Can...open...worms... everywhere.
I for one cannot agree with you enough here, Strom. Sadly, the epidemic of poor spelling/grammar is not confined to the tech world, but is pervasive throughout just about every aspect of American culture. I was raised and educated to believe that spelling and grammar counted...that the coherent presentation of your information was at least as important as the information itself. I don't know exactly when we as a society decided that coherence was no longer important...sometime in the mid-eighties, I'd guess.
I will agree with you, however, that this problem is especially apparent in the tech world. I've known many techs that not only didn't care about the rules of the English language, they actually regarded their ignorance of such rules as a perverse badge of honor, as if mastering the intricacies of the language was somehow beneath them. I've always found it intriguing that a programmer who could master several arcane computer languages (especially since computers are notably intolerant of errors), could fail so utterly to master his own native human language.
____
~ |rip/\/\aster /\/\onkey
Definately.
"Simplify, simplify, simplify!" Thoreau
As someone who is constantly picked on by these people, I can say that more than often, they are rude, have very little to add to any discussion, other than showing off their impressive command of the English language. I'd be more receptive if some of them made their response to the thread at hand, and did a BTW, but that's not what happens. Usually they are just have one line response that is rude, and often picking on one or two 'mistakes', and always critical of one's intelligence. I've said it before, but it's not the diction that matters, but the message. Good grammer is only helpful to get a message across. I'm not writing a fucking paper, it's an response in a damn forum.
Yes, good humor, understanding, and basic people skills.The force that blew the Big Bang continues to accelerate.
Hands up if you read through the paragraphs several times trying to find a mistake!
Technical precision requirement on programming language and human language is very different, for I am (and maybe many others are) extremely lazy and just want to get things done with as little effort as possible.
So if "return true;" works but not "ret tru", then I'm forced to use "return true;" every time.
However, if "alot" works as good as "a lot", I can use whatever comes to up mind at time of typing. When I was in highschool, few of us liked to say "os cof" in place of "of course" and it didn't affect our communication at all.
I think the main difference between a native English speaker and a foreign English user is the former heard a word before he learnt to write it, while the latter tends to learn to write and speak at the same time.
I'm shocked to see natives using "its good", "don't go their", these are mistakes that no foreigners will make.
I'm not sure why this has anything to do with hackers or geeks specificially. Racers, police and builders are all technically competent yet they can still make these kind of mistakes.
Rock that crushes, Paper & Scissors that don't matter.
Talk about your flamebate!
I watched C-beams glitter in the dark near the Tannhauser gate.
At georgia tech there is a road named Ferst street. Naturally the running joke is that they misspelled First Street.
HuKt aWn FoNix WerKt fer mE.
It doesn't help that English spelling is such a mess. In order to really know how to map sounds to spelling, one needs to (perhaps unconsciously) learn a number of rules corrisponding to the bewildering number of languages that have been borrowed from in constructing American (or British, or Australian, or ...) English. Somehow we all manage, more or less, to do it, but it's worth noting that in a lot of other languages, it's a lot harder to misspell words, and spelling bees seem somewhat humourous.
For every problem, there is at least one solution that is simple, neat, and wrong.
Uh,
What is this 'correct English' of which you speak? Can you send me a copy of the official English language handbook? No. Hrm. Well maybe you could direct me to the official governing body of the English language. You mean, French has one and English doesn't?
Bugger!
Then, how do we know what correct English is? You mean, 'correct' English is by definition 'common' English?! No! But then what will all those semi-intelligent pedants who haven't caught on to the fact that 'should have' is no more meaningful than 'should of', but that 'should of' is much more common in spoken English do? Who knows!
All I can say is that having worked in the publishing industry, you could tell the people who had little intelligence but a lot to prove by how frequently and strongly they misunderstood the fact that there is no 'correct' English, and jumped down the throats of those they perceived to not have as good a grasp on this 'correct' English as they did.
+Pete
Score:-1, Funny
On this subject, why do people resort to phrases like "u", "ur", "l8r", "plz", etc? You have a full keyboard, use it. Shortening a 5 letter word down to 3 saves very little time, and makes you look like a big idiot. I don't even like it in SMS messages: on my phone, and most I've seen, I have a "t9" input. To say "hello", for example, you type 43556. It automatically figures out what word you're trying to spell, and there's a "next" button if it gets it wrong. Very rarely I have to switch to alpha input to type a word it doesn't know.
Now, what really pisses me off is I bought a USB analog video capture device today. I didn't notice until I got back, but it actually says on the front: "DVD Direct Burn. No need to save in ur HDD". Seriously. I'm not sure I would have bought it if I noticed that earlier..
Speak before you think
Seriously though, I think being taught phonix(sp? lol) as a child really hendered my spelling capabilities because so many words are spelled in ways they shouldn't...
"A truly wise man realizes he knows nothing."
I am not a perfect speller. Occasionally I may misplace a comma or semi-colon. It bothers me when I misspell a word on a forum or document that matters. (i.e. A report for work) It bothers me less, or not at all to make these minor errors in a forum like /.
When I am posting here, I am giving my opinion on a topic. The content is what is important. I feel this is the wrong forum for your 'corrections' and 'suggestions.' It breaks the flow of the discussion. It has nothing to do with the topic being discussed, and makes you sound like a show off intellectual.
Frankly, I really dont want your critique of my grammar and spelling skills. If the post is intelligible or the error changes the meaning of the post significantly, then there's your time to jump in with your corrections. Otherwise, it just seems arrogant that folks like you feel free to offer your unsolicited advice and expect me to appreciate it.
There is nothing so powerful as an idea whose time has come.
I'll play devil's advocate. The purpose of language is communication, and the standardization of such is to ensure against ambiguity, right? If someone's written work is devoid of some common rules of grammar and usage, does it matter if you completely and unambiguously understand what they are saying/writing?
I try to use the rules, but if I understand you, what else matters?
un burrito me trampeó.
I've seen this issue raised numerous times over the past several years... hell, I've brought it up in random conversation quite a bit...
But...
The question that I've *never* heard asked...
Is America the only country where the native language is so disappointingly mangled by the vast majority of native citizens?
The funny/sad thing is when an American will gripe about a foreigner verbally mangling English... yet that same American most likely can't even speak a 2nd language... let alone speak it fluently. Bah.
Seriously though, I think being taught phonix(sp? lol) as a child really hendered my spelling capabilities because so many words are spelled in ways they shouldn't...
The above sentence made me cry.
Video Phone Blogs send video messages straight to the web.
And everyone who reads it will understand that you are of below average intelligence, and will treat you accordingly.
If you communicate like a moron, you are treated like a moron.
If you don't like that, don't reply, since I'm acting like an arrogant, elitist bastard, but I want you to treat me like a friendly, helpful mentor.
-- I care not for your foolish signatures.
I tihnk taht seplnilg rellay deosnt matetr at all. For exmalpe, I bet taht you can raed tihs precfcetly fnie.
I bieelve it was proevn that as lnog as the frist and lsat lettres do not chnage, our brians can aoutomtacalily rearragne tehm and we have full comhenpresion.
I cnnaot fnid the lnik rgiht now but I am srue taht tihs was psoted on salhsodt a few mnoths ago.
Bet this
You are wrong. It will never take hold for one simple reason: the words don't make sense together. "Of" is not a verb; "have" is. Common usage or not, it will never logically make sense. "Should of" almost certainly stems from phonetically spelling "should've" ("should have"). Even in speaking, therefore, it never occurs.
English is a living language, why do i care if "should have" is technically correct according to some english professor somewhere. "should of" is common usage, and in the long term the common usage will win out (once the grammar police die out from old age).
What a strange logic: it's like saying "most people round 100/3 to 33, it's common usage, so when the math police die out of old age, the common usage will win out".
That's stupid because 100/3 != 33, it's completely incorrect, just like "should of" makes absolutely no sense. The only reason most people understand "should of" as "should have" is because they know the correct form is "should have".
"A door is what a dog is perpetually on the wrong side of" - Ogden Nash
You know, the thing about that is... proper spelling and grammar make the writer look more "grown up". A tpyo or two are one thing, but if the grammar and spelling are at an eighth-grade level, I tend to assume that the writer is in the eighth grade. I'm always on the side of the grammar nazis on slashdot (even when they get me) because really poor grammar (from an otherwise obvious native English speaker) tend to make me discount the opinion of the poster. Although the grammar nazi victim may not think this is fair, I know I'm not alone... and you'd think that the poster would want to improve his/her writing skills just to make his/her opinions, thoughts, rantings, etc. more valuable to others.
Proud neuron in the Slashdot hivemind since 2002.
Actually, you are wrong.
"should of" is not the common usage.
"should've" is the common usage - which is a contraction of "should have"
However, some people, having only heard "should've" and mis-heard it as "should of", think that "should of" is the common usage.
www.eFax.com are spammers
The problem is that spelling is completely arbitrary. America obsessed about spelling in post-colonial times and came up with standard dictionaries. Britain didn't care.
We should throw out the old spelling. Knight is spelled the way it is because it used to be pronounced kuh-nig-it (yes, just like monty python). All it does is confuse everyone. With its odd mix of Latin and Anglo-Saxon words and grammar rules it's complicated enough as it is without weirdo spellings that are unrelated to pronunciation.
That being said though, the above sentence made me cry as well.
What is slashdot but a bunch of intellectuals (or intellectual wannabes) showing off to each other?
As for sounding like an intellectual - spelling errors can make you look like a retard. What do you prefer?
I try to use the rules, but if I understand you, what else matters?
I think of it like a stuck pixel on an LCD around the edge of the screen. During normal use you wouldn't even notice it; the monitor works fine, you can watch movies, play games, surf the net... but in the back of your mind that monitor is still broken.
Poor spelling or grammar still gets the point across. Though, if the reader notices it lingers in the back of their mind and detracts from your message.
D6 63 0D 70 89 81 BB 8E 7B 7C 5F 5D 54 EA AB 73
> a quick proofread
But... but if we proofread how will we get FP?!
- For the complete works of Shakespeare: cat
(i.e. A report for work)
;-) (Sorry to pick on you.)
e g.html, or http://ancienthistory.about.com/od/abbreviations/f /ievseg.htm. (Note the use of "e.g." for "for example.")
Here's another thing that bothers me about common usage.
The abbreviation "i.e." does not mean "for example."
Repeat after me:
The abbreviation "i.e." does not mean "for example."
The abbreviation "i.e." does not mean "for example."
The abbreviation "i.e." does not mean "for example."
The abbreviation to use if you mean "for example" is "e.g.". The abbreviation "i.e." stands for (the Latin of) "that is."
I.e., "i.e." is used when you are rephrasing, clarifying, etc. what was already said. The sentence "i.e. A report for work", if taken literally, means that the only documents that matter to you are reports for work.
For more information, see, e.g., http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/8707/52862, http://www.planetoid.org/grammar_for_geeks/ie_vs_
(Sorry, I go on this rant periodically. Don't take it personally.)
An easy way to remember this:
i.e. - in explanation
e.g. - example given
How in the world is spelling properly oppressive to minorities?
Tin foil hat time, man.
One common hacker trait is an utter disdain for things that are deliberately illogical. The problem is that the standards of language often are illogical and yet enforced anyway. It's clear that the intent of English was to have a langauge where the letters record the sound of the word. But it failed miserably at it due to merging in words from different languages and now spelling in English is an utterly illogical mess. So it's not surprising that hackers wouldn't really care to spell things by the standard. To do so you have to fight against what is logical.
Then there's the grammar standards of where punctuation marks are used. The comma was invented to just indicate an audio pause in speech. Then later on anal people changed it to only being usable under specific circumstances - Again, For, No, Reason.
Then there's the confusion over whether or not the quote marks are supposed to accurately quote what is inside them or not. I'd say that only things that are part of what is being quoted belong inside the quotes. Punctuation that is an artifact of the fact that the quote got pasted into another sentence are part of that external sentence, NOT part of the quoted material - so they logically belong outside the quote marks. For example:
Logical, but incorrect according to standard:
"Hello", John said.
Did John say, "Hello"?
Illogical, but correct according to standard:
"Hello," John said. (The comma isn't part of the quote dammit)
Did John say, "Hello?" (The question mark is there because of the sentence the "Hello" is pasted inside of, NOT because it is part of the "Hello" that John might have said. This allegedly correct way looks, to me, like the question is aksing whether John spoke "Hello" in a questioning tone, because the question mark ended up inside the quoted part.
According to standard, a question asked in the negative isn't really asked in the negative. "Aren't you coming with us", should logically be answerable by saying "Yes I am not coming with you". But the expected interpretation is the inverse of that. Again, the standard is at odds with logic.
Most people look at stuff like that and don't care. People who think logically get fed up with crap like that and rebell.
Don't label something "offtopic" unless you know the topic well enough to tell what's on topic.
I meant to add:
There is also the issue of ease of understanding. Any text is written just once, it is however, likely to be read multiple times by multiple readers. Shouldn't the author try to ease the workload of the readership?
Finally, consider the following quote: "As long as you completely understand them, does it matter if a person breaks common rules of grammar and usage?" transformed thus:
"As long as the page renders correctly in my browser does it matter if the HTML fails to conform to the DTD?"
Doesn't that make you shudder?
I'm a techie who is presumably competent in English; I've got published fiction and card-carrying status with a professional writers association. But my prose is hardly flawless on a first draft typed at 60 words/minute, and that's the style of communication on free-for-all boards like /. and most web venues.
Unsolicited correction of someone's English on the web is like stepping up to fellow customers in a clothes store and suggesting ways to improve their current wardrobe. Sure, you might be more fashion-savvy, but you'd still be arrogant.
I try to use the rules, but if I understand you, what else matters?
The problem is when non-native speakers are taught the meaning of "should have" and never EVER have had contact with the completely illogical term "should of". I'm saying this because i couldn't understand what my friend tried to tell me whenever he said "should of". I'm not saying it was difficult to understand him. I'm saying i could NOT understand him AT ALL. I didn't know if he missed a word, and only after the third time he tried to explain, i caught the meaning.
You call this EFFECTIVE COMMUNICATION? I don't think so.
Why should non-native speakers have to LEARN a WHOLE NEW LANGUAGE that is not even english? Shouldn't native english speakers learn ENGLISH in the first place?
Poor grammar does NOT help communication between people of different countries. And the fact that english is the universal language today is only by chance. Remember latin was universal 1000 years ago.
"I dislike the French because because they do not speak English, but I abhor the Americans because they speak English badly."
-Winston Churchill.
Aide-toi, le Ciel t'aidera - Jeanne D'Arc.
If someone's written work is devoid of some common rules of grammar and usage, does it matter if you completely and unambiguously understand what they are saying/writing?
Well, the first problem is that you are begging the question: why do you think it is possible to write clearly and unambiguously without recourse to conventional spelling, grammar, and usage? I think this is a highly doubtful proposition, because even clear and correct writing is often ambiguous. When I do understand bad writing, it is because I am smarter and have worked harder than the person who wrote it (remember, we are talking about native speakers, not geniuses who don't know the language.) Then too, bad writing is rude because it conveys the implicit message that time you save in writing is worth more than time I save in reading. But why do you think I should bother to read something you can't be bothered to write?
I think you are also mistaken in assuming that the only drawback of bad writing is that other people can't understand you. Literacy is a system, and if you are a bad writer you are unlikely to be a very good reader. Consider the locution I employed in my first paragraph: "begging the question." This phrase derives from a meaning of "begging" that is no longer current, namely "taking for granted." Because this is an antiquated meaning, many people interpret the phrase as "begging for the question." What's wrong with that? After all, language is continuously changing. Certainly. But if you don't even know the old meaning, and make a point of refusing to learn it, you have cut yourself off from the writings of earlier generations; writings that in many cases are more interesting than what you have to say now (that, after all, is why they have been preserved.) For my part, I believe that most people who misuse phrases like this do so in ignorance and are tacitly acknowledging my point: they have adopted the phrase, without understanding it, in hopes that by emulating better writing, their own will be more favourably received.
"The good reader is a rarer swan than the good writer."
Rosencrantz: Do you think Death could possibly be a boat?
Guildenstern: No, no, no... Death is "not." Death isn't. Take my meaning? Death is the ultimate negative. Not-being. You can't not be on a boat.
Rosencrantz: I've frequently not been on boats.
Guildenstern: No, no... What you've been is not on boats.
-Tom Stoppard, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are dead.
Aide-toi, le Ciel t'aidera - Jeanne D'Arc.
Your text is your voice. It doesn't convey information about what you said, it conveys information about you --- it's the equivalent of your accent. If you write sloppily, you'll sound as if you're speaking sloppily, which means that people will associate what you said with sloppiness, which is probably not what you want if you want to be taken seriously...
I know it shouldn't happen, but it does, in just the same way that people associated educated accents with intelligence and working-class accents with stupidity.
Personally, I don't think you have a problem --- you come across coherently and precisely and you're not slurring at all. However, uh... I think in that last sentence you might have meant 'unintelligable'...
The problem with changing spellings is that the more we do it, the less the current generation can comprehend writings from the past. Isn't it nice that we can still read Shakespeare's works 400 years after they were published? But writings just 200 years before that, such as Chaucer's, are very difficult to read because there wasn't a yet standardized language. The reason there was no standardization during Chaucer's time, though, was because it was difficult for language to travel long distances. Hence it did not become standardized across regions. But now that we have television, and the Internet, it would be a shame if we changed our language. It would move us away from our cultural heritage linguistically.
my blog
I agree!! For example, in Year 1 that useless letter "c" would be dropped to be replased either by "k" or "s", and likewise "x" would no longer be part of the alphabet. The only kase in which "c" would be retained would be the "ch" formation, which will be dealt with later. Year 2 might reform "w" spelling, so that "which" and "one" would take the same konsonant, wile Year 3 might well abolish "y" replasing it with "i" and Iear 4 might fiks the "g/j" anomali wonse and for all. Jenerally, then, the improvement would kontinue iear bai iear with Iear 5 doing awai with useless double konsonants, and Iears 6-12 or so modifaiing vowlz and the rimeining voist and unvoist konsonants. Bai Iear 15 or sou, it wud fainali bi posibl tu meik ius ov thi ridandant letez "c", "y" and "x" -- bai now jast a memori in the maindz ov ould doderez -- tu riplais "ch", "sh", and "th" rispektivli. Fainali, xen, aafte sam 20 iers ov orxogrefkl riform, wi wud hev a lojikl, kohirnt speling in ius xrewawt xe Ingliy-spiking werld. -Mark Twain
There are no rules, only patterns. Grammatical rules are misleading. Langauges evolve. They have evolved from the ground up and continue to change. The "rules" at the moment represent the normative usage at this time. So it seems sort of silly to teach English "rules," but it is the best way to express the common English code to English-language-learners. In other words, "You ought to follow these rules if you want to be understood."
Language is in the mouths of the people, not the pages of the dictionary and grammar book. Usage by English speakers defines the language. That is why new words and grammatical constructions and figures of speech and idioms pop up and fall away all the time.
The purpose of language is communication. The reason we talk is so that we can communicate with one another. When someone says "should of" instead of "should have," most seasoned English speakers understand exactly what that phrase means. Communication has happened, and the language has served its purpose. This happens all the time in common English. Example: Goodbye. I do not attack people who use this nonsensical grammatically poor word. You see, it originates from "God be with ye." Goodbye is an obvious grammatical distortion that has taken hold as a normative part of English language. So will "should of" as has "aint" as done as well.
It is silly to get mad at someone for not following the "rules" of English if you know exactly what they mean.
Sure, Slashdot is a conversational forum, and people write "from the hip" without absolute consideration to their spelling. But come on
How am I supposed to take anything someone says seriously, when their text is riddled with grammatical errors that my 14 year old nephew mastered years ago.
Native English speakers who can't express themselves without making childish mistakes like that, just appear thick! And it devalues anything of real importance they may have to say.
Have you also considered that if you practice spelling correctly all the time, then you're less likely to screw up when it really matters?
According to your own argument , minimizing a person's intellect based on their tendency to minimize another person's intellect is therefore also a form of racism, and you too are guilty of tying two unrelated concepts together to diminish a person's worth.
So, either you're wrong, a racist, or a hypocrite.
Could you clarify for us by letting us know which?
Based on your numerous spelling and grammar errors, I'm gleefully jumping on your minimization bandwagon and am guessing that you're merely wrong (which means neither of us are therefore necessarily racist! yay!) though I haven't ruled out hypocrite yet.
The article is based on a flawed premise.
Look at Linus Torvalds, James Yonan, Guido van Rossum, Donald Knuth; all of these people have outstanding communication skills. It's merely the wannabes and hangers-on whose skills are inadequate -- and arguably, such individuals aren't really part of the community at all.
Indeed, I distinctly recall it having been noted decades ago that there was a disproportionate number of English majors in the computing community. Perhaps someone will have a source?
Some of these drive me nuts. "Walla" when Voilá is meant, for example.
Bullshit! That's short for "ergo"!
The moment I posted that, I remembered an even more appropriate quote:
Guildenstern: The old man thinks he's in love with his daughter.
Rosencrantz: Good God. We're out of our depths here.
Guildenstern: No, no, no! He hasn't got a daughter! The old man thinks he's in love with his daughter.
Rosencrantz: The old man is?
Guildenstern: Hamlet... in love... with the old man's daughter... the old man... thinks.
Rosencrantz: Ah.
I wonder what Stoppard would make of the debate here? Something amusing, probably.
Aide-toi, le Ciel t'aidera - Jeanne D'Arc.
"Should", "Could" and "Would" don't have ANY tense.
A: "What do you want to to do tonight?"
B: "We could go see a movie, but I think we should just rent something... that would be cheaper."
Also, "have" in "should have" is not a verb either. It's another modifier. Usually the verb follows after, with "(sh|c|w)ould have" suggesting a possible alternative to a past action.
"He would have left a bigger tip if he had change."
"You could have turned left on main street as a shortcut."
"You should have read the manual first."
The verb determines tense. There is only a handful of exceptions where the "have" is the acting verb, and is always used as a possessive for the subject.
"The jar should have holes in the lid."
"The car could have a larger engine if you want that option."
"He would have more time if he stopped surfing slashdot."
You are absolutely correct that language evolves. However, you can't honestly claim that substituting "of" for "have" in any of the above examples is sensible, readable english because 'of' is a preposition. It might be acceptable in speech from the slurring of "should've" but that does not make it grammatically correct.
=Smidge=
The parent is Mark Twain's proposal for the improvement of english spelling. Link
but that begs the question, who dies when a bear shits on a fallen log in the woods if no one is around to smell it?
moo.
blarg.
Pax tecum.
~Idarubicin
An easier way for me is this:
i.e. - id est (that is)
e.g. - exempli gratia (for [the sake of an] example)
Once I learned what they actually stood for, I never got them confused again. You don't have to speak Latin to know which is which. It amazes me how many people use these every day and don't know what they stand for. Also, they should usually be followed by a comma when used in a sentence, just like the phrases "for example" and "that is" are.
Trivia: in German, instead of e.g., they use z.B. which stands for "zum Beispiel".
The Mark Twain quote reminded me of the following, printed in my high school yearbook and probably inspired by it: The Great European Dream The European Union commissioners have announced that agreement has been reached to adopt English as the preferred language for European communications, rather than German, which was the other possibility. As part of the negotiations, the British government conceded that English spelling had some room for improvement and has accepted a five-year phased plan for what will be known as EuroEnglish. In the first year, "s" will be used instead of the soft "c." Sertainly, sivil servants will resieve this news with joy. Also, the hard "c" will be replaced with "k." Not only will this klear up konfusion, but typewriters kan have one less letter. There will be growing publik enthusiasm in the sekond year, when the troublesome "ph" will be replaced by "f." This will make words like "fotograf" 20 per sent shorter. In the third year, publik akseptanse of the new spelling kan be expekted to reach the stage where more komplikated changes are possible. Governments will enkorage the removal of double letters, which have always ben a dterent to akurate speling. Also, al wil agre that the horible mes of silent "e"s in the languag is disgrasful, and they would go. By the fourth year, peopl wil be reseptiv to steps such as replasing "th" by "z" and "w" by "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 trubls or difikultis and evrivun vil find it ezi to understand ech ozer. Ze drem vil finali kum tru.
In order to understand English spelling, you first need to understand English (assembly of Japanese motorcycle requires great peace of mind).
All words in English are derived from words in other languages. The way words are spelt in English is determined by the language they came from, so when you learn a new word, you need to learn its etymology. Fortunately, this is in the dictionary (The Oxford University dictionary. Others don't count).
Unfortunately, the etymology is not entirely correct in many cases - most etymologists know their Latin, Greek, and French, and can read German text books, but know nothing of Arabic or Chinese or various Indian, and possibly African languages that may have been the origins of common English words, so they are rarely credited. Nothing is perfect except God.
Why is the preterite of run ran, yet the preterite of shun is shunned?I do not know the actual answer to this question, but there are normally two explanations for this, both working together. The change of vowel sound: run->ran is generally derived from Arabic, while the change of ending is a European (Greek, Latin) technique. The reason the difference is retained is generally to maximise the linguistic difference from words which might be confused in the same context. Context being both gramatical (similar positions in a sentence), and semantic (words with similar meaning). It may also be that this is specific to certain environments: the similarity might only occur in a classroom, printing house, or some other significant work environment. It might be to make the word easily distinguished from background noise in an environment where it was common.
English has developed in a darwinian manner, and the fact that you cannot tell the spelling from your local pronounciation is not necessarily a snag. Your accent is likely very different to mine. Within my family, we pronounce "there", "their" and "the're" recognisably differently. My wife's family pronouce "ear" and "hair" indistingushably.
I once worked on a speech synthesiser using a National Semis phonym based synthesiser chip. Unfortunately, although the users could easily tell which parts were programmed by me (with a Cambride accent) and which by my colleague (With a Newcastle accent) no one could understand what the damn thing was actually saying.
The problem is more complex than you think: People actually recognise English words by different features in different places. Yoruba speakers are used to a pitch language, and will always pronounce English words with the same pitch setting. They readily understand each other speaking English, but often find it hard to recognise English spoken by English people who use changes in pitch for emphasis.
Before the Internet was common, we had Fidonet. We found out on Fidonet that: If you obey the established spelling rules, people who are not native english speakers have a chance of understanding what you mean, even if they have to look up every word in the dictionary. If you don't, and try to write phonetically, then people outside your local area won't have a clue what you are talking about.
Sent from my ASR33 using ASCII
No, the spelling is NOT arbitrary. I don't know how many times I have to point this out in my life as a linguist. An arbitrary system is one like Japanese kanji, which have no phonetic component whatsoever. The fact that I can throw a word at you that you've never seen, like, for example, "orthography," and you can read it and pronounce it correctly is proof positive of this. The fact that the spoken==>written relationship is not as strong, however, is not proof of arbitrariness. It indicates something else--something people have already discussed here without realizing it (in discussions of the multitudinous influences on the development of English), and that is the concept of morphology.
/g/ followed by an /I/. The sound no longer exists in English.
Words usually do not exist all by themselves but are members of a "word family" (and yes that is the technical term). Word families are made up of forms of the same word which feature little to no extra learning burden to master given knowledge of one of the other forms. These relationships are best represented by fixed spelling of the morphemes, even when there are pronunciation differences.
Something like Japanese (kanji, not the hiragana and katakana syllabaries) or Chinese puts all their eggs in the morphology basket, and none in the phonetic. Words are comprised of morphemes which are represented by particular graphemes (kanji/hanzi). This is great once you learn all the morpheme/grapheme pairs, but at 15,000 for Chinese, the system requires a large initial investment of time and cognitive burden.
English splits the difference between a morpheme-centric and phonetic orthographic system, wherein spellings of morphemes are relatively regular, but they are also phonetic enough that anyone with a basic understanding of the phoneme-grapheme pairings of the English use of the Roman alphabet can at least make an excellent guess at the pronunciation.
And to the many lazy and weak-minded individuals who whine about how everything should be phonetic, I would like to point out that there is an entire alphabet designed for this: the International Phonetic Alphabet. Learn this and try reading some text in it. See if it's really easier. A morpheme-centered orthographic system allows for faster processing of text because it allows the reader to bypass the sound production phase entirely, linking written words directly to their meanings (resident in the brain).
So stop whining, whiners, and learn the system. It's just a system to aid in the transfer of information. It's there to help you, not keep you down, man.
And BTW, although Noah Webster gave birth to the modern science of lexicography, dictionaries did indeed exist before his tome. They were used as spelling lists, mostly. The phase in which the English didn't care about spelling to which you are referring was up to the introduction of the printing press. Once more reading material was available to the masses it was very rightly decided that spelling should be standardized throughout the industry (he wrote with the arguably NON-standard, American spelling of "standardised). Furthermore, the "gh" that's left over in many words, including "knight" was a voiced velar fricative, not a
Read books. Seriously. Read a lot of books that have been edited well, and you'll start picking up good grammar and spelling by osmosis.
/. where people use atrocious pseudo-English and your skills will atrophy after a time.
The reverse is true. Hang around sites like
Hail Eris, full of mischief...
E pluribus sanguinem
Everybody loves to use "It's" like it's going out of style.
IT'S = a contraction of IT IS
Used in sentences like:
"It is a sunny day" = "It's a sunny day"
"It is really annoying" = "It's really annoying"
"Don't do that, it is stupid!" = "Don't do that, it's stupid!"
ITS is neuter possessive - as in his or hers, only it refers to a non-gendered object.
Used in sentences like:
"My laptop's battery lost its charge"
"Open Source Software has its drawbacks"
"The G5's strength is its vector processing abilities"
Many times you can save an extra keystroke by using "its" instead of "it's" - and you get the bonus of being grammatically correct.
I sig for world peace
The easy way to think about it is to consider "his, hers, its". When using "it's" you should be able to replace it with "it is", "it has" or similar and the sentence should still make sense.
its == 1 word
it's == 2 words
If you're unsure about which to use, see if "it is" works in the same place. If it doesn't, you should probably be using "its".It's a fairly simple construct, but I've seen English teachers get it wrong, and worse, teach the exact opposite.
It does seem to break the general rule of "an apostrophe indicates possession", but it's easy to think of "its" as a more specific rule that should supersede the use of "it's", if you're so inclined.
On a completely different note, does anyone find themselves previewing maybe a dozen times when posting about spelling or grammar? (And probably missing a half-dozen errors?)
Just to clear this up, the general rule is actually "When you leave a letter out, put in an apostrophe". This explains everything, including "it's", "won't", and the like.
The posessive is a leftover from the days when English had more noun declensions. For example, we still have "I", "me", and "my" as examples of the Nominative (Subject), Accusative (Object), and Genitive (Possessive) cases. Currently, a person's name would be represented as eg. "John", "John", "John's". But at one time, the Genitive case had an "i" in it, so it would've been "John", "John", "Johnis". You still occasionally see this in old place names. For example, the Spotswood hotel near here has embedded into its concrete "Spottiswoode".
People who prefer to avoid language history usually remember the apostrophe indication posessive as a secondary rule to the one about a letter being left out.
Hey ... you sound like you know what you're talking about. No fair.
The real Captain Avatar is a fictional character, so I suppose he doesn't mind if I impersonate him.
HAH! exactly what is logical about the semi-random assignment of gender to nouns (die-das-der)?
The Tale of the Fishwife and its Sad Fate:(as literally translated into English)
"It is a bleak Day. Hear the Rain, how he pours, and the Hail, how he rattles; and see the Snow, how he drifts along, and of the Mud, how deep he is! Ah the poor Fishwife, it is stuck fast in the Mire; it has dropped its Basket of Fishes; and its Hands have been cut by the Scales as it seized some of the falling Creatures; and one Scale has even got into its Eye, and it cannot get her out. It opens its Mouth to cry for Help; but if any Sound comes out of him, alas he is drowned by the raging of the Storm. And now a Tomcat has got one of the Fishes and she will surely escape with him. No, she bites off a Fin, she holds her in her Mouth -- will she swallow her? No, the Fishwife's brave Mother-dog deserts his Puppies and rescues the Fin -- which he eats, himself, as his Reward. O, horror, the Lightning has struck the Fish-basket; he sets him on Fire; see the Flame, how she licks the doomed Utensil with her red and angry Tongue; now she attacks the helpless Fishwife's Foot -- she burns him up, all but the big Toe, and even she is partly consumed; and still she spreads, still she waves her fiery Tongues; she attacks the Fishwife's Leg and destroys it; she attacks its Hand and destroys her also; she attacks the Fishwife's Leg and destroys her also; she attacks its Body and consumes him; she wreathes herself about its Heart and it is consumed; next about its Breast, and in a Moment she is a Cinder; now she reaches its Neck -- he goes; now its Chin -- it goes; now its Nose -- she goes. In another Moment, except Help come, the Fishwife will be no more. Time presses -- is there none to succor and save? Yes! Joy, joy, with flying Feet the she-Englishwoman comes! But alas, the generous she-Female is too late: where now is the fated Fishwife? It has ceased from its Sufferings, it has gone to a better Land; all that is left of it for its loved Ones to lament over, is this poor smoldering Ash-heap. Ah, woeful, woeful Ash-heap! Let us take him up tenderly, reverently, upon the lowly Shovel, and bear him to his long Rest, with the Prayer that when he rises again it will be a Realm where he will have one good square responsible Sex, and have it all to himself, instead of having a mangy lot of assorted Sexes scattered all over him in Spots."
-Mark Twain
For the full laundry list of the difficulties of the German language see The Awful German Language, by Mark Twain
If a job's not worth doing, it's not worth doing right.
This article (PDF) suggests that the genitive ending was -es in Old English, and -ies or -ys in Middle English, and that the apostrophe was introduced as a replacement for omitted vowels.
However, he also describes an alternative view: that the apostrophe was originally used because of the mistaken assumption that the genitive ending was already a contraction of "his". Apparently even Shakespeare made this mistake...
In Shakespeare's day, nobody worried about English spelling in large part because serious people wrote serious things in Latin, where the spelling was thoroughly standardized. Because Latin was the language of the educated, nobody had bothered to standardize the spelling of the vernacular.
Since that time, English spelling has been standardized, and very few of us have reliance on Latin as an excuse today. English spelling isn't difficult: it follows two sets of simple rules. We have a set of rules for the words adopted from Latin (about half the language) and another set for the words derived from Anglo-Saxon. Foreign borrowings generally retain their foreign spellings. See my English spelling page for some pointers to resources for learning how simple it really is.
Those worried over form, miss content.
Those who don't worry over form obscure their content, and ensure that it will be missed or misconstrued. It's just plain rude to deliberately or carelessly use bad grammar and orthography: it shows contempt for your ideas and for your audience.
See what I've been reading.