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Is Simplified Spelling Worth Reform?
digitalhermit writes "I guess many folks are of very little brain, and big words bother them... There's a push for simpler spelling. Instead of 'weigh' it would be 'way.' 'Dictionary' would be 'dikshunery' and so forth. Dunno if it's a joke, but it seems in earnest. Mark Twain must be spinning around somewhere." Twain is often credited with the satirical call for spelling reform called "A Plan for the Improvement of English Spelling," though according to Wikipedia, Twain was "actually a supporter of reform," and the piece may have been written by M.J. Shields. Benjamin Franklin was another champion of spelling reform, and even came up with a phonetic alphabet to implement such reform.
The reson folks are illiterate is that we refuse to fund our schools sufficiently, or pay teachers enough to hire qualified ones.
Or becuase the illiterate are useless fucks that use school as a meeting spot for bartering in drugs and sex. We don't need more teachers in schools, we need more police officers with firearms and handcuffs.
Big ones, small ones, some as big as yer 'ead!
Give 'em a twist, a flick o' the wrist...
Generic phonetic spelling only works when everyone talks the same way. Otherwise, you alienate everyone who doesn't talk the same way you do.
Stupid idea... the spelling of language combined with a high literacy rate fixes dialect in place and slows considerably the natural evolution of language. What, you all want to drop the pronounciation of our 'r's? Maybe drop half our syllables altogether like the Brits do? Or, perhaps you want to advance the evolution of the language another 1,000 years or so and end up with a language like Chinese, that has no verb tenses, and only makes sense based on context, and where half the words all sound the same?