# How easy is it for you do read the following "simplified spelling" text? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [November 13, 2013, 11:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-easy-is-it-for-you-do-read-the-following-simplified-spelling-text/673866 "2013-11-13T23:31:23Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 16\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Polerius](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/d78d45/32.png) [@Polerius](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Polerius)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2013, 6:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-easy-is-it-for-you-do-read-the-following-simplified-spelling-text/673866/41 "2013-11-14T18:55:20Z")
> [@Khendrask](#): > > It however fails miserably if you bring together people with different backgrounds or accents. Imagine someone from Vancouver and someone from Louisiana trying to communicate this way… Yes, going for a phonetic spelling is problematic when you take regional accents into account. But, as I mentioned in post #36, the biggest motivating factor for me in trying the above was not to be phonetic per se, but to have consistency: Each letter is pronounced the same way in each word, no exceptions. So, if the above spelling were to take hold, we would all get used to the new spelling and still keep our regional accents. It’s just that each letter would be pronounced the same in each word. So, a Scottish person might pronounce ‘roolz’ differently than a Texan, but they would agree how to spell it. The above though might not work out if two accents treat a letter, e.g. ‘u’, the same in one word but differently in another word. So, yeah, the accent problem may be intractable. ---
**Author:** ![Hari\_Seldon](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hari_seldon/32/5173_2.png) [@Hari\_Seldon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hari_Seldon)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2013, 7:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-easy-is-it-for-you-do-read-the-following-simplified-spelling-text/673866/42 "2013-11-14T19:45:16Z")
I could read it easily enough and would adapt quickly, but it was awful. It may be phonetic in some dialect, but not mine. Only the common (nearly) spelling is keeping English as one language. In my dialect “to” does have the same vowel as “proof”, or not depending on the patterns of stresses in the sentence. “I am going to school” usually uses an unstressed schwa, but it is given full value if it is in contrast with “I am coming from school”. In my native dialect, the words “sad” and “bad” do not rhyme and the second would have to be spelled something like “bayd”. No, phonetic spelling is a poor idea. ---
**Author:** ![Snowboarder\_Bo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/snowboarder_bo/32/229_2.png) [@Snowboarder\_Bo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Snowboarder_Bo)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2013, 8:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-easy-is-it-for-you-do-read-the-following-simplified-spelling-text/673866/43 "2013-11-14T20:01:01Z")
Obligatory link to [Meihem In Ce Klasrum](http://www.angelfire.com/va3/timshenk/codes/meihem.html) by Dolton Edwards. ---
**Author:** ![Karen\_Lingel](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/karen_lingel/32/18649_2.png) [@Karen\_Lingel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Karen_Lingel)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2013, 8:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-easy-is-it-for-you-do-read-the-following-simplified-spelling-text/673866/44 "2013-11-14T20:08:16Z")
I gave up in the middle of the second sentence. (Same reason why I don’t read illiterate posts on this board.) I’m a visual person. The words “here” and “hear” are as different to me as the words “yonder” and “listen”. The words “its” and “it’s” are as different to me as “his” and “hi’s”. Having to translate the letters to sounds, then ignore the visual stimulus in favor of the aural stimulus and sound out the words to translate them is like trying to read Russian. ---
**Author:** ![Polerius](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/d78d45/32.png) [@Polerius](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Polerius)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2013, 8:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-easy-is-it-for-you-do-read-the-following-simplified-spelling-text/673866/45 "2013-11-14T20:14:56Z")
> [@Snowboarder\_Bo](#): > > Obligatory link to [Meihem In Ce Klasrum](http://www.angelfire.com/va3/timshenk/codes/meihem.html) by Dolton Edwards. See, in my scheme it would be “Meihem In The Clasroom”, \*much \*closer to our current spelling 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![TBG](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/c89c15/32.png) [@TBG](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TBG)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2013, 8:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-easy-is-it-for-you-do-read-the-following-simplified-spelling-text/673866/46 "2013-11-14T20:33:57Z")
I wd ttly rthr rd smthng lk ths thn tht sht. ---
**Author:** ![Dendarii\_Dame](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/bbce88/32.png) [@Dendarii\_Dame](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dendarii_Dame)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2013, 8:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-easy-is-it-for-you-do-read-the-following-simplified-spelling-text/673866/47 "2013-11-14T20:42:36Z")
> [@Sahirrnee](#): > > Like reading a paragraph written by a first grader. +1. But I didn’t have any trouble reading it. On the other hand, I used to be a substitute teacher. I recall one student’s story which began, “Wunsaponatim…” Native English speaker. ---
**Author:** ![Skywatcher](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/skywatcher/32/254_2.png) [@Skywatcher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skywatcher)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2013, 8:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-easy-is-it-for-you-do-read-the-following-simplified-spelling-text/673866/48 "2013-11-14T20:49:09Z")
Prior to being reassigned, my primary job fuctions were proofing & editing. The quoted section makes my eyes hurt. ---
**Author:** ![Inner\_Stickler](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/inner_stickler/32/318_2.png) [@Inner\_Stickler](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Inner_Stickler)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2013, 9:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-easy-is-it-for-you-do-read-the-following-simplified-spelling-text/673866/49 "2013-11-14T21:03:06Z")
I read it last night and gave it another try just now. It feels alien but it’s not that bad. After a week of constant exposure, I’m sure I’d be roaring along at full-speed. After all, my fluency with standard english comes with about 20 years of practice. I could hardly expect myself to pick up a new orthographic standard immediately without a hiccup. Native english speaker. ---
**Author:** ![Ximenean](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/x/aca169/32.png) [@Ximenean](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ximenean)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2013, 9:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-easy-is-it-for-you-do-read-the-following-simplified-spelling-text/673866/50 "2013-11-14T21:13:44Z")
> [@Polerius](#): > > The above though might not work out if two accents treat a letter, e.g. ‘u’, the same in one word but differently in another word. So, yeah, the accent problem may be intractable. There’s also the problem that the same letters can be pronounced differently, depending on the sounds that precede them. For example, the “-ed” sound at the end of words is pronounced like a “-t” when it follows an unvoiced consonant sound such as “s” (e.g. “missed”, which sounds like “mist”). In English the suffix is nevertheless almost always spelled “-ed”, reflecting the grammatical function of the suffix. In phonetic spelling, sometimes it would be “-d” and sometimes “-t”, so the spelling might even be less consistent than English, and the semantic connection between the words, i.e. that they’re all past forms of verbs, would be obscured. ---
**Author:** ![Macca26](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/13edae/32.png) [@Macca26](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Macca26)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2013, 9:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-easy-is-it-for-you-do-read-the-following-simplified-spelling-text/673866/51 "2013-11-14T21:22:15Z")
> [@Polerius](#): > > I should say that, as an engineer, the biggest motivating factor for me in trying the above was not to be phonetic per se, but to have consistency: Each letter is pronounced the same way in each word, no exceptions. This is something that is sorely lacking in English (IMO). If you want a language that has almost every letter or digraph pronounced the same way every time, go learn Welsh. ---
**Author:** ![Zyanthia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/d6d6ee/32.png) [@Zyanthia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zyanthia)\ **Post date:** [November 15, 2013, 12:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-easy-is-it-for-you-do-read-the-following-simplified-spelling-text/673866/52 "2013-11-15T00:11:23Z")
My first attempt to parse it failed completely, I’m not used to trying to read one word at a time. It felt like I was trying to read Greek or Chinese. Once I gave up trying to parse the entire sentence and then read it one word at a time, and mentally created a sentence, I was fine. 1. Very difficult to parse 2. Extremely jarring. Had to translate to real English to parse the meaning. 3. Native English speaker. ---
**Author:** ![major](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/b3f665/32.png) [@major](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/major)\ **Post date:** [November 17, 2013, 8:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-easy-is-it-for-you-do-read-the-following-simplified-spelling-text/673866/53 "2013-11-17T20:43:42Z")
Polerius wrote: **How easy is it for you to read** (my) \*\*simplified spelling? \*\* US Airways’ moov Thersdei hapend a week after the FAA anaunsd the loosening of electronics rools abord aircraft. Under the niu rools, pasenjers mei yuz serten electronic devaises in “erplein moud” dooring taxiing, teikoff and landing. Eech erlain has too proov too the FAA that devaises ar seif to yuz in erplein moud on its ercraft. Major: Even with the inconsistencies and code overlaps, it is quite easy to read. In fact, almost all reform proposals are relatively easy to read. They just can’t be read as quickly as one you have studied for ten years or more and read as sequences of word-signs. Reading sound-signs tends to be slow and when the sound-signs are ambiguous, very slow. Both Chinese and English scripts can be read very fast when the marks on the page are read as meaning signs rather than ambiguous sound-signs. The problem is that it usually takes ten years to achieve this level of proficiency. A highly alphabetic writing system with one and only one symbol per sound (phoneme) can be learned by some in 3 hours and by all in 3 months using a writing to read approach where the focus is on writing as soon as students have memorized 40 paired-associates. Fast learners are assigned to help slow learners with their compositions. The first rule for a more phonemic representation of spoken English is consistency. I am not sure that you have achieved that. Most non English speakers would find oo for uu to be odd. ei-ey commonly represents /á/ as but it is not a highest frequency pattern in Engllsh. ai-ay as in pail pay would be the more common spelling pattern. There are hundreds of simplified spelling proposals. The most basic proposal is to get rid of silent letters that are not markers. The e in made marks a long vowel, so it is not a surplus character in the traditional notation. Here is an attempt from 1883 to list the worst spellings and how they could be improved. [![](https://i36.photobucket.com/albums/e25/majorbett/24rules.jpg) ](https://i36.photobucket.com/albums/e25/majorbett/24rules.jpg) The next least disruptive proposal is to get rid of the low frequency spelling patterns. This would respell about 15% of the words in the dictionary but only about 6% of the words we normally encounter in reading. In the traditional writing system, there is an average of 14 spelling patterns per phoneme. Dewey found 560 ways to represent 41 phonemes [![](https://i36.photobucket.com/albums/e25/majorbett/Linguistics/spelling-patterns.jpg) ](https://i36.photobucket.com/albums/e25/majorbett/Linguistics/spelling-patterns.jpg) The RV or Reduced Variant Spelling Patterns reform would have only four ways to represent /u:/ u-luminous and Lulu (56%). u.e - flute (18%), oo - tool (11%), ue - true (4%). Only the first 3 patterns are needed to account for 85% of the spellings found in the dictionary. This reform means that fruit, canoe, who, and soup would be respelled. They could be spelled as in the 1600’s: froot or frute, canu or canoo, hoo or hu, soop or supe The problem with minimal reforms is that they may not achieve the stated goal of spelling reformers which is to accelerate literacy. The orthographies of many languages that use the Latin alphabet are as transparent as Webster’s dictionary key. They are so phonemic that a separate pronunciation guide spelling is not needed. \*\*If a spelling reform gave every kid a 2 year head start in school, would you support it? \*\* Is it worth the inconvenience to accelerate literacy in the next generation? Currently, only 50% are reading at grade level in the 3rd grade. If selling reform enabled all kids to read aloud at an 8th grade level in their 2nd year of school, would you oppose it? [/SIZE][/FONT] ---
**Author:** ![Tapiotar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/3be4f8/32.png) [@Tapiotar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tapiotar)\ **Post date:** [November 17, 2013, 8:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-easy-is-it-for-you-do-read-the-following-simplified-spelling-text/673866/54 "2013-11-17T20:56:15Z")
> [@cwthree](#): > > Native English speaker. > > I find it difficult because several of the “simplified” spellings already exist as words in English with vastly different meanings. In the first paragraph alone, “wont,” “reed,” “wail,” and “too” are perfectly good words that don’t have any relationship to the words represented by the standard spellings they mean to replace (“want,” “read,” “while,” and “to”). > > I also find it confusing because the simplified spellings are based on a different regional accent than I’m used to. When I see “wail,” I don’t hear the sounds of the word that’s usually spelled “while.” I’m used to hearing “while” pronounced _ˈhwī(-ə)l_, that is, with a slightly aspirated “h” in front. When I see “wail,” I hear _ˈwāl_. They don’t even rhyme. > > Similarly, I see that the simplified scheme uses “oo” to represent more than one vowel sound. “Too” and “proov” replace “to” and “prove,” but those words use two different sounds. I can’t think of any regional accent in which the vowels in _tə_ and \*prüv \*sound the same. > > Overall, it looks less like a simplified spelling scheme and more like a transcript of what text-to-voice software (think MacTalker from the bad old days) generates. Also a native Englsih speaker and I agree with all the points above. As well as the ugliness mentioned below. ---
**Author:** ![Teuton](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/teuton/32/3864_2.png) [@Teuton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Teuton)\ **Post date:** [November 17, 2013, 9:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-easy-is-it-for-you-do-read-the-following-simplified-spelling-text/673866/55 "2013-11-17T21:00:16Z")
I read it. It hurt. Native speaker. I’m surprised the thread has got this far without anyone mentioning [Feersum Endjinn](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Feersum_Endjinn), a book by Iain M. Banks. A good quarter of the book is the journal of Bascule the Teller, who writes with a curious mixture of textspeak and phonetics. As the wiki page says, the fourth chapter opens with: > [@](#): > > Woak up. Got dresd. Had brekfast. Spoke wif Ergates thi ant who sed itz juss been wurk wurk wurk 4 u lately master Bascule, Y dont u ½ a holiday? & I agreed & that woz how we decided we otter go 2 c Mr Zoliparia in thi I-ball ov thi gargoyle Rosbrith. It was a struggle to get through at first (one word in particular - xhost for “exhaust” - took me ages to figure out), but by the end of the book I found myself reading it as quickly as the rest. ---
**Author:** ![Ximenean](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/x/aca169/32.png) [@Ximenean](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ximenean)\ **Post date:** [November 17, 2013, 9:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-easy-is-it-for-you-do-read-the-following-simplified-spelling-text/673866/56 "2013-11-17T21:48:04Z")
> [@major](#): > > If a spelling reform gave every kid a 2 year head start in school, would you support it? I am not in favour of any reform that requires us to use Comic Sans. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-easy-is-it-for-you-do-read-the-following-simplified-spelling-text/673866.md?page=2)