Questions about U.S. spelling

Factual Questions
1

Idle question about U.S. spelling. I *think *this does allow a factual answer, but I trust the mods will move it elsewhere if necessary, as I agree that it *could *also be said to be a bit mundane and pointless. It’s a real question, though.

Right, I do get the idea that it’s intended to be a bit more “sensible” than the British version, (which would not be difficult :slight_smile: ) but some things about it cause me puzzlement. (Come on, people, I’m lazing on a Sunday afternoon here, so I’m allowed to indulge in some idle wondering).

What set me off on this was thinking about the “cheque/check” difference, but Og alone knows why, given that it’s hard to remember when I last wrote a cheque. I suddenly wondered why reformers would stop at “check”, rather than “chek” or “chec”.

For example, why is what I know as a “plough” spelled as “plow”, when one might reasonably argue that the spelling can lead to confusion when compared with other words such as “snow”, “crow” etc? And it seems that no-one felt sufficiently moved to change spellings of “slough” and “cough” and so on. Yeah, I realise the the whole “ough” spelling and pronunciation is a whole can of worms all by itself. Or even wurmz, I suppose. However, since the “ough” thing must surely be the most egregious example of confusing spelling, why was that one not addressed, given the ghoti=fish idea? One might think that would be the place to start, before bothering about theatres and theaters and colours and colors.

Similarly, it seems that (British) “trawl” (as in fishing) is “troll”, just like the mythical Scandinavian creature and like the annoying internet creature, despite the fact that they are pronounced differently. (Or perhaps they are not pronounced differently in the U.S.A., so feel free to correct me on this).

Also, there are some words that even people who ought to know better often spell wrongly. (Please read “wrongly” as “other than the generally accepted way”, if “wrongly” sounds too prescriptive for your liking). For example “weird”* often appears as “wierd”, even on the S.D.M.B. If reasonably literate people often get that one wrong, surely that ought to have been a candidate for simplification.

And it seems that no-one felt moved to worry about “sew” and “sow”. And what about “bow” and “bow”? “Style” and “stile”? What about “word” and “worn”, having the same spelling form but different pronunciation? And it now occurs to me to wonder why, if Noah Webster was so keen on spelling reform, did he not become “Noa”? :slight_smile:

So (or sow or sew) I suppose my question is: why stop halfway? Did the spelling reformers get so far and then get bored? (Or board, even). Note that I am NOT suggesting the either the U.K. style or the U.S. style is better or worse in any way, but merely wondering why the spelling reformers started then stopped.

I would bet real money that I have managed a few strange spellings/typing mistakes of my very own in this post, but that’s just Gaudere’s law for you. :slight_smile:

  • on preview, yes I realise that the meaning of that word as used at present is somewhat different from its earlier meaning but let’s leave that aside for now.*
2

Short version: You can attribute most of the differences to a man named Noah Webster, a crank who wrote An American Dictionary of the English Language in 1828. Early in the US’s history of independence, there was a felt need to differentiate it and its history and culture from Britain’s, and using an actual American dictionary in schools and elsewhere was one way to do it. Celebrating an Italian’s voyages to the Caribbean as “the discovery of America” was another.

Anyway, Webster had his own idiosyncratic and inconsistent ideas about simplifying spelling, and put those into his dictionary. You’ve given a number of examples. Since that was the only “American” dictionary available, those spellings became standard here.

3

Actually, many of the ones mentioned was due to Teddy Roosevelt, not Webster.

In any case, language isn’t consistent, and the English language is more inconsistent than others. It boils down to what changes people were willing to accept, logic or not.

4

Trawling & trolling are different methods of fishing. A trawler drags a net, a troller hangs a long line. Not really the same word, surprisingly.

5

And the Internet type of troll derives from the method of fishing, not the Scandinavian monster.

6

There has been a long tradition of efforts to “reform” spelling in the U.S. My favorite has always been Robert McCormick, publisher of the Chicago Tribune. He gave the world such contibutions as donut, thru and ameba, and changed his own name to M’Cormik.

Despite being one of the most powerful newspaper publishers of the 1930s and 40s, his efforts were met with indifference.

7

Not just in the US. The (Simplified) Spelling Society is a British organization that’s been around for about a century. And despite all of its efforts, they’d be hard-pressed to point to a single simplification that they’ve advocated that’s been adopted by the general public.

8

QFT:

9

I guess I just learnt the alternative pronunciation for troll.

10

I guess my head just asploded.

11

Friedo, why do you attribute that to Mark Twain?

12

Probably because that’s the common version. It is wrong, as you note.

13

Weird! I had always seen that attributed to Mark Twain on the intertubes. Oh well. He can’t have everything.

14

He misspelled "dubble"and “delt”.

15

Because everything written on the Internet is eventually attributed to Mark Twain.

16

Not true – sometimes they’re attributed to Plato.

Or Philo

17

Webster didn’t get everything he wanted though. Only some of his reforms took off. Found a couple pages on the subject here.

Spelling reformers have been at it a long time now, but as others here have said, it almost always goes nowhere. The reforms that did succeed in the US happened because the country was new at the time, when Webster published his dictionary, and Americans were eager for ways to distinguish themselves from the English.

18

I suppose spelling reformers eventually gave up and thought that something like world peace might be easier to achieve. :slight_smile:

I hadn’t known that trolling and trawling were different. Ignorance fought!

19

Flakey pastry?

20

Just as every witty comeback is attributed to Churchill.