I probably need to find better things to think about when I’m eating, but…
I was web surfing during my lunch hour, and visited several forums. I noticed that in each one every time the word “ridiculous” is used it was spelled “rediculous”. This used to bug me a lot more than it does now, mainly because I know that if you correct someone on the internet they usually cally you a spelling nazi.
But since a lot of folks, either on purpose or inability to spell write “rediculous” will that soon become a dictionary spelling for the word? Should it become the accepted spelling?
I don’t think it should, but I’m sure there are people that do.
Why do you zero in on just one word? In English, all unstressed vowels are reduced. By the logic of your proposition, we should spell “photography” as “phetogrephy”–that is, if enough idiots insist upon doing so in some moronic chat room.
Orthography is a convention. Just like the convention of saying, “You’re welcome,” when some says, “Thank you.” Would you want to change “You’re welcome” to, let’s say, “Fuck you” just because you hang out with a bunch of adolescent losers who like to say that?
Conventions serve a useful purpose in that they tell us what to do or say in a particular situation so that our intention is understood. Someone just said “Thank you” to you, so what do you say back? No one will mistake your intentions if you say, “You’re welcome.” But if you go around misspelling words, people will just think you’re uneducated or careless or you spend too much time in chat rooms.
Its not really my proposition, since I think its a bad idea. I don’t like purposely mispelled words. But people are going to do it anyway, and I wouldn’t besurprised if rediculous ends up in the dictionary.
People who spell it “rediculous” do so because they are saying it wrong. It’s rid-ICK-you-lus. Similar words are risible, derisive, ridicule, and wristwatch. No, wait, wristwatch doesn’t belong in there.
The whole thing with ridiculous is, well, ridiculous. There are many, many words in english that are spelled nonsensically, but ridiculous isn’t one of them. Who says red-iculous? It’s rid-iculous, like rip, rim, rib… Some people even say ree-diculous…hmm, maybe that’s where the confusion comes from? Ugh, I hate english sometimes.
I’m about as prescriptive as they come, and I don’t think the dictionary should change the spelling. Written language, unlike oral language, is contrived and driven by conventions. It ain’t something that comes instinctively to human beings; rather, it’s a technology we’ve invented to simulate oral language. The technology, like many technologies, depends on having standards, and the standards are not based on anything except mutual agreement. Sure, we could reverse what commas and periods mean, or what “b” and “d” mean, but there’s no good reason to do so. And there’s no good reason to change the spelling of “ridiculous”: for one thing, it’d make a lot of older materials slightly more difficult to understand, ruin the written language’s backwards compatibility.
That said, if it becomes an acceptable spelling, who gives a shit?
