why does U.S spelling omit the 'u'?

[Inner_Stickler]

@sentrix

the great bard would be turning in his grave.

then again most of his works in today’s modern diction is unintelligible.

Who, Shakespeare? The guy who made up vasty to fit his meter? Yeah, I’m sure he’d be just distraught at the thought of people playing fast and loose with spelling.

[DrFidelius]

@sentrix

the great bard would be turning in his grave.

then again most of his works in today’s modern diction is unintelligible.

Skakespeare? The man who couldn’t seem to spell his own name the same way twice in a row?

[Diceman]

@Frank

“Though the tough cough and hiccough plough him through.”

Forget unnecessary U’s. This, in a nutshell, is the biggest problem with the English language. The best thing that could happen to our language would be if we could get away from the “ough” combination, replacing it with more phonetic combinations, and consign this convoluted combination to dusty old books from bygone days.

“Tho the tuff coff and hiccup plow him thru.”

[Thudlow_Boink]

@sentrix

phonetically though, the ‘u’ is necessary

I don’t understand. “-or” is closer to the way I (an American) pronounce words like “color” and “humor.”

Wikipedia actually has a fairly extensive discussion of the issue.

Most words ending in an unstressed -our in British English (e.g. colour, flavour, harbour, honour, humour, labour, neighbour, rumour) end in -or in American English (color, flavor, harbor, honor, humor, labor, neighbor, rumor). Wherever the vowel is unreduced in pronunciation, e.g. contour, velour, paramour and troubadour the spelling is the same everywhere.

Most words of this kind come from Latin non-agent nouns having nominative -or. These words were first borrowed into English from early Old French and the ending was spelled -or or -ur. After the Norman conquest of England (1066), the ending became -our in Anglo-French to try to represent the Old French pronunciation, though color has sometimes been used in English since the 15th century. The -our ending was not only used in English borrowings from Anglo-French, but was also applied to the earlier borrowings that had used -or. After the Renaissance, new borrowings from Latin were taken up with their original -or ending and many words once ending in -our (for example, chancellour and governour) went back to -or. Many words of the -our/or group do not have a Latin counterpart; for example, armo(u)r, behavio(u)r, harbo(u)r, neighbo(u)r; also arbo(u)r, meaning “shelter”, though senses “tree” and “tool” are always arbor, a false cognate of the other word. Some 16th- and early 17th-century British scholars indeed insisted that -or be used for words from Latin (e.g. color) and -our for French loans; but in many cases the etymology was not clear, and therefore some scholars advocated -or only and others -our only.

Webster’s 1828 dictionary had only -or and is given much of the credit for the adoption of this form in the United States. By contrast, Johnson’s 1755 dictionary used -our for all words still so spelled in Britain (like colour), but also for words where the u has since been dropped: ambassadour, emperour, governour, perturbatour, inferiour, superiour; errour, horrour, mirrour, tenour, terrour, tremour. Johnson, unlike Webster, was not an advocate of spelling reform, but chose the spelling best derived, as he saw it, from among the variations in his sources. He preferred French over Latin spellings because, as he put it, “the French generally supplied us”.

[sentrix]

exactly. it goes down to pronounciation.

standard or otherwise.

[sentrix]

pronounciation/dialect/accent.

my partner is from seattle and he has a wonderful gist of the tongue. i find other americans more difficult to understand. then again most aussies have a problem understanding south africans or new zealanders.

[picunurse]

@sentrix

pronounciation/dialect/accent.

my partner is from seattle and he has a wonderful gist of the tongue. i find other americans more difficult to understand. then again most aussies have a problem understanding south africans or new zealanders.

That’s probably because Seattlites are nearly Canadian!

[Unpronounceable]

Besides, isn’t it past time the British return the vowels they pillaged from the Welsh?

[sentrix]

along with the irish, scots another unintelligible nation.

when will you people stop bastardizing ( notice i used a ‘z’) the bloody english lingo?

[md2000]

@sentrix

zed’s dead baby. zed’s dead 555. ( pulp fiction)

and its arse not ass.

beats me to it…
It always amazes me there are a billion or more people in the world who speak English of some form, but only about 20 million people, all in Canada, who speak it and spell it properly… And know it’s *zed *not zee. (Unless you’re Dutch)

[John_Mace]

@sentrix

then again most aussies have a problem understanding south africans or new zealanders.

No, they don’t.

[Dublin11]

@Unpronounceable

Besides, isn’t it past time the British return the vowels they pillaged from the Welsh?

Welsh people are British. Pillaging yourself is a bit masochistic.

[Kent_Clark]

@sentrix

phonetically though, the ‘u’ is necessary but if it is not translated into the spelling mode this confuses kids later on.

@Thudlow_Boink

I don’t understand. “-or” is closer to the way I (an American) pronounce words like “color” and “humor.”

Sentrix, could you explain to us (the best you can, considering we’re communicating by writing) what you hear as a difference between “color” and “colour”? Most Americans pronounce both spellings identically, and rhyme them identically with “poor” “pore” and “pour.” A few of us, however, do pronounce poor/pore/pour slightly differently, and rhyme color with one of them. What do you hear?

[njtt]

@TheChileanBlob

We call it a U-turn. We are not allergic to the letter U.

Actually, in my experience, when Americans talk about a U-turn, they quite often seem to mean what a British person would call a three-point turn. Actual U-turns, however, are probably more commonly performed in the USA, given that most US roads are much wider than most British ones.

[tracer]

@sentrix

what do you call a ‘U’ turn then?

I think we Americans call it “soccer.”

[madsircool]

@Dublin11

Welsh people are British. Pillaging yourself is a bit masochistic.

As if British=English. :rolleyes:

[Rhiannon8404]

@njtt

Actually, in my experience, when Americans talk about a U-turn, they quite often seem to mean what a British person would call a three-point turn. Actual U-turns, however, are probably more commonly performed in the USA, given that most US roads are much wider than most British ones.

I have never heard someone here in the US refer to a three-point turn as a U-turn. I have only ever heard U-turn to mean a turn in which direction is changed to the opposite way in one movement with no stopping. A three-point turn is a three-point turn.

[bob_2]

O Romeo, Romeo, wherefore art thou Romeo?
Deny thy father and refuse thy name;
Or if thou wilt not, be but sworn my love
And I’ll no longer be a Capulet.

Oh Romeo, why do yer have to be Romeo?
Tell yr dad to get lost and change yer name,
Or, if ya can’t do that,
Then I’ll change mine.

[Exapno_Mapcase]

@Rhiannon8404

I have never heard someone here in the US refer to a three-point turn as a U-turn. I have only ever heard U-turn to mean a turn in which direction is changed to the opposite way in one movement with no stopping. A three-point turn is a three-point turn.

A three-point turn is a K-turn. At least it was when I took my driver’s exam.

[Rucksinator]

@friedo

…
While most attempts at radical spelling reform failed…

@Inner_Stickler

…Noah Webster … was actually much more extensive in what he wanted to do but the dropped U, the reversed ER at the end of words, and -ize instead of -ise, along with a few other changes were the ones that stuck…

@Colibri

…Noah Webster made many other changes to American spelling, some of which caught on, and some of which didn’t…

What were some of his other changes that didn’t catch on? Were they in his original dictionary? If so, did he (or someone later) change them to what everybody was using?