YAESR (< Interesting Experiment)

li [David Wolff] mi tulis la ...

> In article <1190831859.068716.140370@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
>,
>  <alanduncan80@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote:
> > 
> > Why don't we get one of the people at the Academie Francais,
> > responsible for French spelling, to use the same reasoning to design a
> > spelling system for English (one that takes into account all the
> > sensible objections to reform)?
> > 
> > I _don't_ mean to apply a French spelling system to English. I mean
> > ask them to apply their skills to help create a spelling system for
> > English that is as regular as the French spelling system. A Briton
> > could not do this -- such an undertaking is athwart his intellectual
> > tradition.
> 
> "As regular as the French spelling system"?  Do you mean that every
> other letter is silent?

I suppose that's what he meant.   The only thing worse than
English has to be the only language with an orthography that's
worse than French.  On the other hand, at least we don't have to
hassle with diacritics in English.

FWIW: 
There are a few minor reforms that could be done without
upsetting things too much.  Then we could apply a new set of
reforms every 25 years or so to gradually transition into a
system that is more phonetic.  

The hardest part would be the vowels because they vary greatly
from on dialect to the next, and vowel-reduction doesn't help
the situation.  So let's start by working mostly on consonants.

	1.  Get rid of all "silent" consonants like <gh> in
<high>.
	2.  Respell all exceptions like <ch>=/S/ or /k/.
	3. <x> -> <ks>
	4.  <q> -> <k>
	5. "Soft" <g> -> <j>
	6.  "Hard" <c> -> <k>, "soft" <c> -> <s>. 
	7.  Now that <c> is free, the digraph <ch> -> <c>
	8.  Since <x> is free, the digraph <sh> -> <x>
	9. Voiced <th> -> <dh>

	

-------------------------------------------------
deinx nxtxr

LI SASXSEK LATIS. (http://www.nutter.net/sasxsek)