>I see the 'first' use of the Camion Code to represent English
(and yes, Adam (and Andrea), one could write it in any
'variety' they choose, or possibly decide to *write* in RP,
whether or not that's what they speak!)
Ah, but once people start learning conventional spellings based
upon a "received" pronunciation that they are not familiar
with, then the system loses all claims to iconicity
("decipherability"), and the symbols become purely meaningless,
abstract representations, no better than the lowly alphabetic
system which it has replaced. Don't let that discourage you too
much: every iconic system for representing language has either
gone that direction or died.
As Jesus said to Paul, "Why do you try to fight against the
goads?"
And as Helmholtz (or somebody) also said,
delta S >= 0
>I leave it entirely to experts and/or users of other languages
(French, Japanese, Arabic, or Sanscrit!) to see whether (and
how) CC might be useful (possibly for the same reasons) in
their language
But you evidently know French, so ask yourself you to represent
the high, front, rounded vowel, as found in the 2nd person
singular pronoun, "tu" or the similar dipthong found in "lui".
>...merely to propose a simplified 'spelling' system which
does, yes, 'strip away' the etymology which is (I hear/fear the
flames of wrath here) *unnecessary* in ordinary daily usage!
No wrath; it's just that this etymological aspect of English
spelling is, for better or worse, one of the keys to the
success of English spelling (yes, success - it's not very
intuitive, but lots of people are able to use it regardless),
and of the English language itself. If English were written
phonetically, with different spellings in Australia, NZ, India,
Singapore, Kenya, US, Canada, England, etc. (and all that
multiplied many times by the many different dialects within
those countries), the language - spoken and written - would not
have 1% of the current status that it has in the world today.
We'd most likely be having this discussion in French (providing
they hadn't written phonetically, in which case... )
As far as proposals to improve English spelling go, I'm
inclined to agree with Michael that the best reform would
introduce limited and minor changes that provide greater
consistency.
By the way, before I go any further in this thread, I'd better
stop to point out that the views I've expressed are my own, and
not those of my employer. (Seriously.)
Peter
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.2 : Tue Jul 10 2001 - 17:20:51 EDT