I think many of his changes were really good, except for Q. He literally ditched Q and then hired a graphic designer to make a new letter... which did Q's job. Just let Q make the KW sound. I...
I think many of his changes were really good, except for Q. He literally ditched Q and then hired a graphic designer to make a new letter... which did Q's job. Just let Q make the KW sound.
I would also change his solution to the CH problem. Just give the CH sound to C, and replace C in words with K or S where necessary.
But I agree with the premise. The English alphabet could certainly be updated to reflect how the language is actually used.
Replacing C with K and S is actually a pretty bad idea unless you also drastically change how S works. Soft C is always voiceless /s/, while S itself very frequently is actually/z/. But you don't...
Replacing C with K and S is actually a pretty bad idea unless you also drastically change how S works. Soft C is always voiceless /s/, while S itself very frequently is actually/z/. But you don't really want to split S apart based on phonetics because then you get annoying things like cats and dogz.
I actually watched this video independently of this post on Tildes. And, the whole time I was watching it, I couldn't help but think of the Plan for the Improvement of English Spelling attributed...
I actually watched this video independently of this post on Tildes. And, the whole time I was watching it, I couldn't help but think of the Plan for the Improvement of English Spelling attributed to Mark Twain. This revamp is just as logical and ridiculous as that one.
It could be better as sh → x, as in some Roman languages; and th → y as it was in English. If we speak about another English reform thne I also recall Simpel-Fonetik which's based on Finnish...
Bai iear 15 or sou, it wud fainali bi posibl tu meik ius ov thi ridandant letez "c", "y" and "x" -- bai now jast a memori in the maindz ov ould doderez -- tu riplais "ch", "sh", and "th" rispektivli.
It could be better as sh → x, as in some Roman languages; and th → y as it was in English.
If we speak about another English reform thne I also recall Simpel-Fonetik which's based on Finnish languages.
A fun and educational watch. I fear I involuntarily twitch a little whenever I contemplate no longer being able to use the ASCII character set for most things, but that's a sort of guilty holdover...
A fun and educational watch. I fear I involuntarily twitch a little whenever I contemplate no longer being able to use the ASCII character set for most things, but that's a sort of guilty holdover from having programmed computers since the 1970s. The world has moved on to Unicode and could support alphabetic evolution in English, at least if it happened organically.
Is that a worry for the future of language? Maybe worry isn't the right word, but "something": that the representation of words and letters on the internet, standardized across billions of users,...
Is that a worry for the future of language? Maybe worry isn't the right word, but "something": that the representation of words and letters on the internet, standardized across billions of users, restricts the natural evolution of the writing system? Granted, the internet is very, very young compared to writing, but it is something that has struck me before, that computer systems will be harder to change than physical writing which can differ from one town or person to the next in style and accuracy. I suppose only time will tell, but I'd be interested to hear others' thoughts.
Note, I'm not an English [I even cann't tell that I know this language very well] or even Germanic linguist. But the main problem of English isn't the alphabet or orthography but language as...
Note, I'm not an English [I even cann't tell that I know this language very well] or even Germanic linguist. But the main problem of English isn't the alphabet or orthography but language as itself which has very many changes, also if you would make orthography very phonetic then each dialect would have own spelling, so… good luck? In the result, orthography is hard because the language is hard, not otherwise.
An another note, I didn't watched the video, only jumped but cadres. First impresion, it's a joke video. But let's try to some analize it and make a new spelling.
Video brings changes only for consonants: th → þ, ch → ч, sh → ş, zh → ž, ss → ß, ng → ŋ, ni + a vowel → ñ, removed q and… returned under a new symbol which I couldn't [or lazy to find for] type here; and a only one vowel ə.
For starts, I don't recommend to use a Cyrillic script for any language, even for Slavic, because it's just a Greek transliteration which gone so far. It'd be better just use Greek — it'd be the same. By the way, ч itself if from Hebrew alphabet, because Greek doesn't had one, but there were trying to use ҁ for the same sound and which's a brother to q from Latin.
If we wanted to use any Latin letter from other alphabet like ş, ž and so on then it would be good to look why do they exist in this form there. And there's additional question, why did he use ч, ş, ž? Because in one language such as Czech, Slovak, Croatian etc that'd be basically č, š and ž.
Some novices, like @BCM_00 already have did, would recommend to remove c. I don't recommend to do this. If you want to watch more videos about English reforms, note this channel. Still, teorethically, you can change Greek ch into kh, but ch as in cheap change into tch.
I agree that the alphabet isn't the primary issue with English. Like you mentioned, it's that there are so many different influences, and there isn't a consistent standard for spelling and...
I agree that the alphabet isn't the primary issue with English. Like you mentioned, it's that there are so many different influences, and there isn't a consistent standard for spelling and pronunciation. Tough, though, through, and thought are all pronounced drastically differently, Eben though they are wireless almost identically.
My comments on c and q were primarily in response to Rob's goal of efficiency. Why have 2 characters that make the same sound?
I would absolutely not use Greek. η, ι and υ are the exact same sound, as are ο and ω. ψ is unnecessary, you could just use πσ if you were updating the language. Same for ξ, when you could just...
I would absolutely not use Greek. η, ι and υ are the exact same sound, as are ο and ω. ψ is unnecessary, you could just use πσ if you were updating the language. Same for ξ, when you could just use κσ. Eight vowels, and not one of them can make the oo sound, a basic vowel! You have to write ου to do that.
Greek, and I say this with love, has one of the most ridiculous alphabets I've ever seen. Like half the letters are redundant.
Yeah. But it's the same situation in Cyrillic which just copied — η → и, ι → і, υ → ѵ, ο → о, ω → ѡ, ψ → ѱ, ξ → ѯ —, and had the same problem untill reforms happened in all Cyrillic Slavic...
Yeah. But it's the same situation in Cyrillic which just copied — η → и, ι → і, υ → ѵ, ο → о, ω → ѡ, ψ → ѱ, ξ → ѯ —, and had the same problem untill reforms happened in all Cyrillic Slavic alphabets. For compare, for Ukrainian it took a long time, and still there's some problem or alogical things.
If we speak about i-sounds then teoreticallyη, ι and υ can be used for æ / h, i and u / y — English doesn't have this sound, it's German ü or French u in many positions —, and ο with ω are for o and ɔ — I don't remember/know which language distinguish those sounsd, but you can try to find out it youself.
What about ψ and ξ, well, good luck; the former letter at least found its place in science, what about the latter I don't recall anything, because if we speak about ks in science then it's usually x which came from a shape of χ, but maybe somewhere in science too but still it has rare occurrence.
I wasn't sure what a capital ə would actually look like, but, yes, it's just a big version of the same character: Ə. It seems like Ǝ would've made more sense, though. Oh well.
I wasn't sure what a capital ə would actually look like, but, yes, it's just a big version of the same character: Ə. It seems like Ǝ would've made more sense, though. Oh well.
I think many of his changes were really good, except for Q. He literally ditched Q and then hired a graphic designer to make a new letter... which did Q's job. Just let Q make the KW sound.
I would also change his solution to the CH problem. Just give the CH sound to C, and replace C in words with K or S where necessary.
But I agree with the premise. The English alphabet could certainly be updated to reflect how the language is actually used.
Replacing C with K and S is actually a pretty bad idea unless you also drastically change how S works. Soft C is always voiceless /s/, while S itself very frequently is actually/z/. But you don't really want to split S apart based on phonetics because then you get annoying things like cats and dogz.
I actually watched this video independently of this post on Tildes. And, the whole time I was watching it, I couldn't help but think of the Plan for the Improvement of English Spelling attributed to Mark Twain. This revamp is just as logical and ridiculous as that one.
I thought of that too! At least the difference is one of the two is in jest :)
It could be better as sh → x, as in some Roman languages; and th → y as it was in English.
If we speak about another English reform thne I also recall Simpel-Fonetik which's based on Finnish languages.
“What sort of self-respecting letter needs help to get anything done?”
Ha he messed up the text at the end and used a ç where he meant to use ч.
A fun and educational watch. I fear I involuntarily twitch a little whenever I contemplate no longer being able to use the ASCII character set for most things, but that's a sort of guilty holdover from having programmed computers since the 1970s. The world has moved on to Unicode and could support alphabetic evolution in English, at least if it happened organically.
Is that a worry for the future of language? Maybe worry isn't the right word, but "something": that the representation of words and letters on the internet, standardized across billions of users, restricts the natural evolution of the writing system? Granted, the internet is very, very young compared to writing, but it is something that has struck me before, that computer systems will be harder to change than physical writing which can differ from one town or person to the next in style and accuracy. I suppose only time will tell, but I'd be interested to hear others' thoughts.
Note, I'm not an English [I even cann't tell that I know this language very well] or even Germanic linguist. But the main problem of English isn't the alphabet or orthography but language as itself which has very many changes, also if you would make orthography very phonetic then each dialect would have own spelling, so… good luck? In the result, orthography is hard because the language is hard, not otherwise.
An another note, I didn't watched the video, only jumped but cadres. First impresion, it's a joke video. But let's try to some analize it and make a new spelling.
Video brings changes only for consonants: th → þ, ch → ч, sh → ş, zh → ž, ss → ß, ng → ŋ, ni + a vowel → ñ, removed q and… returned under a new symbol which I couldn't [or lazy to find for] type here; and a only one vowel ə.
For starts, I don't recommend to use a Cyrillic script for any language, even for Slavic, because it's just a Greek transliteration which gone so far. It'd be better just use Greek — it'd be the same. By the way, ч itself if from Hebrew alphabet, because Greek doesn't had one, but there were trying to use ҁ for the same sound and which's a brother to q from Latin.
If we wanted to use any Latin letter from other alphabet like ş, ž and so on then it would be good to look why do they exist in this form there. And there's additional question, why did he use ч, ş, ž? Because in one language such as Czech, Slovak, Croatian etc that'd be basically č, š and ž.
Some novices, like @BCM_00 already have did, would recommend to remove c. I don't recommend to do this. If you want to watch more videos about English reforms, note this channel. Still, teorethically, you can change Greek ch into kh, but ch as in cheap change into tch.
I agree that the alphabet isn't the primary issue with English. Like you mentioned, it's that there are so many different influences, and there isn't a consistent standard for spelling and pronunciation. Tough, though, through, and thought are all pronounced drastically differently, Eben though they are wireless almost identically.
My comments on c and q were primarily in response to Rob's goal of efficiency. Why have 2 characters that make the same sound?
I would absolutely not use Greek. η, ι and υ are the exact same sound, as are ο and ω. ψ is unnecessary, you could just use πσ if you were updating the language. Same for ξ, when you could just use κσ. Eight vowels, and not one of them can make the oo sound, a basic vowel! You have to write ου to do that.
Greek, and I say this with love, has one of the most ridiculous alphabets I've ever seen. Like half the letters are redundant.
Yeah. But it's the same situation in Cyrillic which just copied — η → и, ι → і, υ → ѵ, ο → о, ω → ѡ, ψ → ѱ, ξ → ѯ —, and had the same problem untill reforms happened in all Cyrillic Slavic alphabets. For compare, for Ukrainian it took a long time, and still there's some problem or alogical things.
If we speak about i-sounds then teoretically η, ι and υ can be used for æ / h, i and u / y — English doesn't have this sound, it's German ü or French u in many positions —, and ο with ω are for o and ɔ — I don't remember/know which language distinguish those sounsd, but you can try to find out it youself.
What about ψ and ξ, well, good luck; the former letter at least found its place in science, what about the latter I don't recall anything, because if we speak about ks in science then it's usually x which came from a shape of χ, but maybe somewhere in science too but still it has rare occurrence.
I wasn't sure what a capital ə would actually look like, but, yes, it's just a big version of the same character: Ə. It seems like Ǝ would've made more sense, though. Oh well.