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Redundancy

Redundancy

Allhazred
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Posted 03/07/08 - 11:35 AM: Subject: Redundancy	#1
Is declaing vowels redundant in open sylables? What I mean is that each letter in the alfabet is acompanied by a sound. the letter b has a 'buh' or 'beh' or even a 'bah' sound. Each consanant has such a 'uh' to close it out and distinguish it from the next sound. My question stems from the fact that declaring a vowel at the end of an open syllable such as 'ne' or 've'in never, is kind of redundant as nvr sounds quite intelligable when sounded out. Who knows, perhaps this only works when you know what the word is supposed to be. What are your thoughts on the matter? or mttr? Tht wrks too doesn't it? Sorry, but it works doesn't it or perhaps I'm just crazy?
_____________________ A lie told often enough becomes the truth. Vladimir Lenin your awareness of the whole is marred by your awareness of that which moves contrary to the whole - the sixth dimension Maybe... if you spend your life worrying... then the only way that your life will have meaning is if what you fear becomes real. - tagline from Sublime

Seneca
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Posted 03/07/08 - 04:54 PM:	#2
They are redundant in the same way that calligraphy is redundant. If you consider the stylistic aesthetic to be redundant that is. I suggest you learn chinese characters. just FYI: you could also just type every word in a jumbled order (except the first and last letter) and still have it be readable by anyone who can read fast enough. Edited by Seneca on 03/07/08 - 05:39 PM

PontificatingChauncy
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Posted 03/07/08 - 06:41 PM:	#3
Vowles are nessesary in that some words are pronounced with all but a single closing phonetic in common. I would imagine that the first vowles were mearly indicators of which variation the preceding consonant belonged to. The use was mearly generalized to form the commmon contemporary usage.
_____________________ The Tao that can be named is not the true Tao. That thing is a chauncy

swstephe
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Posted 03/07/08 - 08:16 PM:	#4
You aren't talking about redundancy, (the repeat of relevant information), you are talking about a form of spelling reform. There are hundreds of groups out there that try to promote their own variations. Removing short vowels is already being done in abjad's like Arabic and Hebrew. The difference is that Arabic and Hebrew have a relatively small set of vowels. English is characterized by the richness of vowel sounds, (we have 15-17, depending on your accent). The immediate problem I would see is that there are a lot of words that differ only by the short vowel. How do you tell which one you mean. Does "bt" mean "bat","bet","bit","bot", or "but"? Can you always tell by context? "The bt bt me in the bt a bt bt I bt it back". What do you do with words that start or end with short vowels? "It" would become "t" and "alpha" would be "lf" or "lf@", (the "@" is often used for the "schwa" sound). Just as an anecdote, I was part of some of the spelling reform groups. I found they ended up with a lot of accent fights. For example, the "rhotic" groups, (Americans mostly), insist on the ending "r" on words. Everyone else in the world, (non-rhotic), felt that the "r" wasn't being pronounced, so it should be left off, (think of how a Kennedy would pronounce "car"). In your example, the Americans might think "nvr" is better, while the rest of the world's English speakers would think "nve" is more correct. Try figuring out how to spell "schedule" in an American and British pronunciations. Any group that survived accent wars usually ended up with some kind of rule that "people should write the way they speak", which eliminates standardization, (try suggesting that "cot" and "caught" should be spelled the same to a group of mixed American accents). I thought the most trouble was in the vowels, too. We have 15-17 vowels, and wouldn't it be good if we had a language which only gave hints on vowels like Arabic and Hebrew? Where I live, they still maintain an Arabic writing system for the local, unrelated, language. I borrowed that system and tried to write up something similar to English, (and I've seen several other authors do similar attempts). As soon as I tried to create a dictionary, however, I found that there was a lot of overlap. That isn't unusual, we pronounce "record" differently and without effort when it is used as a noun or a verb. It looks like you are trying to implement a spelling reform based on SMS and chat shorthand. You need to come up with a systematic set of rules that are easy to learn. I find a lot of the shortcuts were simply introduced and explained enough times to be acceptable in the small group. You need to get past all the culturalists, justify the cost and need for translations of English works into the new spelling, and define a central authority where none exists.
_____________________ A software developer is someone who, when you tell them to "go to hell", they are more worried about the "goto".

Allhazred
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Posted 03/10/08 - 09:42 AM:	#5
Well this is something I have thought about a little before I posted. And many things you guys brought up I have considered. swstephe wrote: The immediate problem I would see is that there are a lot of words that differ only by the short vowel. How do you tell which one you mean. Does "bt" mean "bat","bet","bit","bot", or "but"? Can you always tell by context? "The bt bt me in the bt a bt bt I bt it back". What do you do with words that start or end with short vowels? "It" would become "t" and "alpha" would be "lf" or "lf@", (the "@" is often used for the "schwa" sound). Well this is obviously the biggest problem, words that differ only in the vowels. Well I am not really trying to reform english spelling, just sharing a thought. Anyway back to single vowel words, because that is really where the problem is. One vowel words are short enough that you would still right them out. These words are a single closed syllable. What I was proposing is for words of multi-sylable length, where open sylables are implemented. In the exampel of never, 'nver' would be the correct spelling, as it is broken into two sylables: 'ne' which is an open sylable and 'ver' which is closed.by a second consonant.. Words with no open sylables would be left alone. Words like 'alone' with a silent 'e' at the end would still have the silent 'e' because the 'e' is a direct cause on the vowel in the closed sylable. Alone breaks down into 'a' 'lon' when spoken, written we add an 'e' at the end to denote a long vowel in the preceding sylable which invarriably is a closed sylable. So alone would remain alone. The other major problem I've run across is sequences of sylables where an open sylable is followed by a sylable that consists of a vowell. Well it was a thought.
_____________________ A lie told often enough becomes the truth. Vladimir Lenin your awareness of the whole is marred by your awareness of that which moves contrary to the whole - the sixth dimension Maybe... if you spend your life worrying... then the only way that your life will have meaning is if what you fear becomes real. - tagline from Sublime

swstephe
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Posted 03/10/08 - 09:36 PM:	#6
Even multiple syllables aren't immune: "beggar", "bigger", "bagger", "bugger"; "framer", "farmer", "former", "firmer"; "budding", "bidding", "bedding". If you don't want to reform English spelling, then you may be a budding conlang designer. You should check out some conlang interest groups, like zompist.org. I used to hang out there, but wanted to write some architecture for building and testing conlangs -- with the ability to build filters so you can filter entire documents using your alteration rules. There is some interesting works out there. I remember one person who wrote a filter for "future English", applying some general language evolution rules to English to get an idea of where English might evolve, (independent of new radical influences). It starts out with February finally becoming "Febuary" and "library" becoming "libary" -- then gets more radical, with "sh" and some forms of "th" merging.
_____________________ A software developer is someone who, when you tell them to "go to hell", they are more worried about the "goto".

Landlady
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Posted 03/15/08 - 06:20 PM: Subject: English is Tough Stuff	#7
This thread reminded me of this poem. I think non-native English speakers know exactly how difficult it can be to learn English pronunciation. Dearest creature in creation, Study English pronunciation. I will teach you in my verse Sounds like corpse, corps, horse, and worse. I will keep you, Suzy, busy, Make your head with heat grow dizzy. Tear in eye, your dress will tear. So shall I! Oh hear my prayer. Just compare heart, beard, and heard, Dies and diet, lord and word, Sword and sward, retain and Britain. (Mind the latter, how it's written.) Now I surely will not plague you With such words as plaque and ague. But be careful how you speak: Say break and steak, but bleak and streak; Cloven, oven, how and low, Script, receipt, show, poem, and toe. Hear me say, devoid of trickery, Daughter, laughter, and Terpsichore, Typhoid, measles, topsails, aisles, Exiles, similes, and reviles; Scholar, vicar, and cigar, Solar, mica, war and far; One, anemone, Balmoral, Kitchen, lichen, laundry, laurel; Gertrude, German, wind and mind, Scene, Melpomene, mankind. Billet does not rhyme with ballet, Bouquet, wallet, mallet, chalet. Blood and flood are not like food, Nor is mould like should and would. Viscous, viscount, load and broad, Toward, to forward, to reward. And your pronunciation's OK When you correctly say croquet, Rounded, wounded, grieve and sieve, Friend and fiend, alive and live. Ivy, privy, famous; clamour And enamour rhyme with hammer. River, rival, tomb, bomb, comb, Doll and roll and some and home. Stranger does not rhyme with anger, Neither does devour with clangour. Souls but foul, haunt but aunt, Font, front, wont, want, grand, and grant, Shoes, goes, does. Now first say finger, And then singer, ginger, linger, Real, zeal, mauve, gauze, gouge and gauge, Marriage, foliage, mirage, and age. Query does not rhyme with very, Nor does fury sound like bury. Dost, lost, post and doth, cloth, loth. Job, nob, bosom, transom, oath. Though the differences seem little, We say actual but victual. Refer does not rhyme with deafer. Foeffer does, and zephyr, heifer. Mint, pint, senate and sedate; Dull, bull, and George ate late. Scenic, Arabic, Pacific, Science, conscience, scientific. Liberty, library, heave and heaven, Rachel, ache, moustache, eleven. We say hallowed, but allowed, People, leopard, towed, but vowed. Mark the differences, moreover, Between mover, cover, clover; Leeches, breeches, wise, precise, Chalice, but police and lice; Camel, constable, unstable, Principle, disciple, label. Petal, panel, and canal, Wait, surprise, plait, promise, pal. Worm and storm, chaise, chaos, chair, Senator, spectator, mayor. Tour, but our and succour, four. Gas, alas, and Arkansas. Sea, idea, Korea, area, Psalm, Maria, but malaria. Youth, south, southern, cleanse and clean. Doctrine, turpentine, marine. Compare alien with Italian, Dandelion and battalion. Sally with ally, yea, ye, Eye, I, ay, aye, whey, and key. Say aver, but ever, fever, Neither, leisure, skein, deceiver. Heron, granary, canary. Crevice and device and aerie. Face, but preface, not efface. Phlegm, phlegmatic, ass, glass, bass. Large, but target, gin, give, verging, Ought, out, joust and scour, scourging. Ear, but earn and wear and tear Do not rhyme with here but ere. Seven is right, but so is even, Hyphen, roughen, nephew Stephen, Monkey, donkey, Turk and jerk, Ask, grasp, wasp, and cork and work. Pronunciation -- think of Psyche! Is a paling stout and spikey? Won't it make you lose your wits, Writing groats and saying grits? It's a dark abyss or tunnel: Strewn with stones, stowed, solace, gunwale, Islington and Isle of Wight, Housewife, verdict and indict. Finally, which rhymes with enough? Though, through, plough, or dough, or cough? Hiccough has the sound of cup. My advice is give it up! (sorry, don't know who the author is)
_____________________ There is time to laugh and there is time not to laugh, and this is not one of them. - Insp. Clouseau. From the moment absurdity is recognized, it becomes a passion, the most harrowing of all. But whether or not one can live with one's passions, whether or not one can accept their law, which is to burn the heart they simultaneously exalt--that is the whole question. � Camus.

swstephe
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Posted 03/16/08 - 01:04 AM:	#8
Landlady wrote: This thread reminded me of this poem. I think non-native English speakers know exactly how difficult it can be to learn English pronunciation. And they never let you forget it. Many foreign language guides start out with "Unlike English, every letter in (language X), represents just one sound". Bernard Shaw gave the famous example, (although easily disproven), that "ghoti" should be pronounced "fish". Using "gh" from "enough", "o" from "women" and "ti" from "notion". Landlady wrote: (sorry, don't know who the author is) The Chaos by G. Nolst Trenit�
_____________________ A software developer is someone who, when you tell them to "go to hell", they are more worried about the "goto".

Landlady
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Posted 03/16/08 - 10:44 PM:	#9
Thanks, swstephe. Wow, the original poem is even longer!
_____________________ There is time to laugh and there is time not to laugh, and this is not one of them. - Insp. Clouseau. From the moment absurdity is recognized, it becomes a passion, the most harrowing of all. But whether or not one can live with one's passions, whether or not one can accept their law, which is to burn the heart they simultaneously exalt--that is the whole question. � Camus.

RedPhoenix
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Posted 03/25/08 - 03:41 AM:	#10
I took an Introductory Linguistics class last semester and our midterm included an essay on spelling reform. It was to be a response to an article on spelling reform trying to persuade the general public to take out side of whether or not spelling reform should take place. I also linked the article in case anyone is interested. Also keep in mind we had discussed some of this in class but this was written in a timed testing environment. (Luckily my professor let us type it on a laptop and email it so I didn't have to transcribe it for you) http://www.boston.com/news/nation/articles/2006/0... The essay I turned in: I think Darlene Superville maed a lot uv gud points in her artikl. It wud sertenli taek sum efrt tu cunvins the jenrl populis tu go along with speling reform but ther cud bi meni benefits. Spelling reform certainly wouldn�t happen overnight, but I believe it would be possible. Sure, people would have some difficulty adjusting and some people would resist, but if new spelling was implemented in education and the majority of popular publications switched to the new spelling system, the transition would probably be less painful than many people think. If English spelling was simplified, children would arguably be better able to learn the language and illiteracy rates could be reduced. Our limited educational resources could then be reallocated to other areas of need. Time and effort could also be saved in that spelling the word through might only be spelled thru. This would constitute over a 40% reduction in effort to spell the same word. This spelling is already widely used in text messaging and online chat to save time and effort. Opponents of spelling reform will argue that books and old publications would have to be transcribed to the new spelling system. This is true, but with the technologies available today, this would be a relatively simple process. For years, popular books, newspapers and magazines have been published with the use of computer programs and saved in digital formats. These files could be edited by a simple translation program that makes one to one associations between the new and old spellings. Making English easier to learn and use could also be of a great benefit to American businesses as it could boost the universality of English and encourage even more foreign companies to do business in English. English is already a lingua franca in many areas of the world and could potentially unite even more areas that have diverse populations as it has already done for many. Other countries and languages have gone through spelling reforms and had positive results. Norwegian has in fact gone through several spelling reforms to make their spelling more phonetic and consistent. In conclusion, spelling reform, though it would require a large effort, could be of a great benefit to the English language and to those who use it now and in the future.

swstephe
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Posted 03/26/08 - 07:37 PM:	#11
As a former charter member of some spelling reform movements, here are some of my comments on the essay points: Spelling is constantly changing over time, it is a matter of culture and preference. I always thought it was silly to claim "reform". What is really missing is standardization (standardisation in British English). Most major languages have boards which review and implement spelling reforms, some of them can be major changes. You know those words that the British and the Americans spell different, like color/colour, labor/labour? That was thanks to Daniel Webster and an act of congress, (they accepted about 2 dozen out of hundreds of changes -- some that didn't get accepted, but you might see used are "lite" instead of "light". Make a "board of English standard", get England, Australia and America to agree and all the other countries would probably go along, (I saw, recently, that the majority of people who speak English don't live in generally English-speaking countries, with some suggestions that they might decide how English evolve). Compare reading English to reading Chinese, (I can read Chinese at a grade-school level). I think English must be harder. From the extreme standpoint, you could say that we have to memorize 4 character sets, uppercase and lowercase, print and cursive. What is the point for uppercase letters? In German, all nouns are capitalized, so there is a linguistic rule to follow, but in English, it is a kind of honorific and punctuation. We later added punctuation, and honorifics in written form doesn't add anything that is there in speech. In Chinese, you learn one character and it is valid in all the character combinations and with grammar particles. Someone learning English has to recognize a word with all the prefixes, suffixes and inflection, (the difference between "record" in "a record" and "to record"). Look at how many schools in English speaking countries have to teach reading and writing to students all the way into college, and even then people need spell checkers to make sure they don't look uneducated. Many other languages boast a nearly one-to-one spelling-to-pronunciation mapping, except English. I think spelling reform would be surprisingly easy to accept. I am an American who moved to a country which uses British spelling standard. I find that I have already made the mental switch to the new system within a few years. I now drive on the left, and automatically write "neighbour" and "behaviour" without a second thought. People accept "eye speak", (when an author emphasizes a local dialect in their spelling), pretty well -- try running a spell checker over Mark Twain, (I used Tom Sawyer to test some linguistic software -- it thought "Lordy Tom" was the name of an important character!). I was interested in writing some software that would perform spelling reform transformations of text on websites automatically -- then apply some regional accent modifiers just for fun, (I picked up "An Actor's Guide to Accents" for the latter part). There was a case study -- a group of children were taught a certain spelling reforms system of spelling as their first way to read/write. They found that the children learned faster, but after the test, (as adults), about half complained that it slowed them down in adapting to "normal" spelling -- while the other half said it helped them get access to information faster. I always thought that, as technology advances, our minds have to fill up with much more information, but are being hindered by having to process archaic writing systems, (the reason we spell "threw" and "through" differently is because they were actually pronounced differently at one point in English history).
_____________________ A software developer is someone who, when you tell them to "go to hell", they are more worried about the "goto".

RedPhoenix
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Posted 03/27/08 - 03:26 AM:	#12
I view reform as the means to achieve standardization in this case, but that's just a matter of definitions really. English spelling actually used to be phonetic, until the invention of the printing press. Once the written word became more widely spread, spelling began to automatically standardize. Unfortunately for us, pronunciation has changed since then, but we're still stuck with the old spellings leaving us with only a semiphonetic spelling system. "Most major languages have boards..." Yes, a great example of this is the regulatory board for the Norwegian language which has implemented 3 major spelling reforms in the last century. The only real difference between our use of capital letters and their use in German is that we only capitalize proper nouns and they capitalize all nouns. Both languages capitalize the first letter of a sentence regardless of what type of word contains it. I believe our system to be just as valid, simply different. German speech doesn't really give any special emphasis to nouns so there really isn't much of a correlation to this capitalization in German either. The problem with English isn't that it uses affixes to indicate meaning, if anything it's the inconsistency of their use that makes it confusing. Truly, the major issue that gives English its inconsistencies is rooted in Norman Invasion of 1066. In short, the French conquered England, but they spoke different languages. The germanic grammar of the brits was retained, but much of the latinate vocabulary was infused and in turn created a new pidgin that eventually turned into Old English. What made this unique in that much of the germanic vocabulary was also retained (most pidgins only retain the vocabulary of one of the languages) which is why we have so many synonyms in modern day English. I don't think people's ability would really hinder a spelling standardization as much as their willingness to accept such change. I found your 2 tidbits at the end pretty interesting

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