Fixes

(This page is being worked on.)

There are 2 systems I particularly like: Masha Bell's and Dr. Yule's! 

Masha Bell's approach is --from what I gather-- more traditional as it tries hard to keep some of the basic rules that teacher teach to young learners. Her new coding is regularising the system as much as it is sensible.

Dr. Yule's Interspel system is also looking to regularize matters, but in a different manner

1) Masha Bell's Suggestions

Essentially, Masha Bell's idea is to keep the spelling rules, but to regularize a lot of them, and make a few other changes as well.

• No (limit) "ea", but use the "ee" or "eCe" pattern!
• Double those consonants for short vowels sounds, regularly.
• Eliminate the double consonants when they are not needed.
• Change "gh" to "f".
• Redundant final "e" are indeed redundant!
• Past tense "ed" changed to "t" or "d", when the preceding syllable does not end with "t" and "d"
• Short "e", written as "e",is regularized. So, bed, but sed for said, hed for head, eny for any, frend for friend
• Short "u", written as "u", is regularized. So, cut, but cuple for couple, cum for come, cumpass for compass)
• Using the "oo" digraph is problematic because there are so many alternatives (ou, o, u, ...). No definite solution offered.

2) INTERSPEL (DR. YULE's system)

I cannot recollect if Dr.Yule's system grew on me or if my research led me to it! In any case, it is a system that --for the most part-- I can live with. It is a system that makes compromises like Masha Bell's idea above. This is a system that seems to please the decision-makers (and the voters). It does try to regularize things without making English look like a completely new system! I don't like to cater to the interested or not so interested parties since I foresee a system that would be adopted by children who have yet to learn to write and read, but Dr. Yule is probably much wiser than I considering the years and the decades of work she has put into reforming English spelling!

I urge you to skip this section and go to the Wikipedia's article. It is far better an explanation.

The twist

Dr. Yule advocates that the magic "e" be either added to the vowel that it "controls" or "influences" or put an accent on top of those vowels. So, the long vowels would look like this.

long a : ae or à / to make: pale ----- pael or pàl:

pael or pàl for pale

The same could be said for the long i, e, o, u, transforming pile, peach, pole, cute into

piel or pil (with an accent) ... for pile


peech or pech (with an accent) ... for peach


poel or pol (with an accent) ,,, for pole


cuet or cut (with an accent) ,,, for cute

Dr. Yule recommends that 31 words remain written as they are now because these would make texts less different as these words are ubiquitous in many texts. This idea flies against my idea of making a new system free of the influence and the constraints imposed by traditional speakers (as I believe it should be introduced in schools, phased in that way for 15 years or so), making both systems living side by side. Refer to the main page for a more complete explanation and implications of what would that entail.

I would remove "are" from that list, as it is a word that rimes with "am" and as (az), at, hat, ....

I am. waz, wil

You ar, wer, wil,...

S/he is (iz?), waz

We ar, wer

You ar. wer

They ar, wer

That is so logical and so beautiful! The "is" with an "s" pronounced like an "z" is problematic and I would rather change it to "z", but that's because Dr. Yule's intent is to "appease" the purists and to implement the change among the literate English-speakers of this world! I would be just as happy to have both systems live side by side. In time, traditional spelling would "vanish", although I am sure some people will be interested in being "bicodal"!

I recommend that you follow the link to her website for other explanations as her system is made up of 3 levels.

The inconsistent use of the single vowel with a consonant like in words like be, we, she, he, do, by, ... is not too problematic. We can have a few rules. Here, a rule where a CV word can have a few odd spellings to simplify things. Is it really hard to remember that a CV words with an e vowel is always going to be pronounced like be, we, she, he,... as long as it is consistent, I am okay with that. But, what to do with the exceptions: see, pee, knee, tree, bee,... One thing is clear, the words often used have dropped the second "e"! And, in the case of be/bee, the difference helps with the meaning. Could children get used to pe for pee, se for see, tre for tree? Why not!

Not many words end with an "i" and if they do they have an "e" like a die, lie, pie, tie, vie,... often the "y" is used to make the alphabet i: by, my, why, guy, ... exception: hi, dye, buy, bye... Again, consistency would help. Using the "y" is a bit counter-intuitive because "y" is used for the ending of adverbs. Which makes sense? In the interspel system, the single i would make more sense (since it is derived from the conbo of i+e) to make the alphabet i sound. Could kids read and spell bi, mi, whi, and gui? Hi would ollow the rule, but dye would be di, and buy would be bi (Is it important to distinguish bi (buy) from bi (by) and bi (bye)? ) I went bi to bi! "Bi! He said! Which one does the person means: buy or bye? There could be confusion! Thanks to Interspell, we could add the "e" to differentiate two words.


THE EXCEPTIONS

Sight words or common words are notoriously irregular. Just think of these pairs: am/are, one/won, be/see, glue/few

I suggest we change them slightly, in keeping with the above structure.

Here is the complete list of these "pests".

1) are, as, was, half to be changed to ar, az, waz, haf

2) all, almost, always

3) a, an, among

4) come, some

5) could, should, would

6) pull push put

7) know, of, off

8) one, once

9) what

10) want

11) two, to, who

I suggest we respell some of these words for consistancy.

1) am, as, was, at ------ drop the "e" -- ar (are) and haf (half), az,

2) all, almost, always ------ ol, olmost, olways

3) a, an, among ----- u, un, umong (like in fun, sum, luck,...)

4) come, some -------- com, som

5) could, should, would --------- cood, shood, wood (like in book, hook, cook,...)

6) put, push, pull -------- poot, poosh, pool**

7) know, of, off ----------- kno, ov, of

8) one, once ----------- wun, wuns

9) what --- what (it does sound differently than the a in am, as, and at), but I suspect the w makes it so.

10) want ------- want (here the n makes the a sound like a nasal vowel)

11) two, to, who ------- tue, tue, whue (Unfortunately, these look like alien word\, but the silent e indicates a long phoneme, which is in keeping with the above rules. Alternatively, we could have a rule that says that if the word doesn't end with a consonant, then the oo digraph (usually short) is long. Not the best of solution, but close enough! So, in that case, too, too, whoo would be how they would be represented. Not bad!