The Star. SATURDAY, AUGUST 10, 1912. RATIONAL SPELLING.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 10536, 10 August 1912, Page 6

The Star. SATURDAY, AUGUST 10, 1912. RATIONAL SPELLING.

r If only the experts would put their , heads together and initiate an earnest | sustained movement in favour of phoi netic spelling, there might be some hope of the reform receiving the atten- ( tion it deserves from tho general '!-public. But from time to time different schemes of reformed rational or /simplified spelling are boomed, and the \ names of eminent persons are quoted lin support of them, and on examination it is discovered that no two of the jchemes agree, and that some arbitrary rrule is adopted that raises a subsidiary 'controversy, quite overshadowing the discussion of the main question. The latest scheme or system of simplified spelling to be advertised has the backing of a body called the Simplified -Spelling Society, or, as it prefers to spell itself, the Simplified Speling Soosiety,. which is said to have been founded largely through the influence of Pro- ■ lessor Skeat. A good many people can claim to have been interested in this subject, "largely through the influence of Professor Skeat," for Processor Skeat attacked the spelling of modern English convincingly, but it is ■ difficult to believe that Professor . Skeat or any other authority on philology would recommend the particular (system adopted by the Society. Here, Ifor example, is a paragraph from one W the Society's recent publications:— The objecshon that rashonal speling ■ spoilz the " byuety " ov the langwij rests on the falasy ov mistaking familiarity for pozitiv byuety. The byuety ov. a wurd liez in its sound and its asoesiaishona, not in the leterz .which reprezent it. The speling I am ! yueziag inevitably givz a shoe tu the "{unacustomd ie; but tu a jeneraishon acustomd tu it from yueth upwerdz, (it wil giv no shoo, and it wil pozes the ioenly byuety ov which speling iz ' caipabl—-naimly, the. byuety ov fitnes /for its purpos- ' It is quite true that a person of averr'sge intelligence could master thispar- ' ticular system of simplified spelling in half .an hour or less, but the same may ,'Ho said of other systems. The trouble (is that from the point of view of the Englishman the system is very little ■ better than the present one, while from the point of view of the foreigner it is as bad, if not worse. There are languages that adopt the logical method of giving to each letter one value and ionly one, and it would improve mat(ters if English were similarly logical. But if a rational system is to bo surely it would bo wise to choose one that could be read and accepted all over the world. To commence with, the use of the diphthong " ai." to reprepresent the sound of "a " .in "fate" is obviously vicious. It > would mislead every educated Englishman or foreigner, for " ai" in any sensible scheme would have th'e sound of "i" in "wide." There are weighty ''reasons for changing the spelling of English words, but if a change is to be made it should be in the direction of 'giving the vowels their Italian or German values. The consonants can be left with their English values, with a few modifications. It would be ne,cessary to discriminate between the I sounds of "th" in "the" and -"thin," but that difficulty oould be mveroome by using "dh" for one .sound and "th" for the other. What is needed is obviously a system that i would be applicable to the spelling of fall languages, and, as it happens, there is suoh a system already in use. ( The Indian Government has a very i Bound system of its own, although the use of an "a" to represent the sound jof the "o" in "come" may be considered a defect. In scientific works , such diffioulties are overcome by vary- . ing the type, and in view of the fact I that there are fourteen simple vowel Bounds to be represented by five letters, it is plain that modifications of some kind have to be introduced. However, minor troubles of this kind would soon disappear if it were decided to . /adopt a rational system. j Sir Harry Johnston, who has given very earnest study to the question, is

strongly of opinion that the nystem of Lepsius, with minor improvements, Iwould moot all requirements. Lepsius, .the great German Egyptologist and [philologist, devised his system at the jrequest of the Church Missionary Society, the object being to provide a Ipniform system of spelling for all new languages with which the missionaries Jjnight come in contact. " A combinaJfcion of the Lepsius system and that employed by the India Office and the Indian Government, the Royal Asiatic Society and the Royal Geographical Society," says Sir Harry, " would be the idea alphabet for the transcription of Engylish, and of every known form of human speech. Such an alphabet ought, by some international conference, to be drawn up and imposed on the world at large, taking the place of all others. Instead of, as at present, trying to learn and perpetuate some hundred different alphabets and of letters, of which there are, perhaps, forty in Southern Aria, and of which Hebrew, Arabic, Ethiopian, Ohinesa, Ohino-Japanese, Greek, CyrilJio, Irish, and Black-letter German are familiar examples, of tiresome individuality and needless variation—there ought to be but one universal alphabet of Latin or Italic letters, possessing fixed individual values." When phonetic spelling of modern English is trader consideration there is an additional difficulty, for it has yet .to be deckled what the correct pronunciation ©f English is.. Edinburgh has one ■tyle, Cambridge another, Oxford another, Now York another, San Francisco another, and doubtless another could be found in Australasia. Scotland stands to the "r " i n words from which Southern English eliminates it, i»nd there are other similar differences. But the more important reform is the adoption of a standard alphabet, not only for English but also for other languages, and the good people who are >ngaged in this agitation would %e more profitably engaged in advancing; the larger cause than in devising modifications that would be of use in one country at most.