Talk:Spelling reform
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I think not enough attention is paid here to the circumstances in which language reform generally takes place. Isn't it interesting, historically, that many of those who have pushed for reforms tend to be political radicals also? There might well be a hidden agenda as well as an impatient desire for change and simplicity.
It is certainly true that it doesnot require a political push for a language to evolve, it will do so on its own (though whether that is an advance or dysgenesis is moot).
Leaders of major political revolutions (or invasions), particularly the more oppressive regimes, waste no time in "simplifying" the spelling, grammar, vocabulary of the lingua franca, ostensibly to make it more available to the poor ......, but certainly to impose aNewspeak of their own, to insinuate the new culture into every cranny of their subjects' new existence. A mere side-effect of all this generous help is that, very shortly, most old literature and guidance in the old ways becomes almost completely inaccessible to the new generations, & a cultural paradigm can be completely shifted in double quick time.For that reason alone, those of us who value our liberty should be very suspicious of educational (quiet) or political (noisy) initiatives radically to change our mode of basic communication.
Think about that the next time you are offered something "for free"; a subtlesemiotic variant of "in return for you freedom".
Memethuzla (talk)06:20, 12 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]
'Simplified spelling' should not redirect here, but it does, at the time of writing. To those in the know, the two concepts are far from interchangeable. Simplified spelling has been implemented repeatedly, not only in the writings of private hobbyists and historical genii, but in the secret communications of companies, as well as learning simplification programs such as theI.T.A. andSayspel.The current redirection arrangement also seems to mitigate against bothSimplified Spelling andSpelling Reform. For one thing, it results in simplified spelling schemes not being properly documented, despite their limited historical successes and implementations. Additionally, I raised the subject of 'spelling reform' with another ordinary working class gent, recently (a caretaker atCharlton House, in fact) and noted that he responded with much greater enthusiasm to the concept of 'simplified spelling,' which, despite involving a longer word, sounds less hifalutin. Arguably, the confusion between simplified spelling and spelling reform is among the historical reasons for the failure of the latter. The failure to appreciate, treasure, and use simplified spelling, once devised, itself mitigates against its acceptance, but an instant, assumed equation of examples of simplified spelling with spelling reform, or an attempt thereat, sets it up for something it is unlikely, in any given instance, to achieve. Many simplified spelling schemes are devised, in many written languages, but the number of historical instances of spelling reform is minute in comparison - this becomes clear early on in the study of the subject. Some schemes may be 'born to fail,' in that respect, in the sense that there was never any intention for them to replace traditional spelling -I.T.A. is an example of this. Many are doomed, in this sense, simply owing to the obvious difficulty of instituting changes which will meet with the approval of large (and sometimes, even, comparatively small) language communities. Said confusion therefore leads to expectations unlikely to be met, and a failure, at the time, to appreciate the beauty and worth of any individual simplified spelling scheme for what it is - an experiment in design.--86.31.105.33 (talk)06:59, 3 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I've removed from the article the part where it seemed to state that switching Moldovan spelling from Cyrillic to Latin was accompanied by a phonemization of the orthography. The same part also was saying that Moldovan is a variety of Romanian. Both statements are false. I didn't bother labeling the passage as lacking sources, since I know for a fact that there aren't any.
Moldovan is in fact Romanian. The language was given a different name (and a different script) in Moldova for political reasons and no other. There is no linguist stating they are different languages, or dialects, or anything of the sort. It's one language.
Its Cyrillic orthography was in fact about just as phonemic as the Latin orthography that was used before and after. There is an almost 1 to 1 correspondence between the two scripts (somewhat like the two spellings of Serbian), with only a few exceptions that are regular and depend on the actual pronunciation. As such, the transition in 1989 from Cyrillic to Latin in Moldova was not, and cannot be, justified as a means to render the spelling more phonemic, but to reunite the orthography of the language. —AdiJapan07:52, 18 November 2011 (UTC)[reply]
There's a dialogue on the talk page ofEnglish-language spelling reform about the definition of spelling reform (here). Your input is appreciated.Throughme (talk)20:59, 5 June 2013 (UTC)[reply]
