Crazy English

03/08/08 & 03/10/08

Recently you might have seen  a forwarding of an interesting presentation  of  'Crazy English' listing the many inconsistencis in English plurals and other usages. That inspired me to send to you today some other material that I gathered, to present 'Crazy English' from another angle, the aspect of spellings. This great English language, the language of the 'once an Empire on which the sun never set', but even now the 'lingua franca' of the world, the accepted common language of the European Union, this universal language, alas, is not only crazy wrt plurals, but also many spellings that are inconsistent, irrational, illogical and redundant.

I would call English the ' b-u-t  but  and  p-u-t  put' language. Similar spellings. But the 'u' in 'but' is as in 'shut', while the 'u' in 'put' is as in 'foot' ! If the child were to ask why it is so, no answer except to warn not to ask such questions !
 
An interesting anecdote. A candidate for a job interview, was faring rather badly.  The Interviewer got vexed and said to candidate " I would consider you if at least you answer this one last question correctly.  Spell the word 'coffee' ".  The candidate scratched his head for a while, and blurted out 'KAUGHY' !.  Not a single letter correct! Yet, can be justified, considering the words 'laugh' and 'many' !  That is English language !

Variety of inconsistencies.
1. Crazy Words pronounced similarly, but spelled differently,
2. Words pronounced differently, but spelled similarly.
3. Same alphabet pronounced
differently, 
4. Some alphabets just 'silent',  and so forth'. 

A few examples :

1  Words pronounced similarly, but spelled differently :
after - laughter       attention - tension     beauty - duty    bread-red   bout - doubt
cot - caught    bee-key     done - son    dime - rhyme    brown-noun    eye-sigh    fir-fur
fine-sign    gum-some   hope-soap    knot-naught   loot-flute    one-won     pitch-which
puff-tough   none-nun   ripe-type    rude-brood   site-sight    sock-walk  kite-night
tyre-tire   wood- would   wonder-blunder    year-ear    . . . . .  and many more.

2.  Words spelled similarly but pronounced differently:

but - put    book-boot  blood-wood   bleak-break   bull-lull   cough-through  come-dome
could-mould   cull-pull   dove-move   divegive   door-moor   head-eat   dead-bead   food-mood   gone-done   low-cow   look-nook   near-neat   power-lower  push-rush   phone-gone   rough-cough   son-don   soul-soup   swear-sweat   touch-couch   wood-wool   was-has 

  3.  Same alphabet pronounced differently:

age-are (a)   bar-bad (a)   cycle (c)   circle (c)   centre-cat (c)   divine (d)    gage (g)
hard-hand (a)   gin-give (g)    hire-give (i)   circus (c)   mystic-mynah (y)   report-rectify (e)  scarce (c)   target-budget (g)   tank-talk (a)    wise-wink (i)

 4.  Redundant alphabets :

balm(l)   catch (t)   column (n)   aisle (s)   comb (b)   damn (n)   ditch (t)   doubt (b)   debt (b) fetch (t)   know(k)   kneel (k)   muscle (c)   often (t)   pneumatic (p)  pseudo (p)  receipt (p) science (first c )    talk (l)   whole (w)   yolk (l) 

 5.  Irrational  spellings:

alight   align   bought   cough   caught   cheque   delight   dough   daughter   eight   knight   knave   laugh   rough   sight   through   threw   would   walk

 Well I think the above samples are enuf to justify the coronation of English as the
'His Highness  Crazy English' !

However, all the above only indicate the diagnosis which basically is that the written word does not conform to spoken word.  Any solution to this problem? Yes. In 2002 I had written and published a book entitled 'New English' that dealt with this. Some formulations were postulated to get conformity between spoken and written words. This will be dealt with next week, to conclude this topic.