You may note that I don’t correct spelling errors of commenters. That is because, in my opinion, the Internet is producing phonetic English. I do not remember the last time I had any difficulty understanding, even reading at full speed, what a commenter was talking about.
In England, the purpose of language is largely to tell you what claaaahss a person is. Among the colonials over here, spelling tells you whether a person is educated in terms of our established religion. Many and many a PC cannot think, but by God he can SPELL.
This impresses me the same way a lawyer in a black dress or a drunk in a costume impresses me. But I am not alone. I remember that ten or twelve years ago, there were regular complaints in the chatrooms and Newsgroups about someone’s spelling. Now I don’t see ANY of that.
We may be solving a problem the English-speaking world has had for centuries. And it is a problem people like me have all the time: I want to see how a word is spelled, but I can’t look it up because it is in alphabetical order and I can’t FIND it because I can’t SPELL it.
If you are Buckley and you get PAID for not thinking, all this and words no one else uses and untranslated French phrases are fun and impress the hell out of the illiterates in the press corps and on campus. But for those of us who specialize in THINKING words are just tools, and we do not want to read twelve pages of instructions before we put down what we are thinking.
Spelling, like English English, is a matter of claaahsss. You show you have gone to Cambridge or gotten a full dose of Mommy Professor here by repeating the spelling prescribed by some dictionary.
I consider myself an aristocrat, but the last reason for that is that I can lord it over comrades who don’t spend their lives over a friggin’ dictionary.
And PLEASE don’t make the comment you would have made if I had never been born. READ what I wrote. Somebody is going to say, “But that way lies CHAOS!!!!” I started off by saying I have not had a single problem understanding what a person was saying because of his spelling.
That way lies sanity, not chaos.
#1 by Peter on 02/07/2007 - 2:34 pm
NOT SPAM
NOT SPAM
That is a good point. But typographical errors aside, true spelling errors tell me the person does not read or write much to know how to spell words. Some are forgivable like writing “per say” instead of “per se” — but some of the misspelled words are not uncommon — they just don’t SEE the words written to know how they are spelled. For example, someone who writes “I would of” instead of “I would have.” Though, granted, I suppose someone can be educated just as well verbally.
Spell checkers – like the one now built into Firefox, which I use on Bob’s blog – can catch most ugly spelling errors, but not grammatical errors.
#2 by Bob on 02/07/2007 - 2:40 pm
Why should they read or write much? I want them to THINK.
#3 by Dave on 02/07/2007 - 4:01 pm
NOT SPAM
NOT SPAM
Buckley would not be an issue in and of himself were he not emblematic of the rule of Wordism in human affairs generally and of Wordism’s larger meaning as a fop for the truth and reality of evil in human affairs.
For what is it that permits a man to traffic in the mellifluous tonality of his diction, as if that itself were something profound?
How do his stylized allusions to the existence of evil square with real fear, real dread, real bitterness, real protest, real resentment, and real hatred?
Accordingly, Buckley could never know that there are no “True Believers” among the true believers in the truth and reality of evil.
Names for the devil do not pass their lips for these cannot be spoken of the vapors of a ghastly swarm of spiders, or of the cauldron of intolerable dread, or of the taut agony of terror, rage, bitterness, protest, and resentment.
Where is the solution for these kinds of vapors within the soul of William F. Buckley?
Could they come from his life of interrupted comfort? From his daily baths privilege and esteem? From the instantaneous convenience he always receives in all matters large and small? From the satiated corpulence of his inner being and his fat overfed dog?
Buckley better be grateful for laws that protect him for he is not capable of imagining what his fate would be were he actually and truly at mercy of people like us. He would simply not be capable of imagining it.
Let’s leave it there for he does not bear his sins alone, there is Wordism and Wordism’s larger meaning.
#4 by Peter on 02/07/2007 - 8:19 pm
NOT SPAM
NOT SPAM
I’d hate to see the written language evolve too much because just think of all the valuable books from the past few centuries that would eventually become unreadable. One might expect translations to come about for the popular ones, but I’m not one who seeks out popular books – I love to find a good book in a library and look at the due date stamps to find that I’m the first person in 50 years to read it.
Bruce
#5 by Dennis on 02/08/2007 - 4:14 am
NOT SPAM
NOT SPAM
You have to have consistent spelling, otherwise you can’t use google.
#6 by Papillon on 02/08/2007 - 6:16 am
NOT SPAM
NOT SPAM
Actually Bob, Mommy Teacher and Professor hardly bother with spelling and grammar these days. They are of the opinion that to do so both a) destroys little Johnny’s self esteem and b) puts forth the idea that there is a right and a wrong way to do things. Mommy Professors HATE such absolutes, unless it has something to do with their True Religion. For example, I have heard accounts from teachers who have been ordered not to correct the spelling of captions which children have written on the bottom of pictures of various occupations. “Librarean” and “teecha” are allowed to stand uncorrected, whilst “fireman” has to be changed to “fire fighter” because although it is perfectly spelled it isn’t Politically Correct. Oh and such corrections have to be made with green or purple pens, because “red is too violent and can cause feelings of anxiety and failure”. Is it any wonder why people are so over-medicated these days?
I graduated from high school less than five years ago. I had to teach MYSELF correct grammar along with a lot of other vital things. Instead of teaching children what they are supposed to learn in school, teachers spend the majority of their time alternating between trying to indoctrinate their students into the multicult and trying to discipline unruly kids who probably shouldn’t even be there in the first place. Meanwhile, those with working brains, coupled with a measure of self-discipline, teach themselves. When they’re not trying to fend off the animals, that is.
#7 by cl on 02/08/2007 - 8:04 pm
NOT SPAM
NOT SPAM
Bob said: “This impresses me the same way a lawyer in a black dress or a drunk in a costume impresses me. But I am not alone. I remember that ten or twelve years ago, there were regular complaints in the chatrooms and Newsgroups about someone’s spelling. Now I don’t see ANY of that.”
Back when the internet used to be the domain of haughty (and clueless) diploma mill types (remember when they used to talk about “DARPA” every other sentence?), they went berserk when AOL allowed their “unwashed” users to access Usenet. They used to call it “the September that never ends.” September 1993 was–according to them–when the “cultured” newsgroups were “ruined” by the heathens.
By 2000-2001, Usenet had indeeed been put out to pasture. But it wasn’t because of AOL users. Usenet, instead of being a semi-private club, was in fact a communications medium, and web forums–and their corollaries, the (we)blogs–replaced them. In fact, the “barbarian” web has become synonymous with “internet,” with email the only remaining major non-web based internet function (with the possible exception of instant messaging, which replaced the even more esoteric IRC). If the heathens hadn’t come along, Jim J. Blowhard, BA, PhD would still be pontificating about nothing–right above his ridiculous ascii art footer–at a snail’s pace.
But if you want to screw around with “Telnet” (remember that!?) or that idiotic “Unix”–the technical equivalent of Latin and Greek–sashay over to your neighborhood diploma mill–with wallet in hand, of course.
#8 by JBB on 02/08/2007 - 8:39 pm
NOT SPAM
NOT SPAM
Watta co-winch-a-dense. What follows is a little something someone emailed me over a year ago. I finished re-reading it and re-chuckling over it just before coming to your site, and lo’ and behold, iffen you all ain’t acaring on ’bout misspelled-type words and such. Check this out…
Typoglycemia
This looks weird, but believe it or not you can read it.
I cdnuolt blveiee taht I cluod aulaclty uesdnatnrd waht I was rdanieg The phaonmneal pweor of the hmuan mnid Aoccdrnig to a rscheearch at Cmabrigde Uinervtisy, it deosn’t mttaer inwaht oredr the ltteers in a wrod are, the olny iprmoatnt tihng is taht the frist and lsat ltteer be in the rghit pclae. The rset can be a taotl mses and you can sitll raed it wouthit a porbelm. Tihs is bcuseae the huamn mnid deos not raed ervey lteter by istlef, but the wrod as a wlohe. Amzanig huh? yaeh and I awlyas thought slpeling was ipmorantt
Neat, huh?
#9 by Pain on 02/09/2007 - 12:06 am
NOT SPAM
NOT SPAM
“That is because, in my opinion, the Internet is producing phonetic English.”
Yuu meek a gud point ðer, Bob. Ði Inturnet mee wel bi produusiŋ fonettik Iŋglish. Hwai shud wi hæv tu spel þiŋz a surtin wee jast bikawz samwan root it ðæt wee in a buk? Ða sistem wi yuuz nau dazn’t iivun meek sens: it dazn’t mæc ða wee wi tok.
Speliŋ fonettikly wud meek it iiziur for litul kidz tu lurn to riid. It wud iivun help al ði EDD fook laik yuu, Bob, tuu.
Ænd samwan kud meek big baks seliŋ the kompyuutur kood tu trænsleet evriþinŋ bæk ænd forth in wurd-prosesurz ænd web-brauzerz.
Iventyualy wi kud al rait jast hau wi spiik wiþaut hæviŋ tu wury if wi speld it bai ða buk. If wi root it hau wi see it, ðen it iz rait!
Jast mai tuu sents. Ai hoop ai didn’t spel eniþinŋ rong hiir. Hwat duu yuu þiŋk?
Ai hoop yuu æt liist got a fyuu cakulz aut av ðis wan, Bob.
#10 by Pain on 02/09/2007 - 12:23 am
NOT SPAM
NOT SPAM
USE THIS VERSION
“That is because, in my opinion, the Internet is producing phonetic English.”
Yuu meek a gud point ðer, Bob. Ði Inturnet mee wel bi produusiŋ fonettik Iŋglish. Hwai shud wii hæv tu spel þiŋz a surtn wee jast bikawz samwan root it ðæt wee in a dikshanery? Ða sistem wi yuuz nau dazn’t iivun meek sens: it dazn’t mæc ða wee wi tok.
Speliŋ fonettikly wud meek it iiziur for litul kidz tu lurn to riid. It wud iivun help al ði EDD fook laik yuu, Bob, tuu. Jast þiŋk: no mor speliŋ biiz!
Ænd samwan kud meek big baks seliŋ the kompyuutur kood tu trænsleet evriþiŋ bæk ænd forth in wurd-prosesurz ænd web-brauzerz.
Eventyualy wi kud al rait jast hau wi spiik wiþaut hæviŋ tu wury if wi speld it bai ða buk. If wii root it hau wii see it, ðen it iz rait!
Jast mai tuu sents. Ai hoop ai didn’t spel tuu mac rong hiir. Hwat duu yuu þiŋk?
Ai hoop yuu æt liist got a fyuu cakulz aut av ðis wan, Bob.
#11 by shari on 02/10/2007 - 5:46 pm
NOT SPAM
NOT SPAM
This gave me a fyuu cakulz.