From: utzoo!decvax!ittvax!swatt
Newsgroups: net.nlang
Title: Re: Laissez-Faire spelling reform - (nf)
Article-I.D.: ittvax.403
Posted: Thu Aug  5 16:51:42 1982
Received: Sun Aug  8 03:24:25 1982
References: harpo.921

It's interesting  to  note  the  current  interest  in  "spelling
reform".   About 70 years ago, it was also the rage.  Progressive
educators strove mightily to introduce it.   Reed  College  first
opened it's doors in 1911 under President William Trufaunt Foster 
(I  may  be  spelling  his  middle  name  wrong, but to honor his
memory, you can think of it as "Wilyam Trufont Fostur"  and  have
the pronunciation right).  

Anyway, among his collection of zeals was a passion for what  was
then  known  as  "efficiency  spelling", which was an attempt not
only to introduce phonetic regularity  to  English  (as  used  by
Americans,  of  course), but also to reduce the number of letters
in words by eliminating all the unsounded ones.  This  was  going
on  before  WWI, so it wasn't just motivated by a paper shortage,
but I suppose printing costs were used as one of the arguments to 
support the idea.  He had all the courses emphasise it,  had  the
official  college  publications  use  it,  and  even  induced the
nominally student-run newspaper to adopt it.  

Reading through (thru) early volumes of the  Reed  College  Quest
("Kwest",  I suppose) is really quite an experience.  One wonders
what the printers must have  thought.   Some  of  the  highlights
(hilites) are: 

	through		thru	(even the Chicago Tribune uses this)
	are		ar
	were		wer
	thought		thot	("I thot I thow a putty tat?")
	believe		beleave

William did not just dream all this up of  course  --  it  was  a
general movement of his day.  All of this has disappeared without 
a  ripple (ripul?), even around Reed College, unless you go up to
the College archives or talk to Dorthy Jo.  

I conclude (konklud?) from all  this  that  spelling  reform,  no
matter  how  many "rational" reasons for it, will fail before the
inertia of long practice by a whole society.  Variant  spellings,
like  variant  meanings,  are  codified  when  some "misusage" is
adopted by enough people to qualify it as acceptable.  There are, 
for example, typewriter keyboard designs  with  letter  placement
such  that  the  "average"  typist  can  type typical english 50%
faster; they haven't been generally accepted.  

Presdent Foster?  well if he'd been a better manager  of  college
finances,  perhaps  it would be "Reed Kolege, wer al the wimen ar
strong, and al the men ar good looking, and al the  dogs  ar  out
scaring the hell the kolege loyer".