My Photo
Name:
Location: Upstate, South Carolina, United States

I think that the Meredith Brooks' song, "Bitch," summarizes me rather nicely. Or, if you prefer, X. dell says I'm a life-smart literary scholar with a low BS tolerance...that also works!

Monday, October 03, 2005

For Old HorsetailSnake!

For an English teacher, my spelling lacks. For an average American, my spelling is just fine, but English teachers are always held to a higher standard (damnit!). However, I have decided upon my new approach to my mediocre spelling: I'm going to invent my own words like Shakespeare, and I'm going to invent my own spelling and state that it's the "Americanized" version.

See, dictionaries didn't really come around until the early 1700's. Before that, a man like Shakespeare could make up words and spell his name however he wanted, and nobody complained. No court fees for a name change. No complaints from his parents about how he was ungrateful for wanting to be called something other than his given name. Beautiful! What a paradise for the crap speller!

But then the dictionaries came. We used to have all Brit spellings, but then after the American revolution, Noah Webster popped up with this thought in 1789: "Culture, habits, and language, as well as government should be national. America should have her own distinct from the rest of the world...." So yeah, it was on purpose that we have different spellings for the same word in American English. For instance, all that U dropping we have going off (honor and favor for honour and favour) was deliberate. Theater for theatre? Yeah, we'll invert TWO LETTERS! LOOK AT US! WE ARE SPECIAL!

Or maybe that's speshul. See, we TRIED to change some words but they didn't take:

wurd = word
reezon = reason
tung = tongue
iz = is

Yeah, so here's my excuse, and I'm sticking with it: I'm not incorrectly spelling a word except ON PURPOSE! DOWN WITH TYRANNY! UP WITH AMERICAN ENGLISH!

Wurd!

11 Comments:

Blogger Amanda said...

Who knew I was teaching so many future Shakespeares at the Premier Tech School!?!?

6:29 PM  
Blogger April said...

Yur awsum! Now I wont feel infeereeor to u in all ur graytnes.

(no apostrophe's either, right??)

6:30 PM  
Blogger OldHorsetailSnake said...

I haven't checkdc lately to see if they still do it, but many years ago the moguls at the Chicago Tribune decided their reporters should spell words like they sound, not how they're "spelled." Pretty adventurous, but not worthwhile since it was a pretty bad idea. AND NOW YOU ARE GOING TO START IT ALL OVER AGAIN?

That's weerd. Willie the Aspairuhgus-Spear mite uhproove, tho.

7:44 PM  
Blogger Unknown said...

Isn't this just ebonics? Seriously, not being racist, totally inquisitive, this is how some of my students are writing in a college setting, completely heartbreaking, but at least they don't use run-on sentences like I just did!

8:08 PM  
Blogger SS said...

i decided to something similar a while back when people would try to correct me when i would mispronounce a word. i decided that it wasn't mispronounced or misspelled. i did it on purpose, and the word has it's own special meaning - MY meaning. i am currently working on my own dictionary. ;)

8:12 PM  
Blogger Hale McKay said...

Good post. from crossword puzzles and word games, I am familiar with an actual word "tung." It is an oil that is used in paints and is sometimes used in the place of linseed oil. It comes from the sap of a tung tree.
...I too like to play around with the sounds, spelling and meanings of words to create new words.
...You can blame Hoss for my visit.

8:36 PM  
Blogger Kira said...

Amanda--and I STILL have the joy of teaching them! One day they'll be famous and we can say, "We knew them when!"

April--no, sorry, we're leaving apostrophe usage for showing possession and contractions for now. You can petition for American English to change that one later!

OHS--well, as long as they do it the way that *I* think it sounds, they are allowed to do so. It's all about me, hon :)

MS--well, it's ebonics before ebonics existed. Interesting, really! Yes, some of my students in their journals in particular use creative slang spelling for many words and concepts. The spelling resembles the suggestions to change American English more than anything else. I DO see that spelling, but not in the formal papers usually (USUALLY means that it sometimes happens anyway). However, run-ons, fragments, verb errors, and punctuation mishaps are another situation entirely. THOSE I see daily, repeatedly!

Sandra--hey, and now you can call it the Sandra American Dictionary too! Haha! Actually, I mispronounce words more frequently than one would assume because I never learned phonics. I started reading too early and was skipped a grade, then isolated in my own reading "class." Therefore, although my vocabulary is large, sometimes I just don't know HOW to pronounce a word. I should take the phonetics with my daughter at school now and learn!

HM--see, and if that dictionary had taken, tung would now be a way more confusing word. "Do you mean you want me to buy the oil or the body part at the store, dear?"

It's easier to just blame Hoss for everything. Good call! :)

3:34 AM  
Blogger Joseph H. Vilas said...

Hmmm.... comment spam, hair removal cream (or is that creme?), and mis-spelling. Seems all of a piece, doesn't it?

I have to say that after 43 years, I'm finally proud of my language -- borrowed words, idiosyncratic spellings, irregular conjugations, and all.

7:21 AM  
Blogger Amanda said...

You know, I'm afraid I won't be able to admit I knew them when...it may interfere with my political career. ;)

9:04 AM  
Blogger Canoes under my shoes said...

My neice made a notebook in kindergarten. They were supposed to write sentences and illustrate them. Content was more important than form. I guess the kids were supposed to get into the joy of writing before the world of academics slammed them back into their propper place with technicalities like spelling and grammar.

Anyhoo...

My favorite was a picture she drew of herself swimming in brown water with little yellow flecks underneath her. Her caption was:

It felz gud win I pee in tha lak.

1:12 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

When I was in undergrad, I started a preposition revolution. We had a Long Island Tea Party in Charleston. It went well for a couple of months, and then fizzled.

I recommend the sophist approach to spelling. There is no correct spell. Only contexts in which one spelling will get you what you want better than another spelling.

6:24 PM  

Post a Comment

<< Home