rvpalliende (07/12/82)
1 2 3 4 5 No. Island never had a pronounced "s". "Island" comes from old English "igland", but the g was lost some time. Some ignorant scholars thought that it came from Latin "inSula", so they respelled the word and their mistake was perpetuated until today. A less surprising spelling would be "ighland". And anyway, what are silent letters useful for? I always was taught that "often" was pronounced "ofn", but here in Ontario many people pronounce the "t". Is it an archaism, or simply a mispronunciation due to the spelling? And there are people who think that you should pronounce the "d" in Wednesday. They would benefit from a (very simple) spelling reform which would only change the few hundred words whose silent letters aren't pronounced by educated speakers. This means: Wednesday should be Wenesday (or Wensday) but we should ask some expert (linguist?, statistician?, Canadian?) before deciding that "often" should be "ofen". And ov course, government should continue to have the N, until the last educated N keeper dies.
wilner (07/13/82)
Well, another view of spelling reform holds that Wednesday, which used to be Woden's Day, be spelled Woden's Day. It may still be pronounced W'n's Day. But then, Boston used to be Saint Botolph's Town, pronounced 'Bo's To'n. Is the point of spelling reform (a) clarity in pronounciation, (b) simplicity in writing, (c) reversal of accidents by illiterates (e.g., island), (d) arrogance of language architects, or any of the above? --Wayne Wilner (houxs!wilner)
rvpalliende (07/15/82)
Island derives from Old English igland Isle derives from Latin insula. Spelling island with an s became fashionable because some ignorant scholars didn't know the first fact but knew the second one. It was ritzy then, it is stupid now.
jon (07/16/82)
Spelling island with an 's' was ritzy then, it is part of the language now. The whole language is stupid; so what. You'll notice that Esperanto, Occidental, Loglan, and a host of others haven't caught on. English is a great language because it's so incredibly *human*. Love it or leave it.