Page:Handbook of simplified spelling.djvu/9



Spelling, Its True Function

Spelling was invented by man and, like other human inventions, is capable of development and improvement by man in the direction of simplicity, economy, and efficiency. Its true function is to represent as accurately as possible by means of simbols (letters) the sounds of the spoken (i.e. the living) language, and thus incidentally to record its history. Its province is not, as is often mistakenly supposed, to indicate the derivations of words from sources that ar inaccessible except to the learned, or to perpetuate the etimologic gesses of the partly learned.

Anomalies of English Spelling

English spelling, owing to the conditions that governd the growth of the English language, now presents many anomalies. The same letter, or combination of letters, often represents many different sounds; while the same sound is often represented by many different letters, or combinations of letters.

The combination ough, for example, represents at least 9 different sounds in the words cough, rough, though, through, plough, hough, thorough, thought, hiccough; and the sound of e in let is represented in at least 12 other ways in the words aesthetic, bury, head,