This book has two parts. The first six chapters are relatively general. They review the history of English spelling and the reasons for the many irregularities of our modern language. The author argues that the irregular spelling of English contributes seriously to the disgracefully high rate of illiteracy in the English speaking world. He then reviews some of the many attempts to reform the spelling of other languages. Korean reforms required centuries, but were ultimately successful. Reforms have sometimes been successfully carried out more quickly, but other attempted reforms have been complete failures. During the first half of the 20th century there was a flurry of interest in reforms for English but since then reform has been little more than the object of humor. The reasons for opposition to reform are considered. The second part of the book is more technical. The criteria that should govern the choice among alternative reforms are described with care. The relatively easily reformed consonants and the much more difficult vowels are then considered in detail. Special attention is given to ways of designing a spelling that is equally suitable for the many and diverse dialects of spoken English. A unified spelling could not be perfect for any single dialect, but it could be very much better than our present spelling for all dialects. Possible ways by which reforms might be brought about are considered, but no particular spelling is advocated.

This book has two parts. The first six chapters are relatively general. In the first chapter the author lays out his personal reasons for undertaking this book and outlines the contents of what follows.

The second chapter begins the author’s historical survey of the various influences which have been instrumental in the development of the English spelling ‘system’, starting with the impact of French following the Norman Conquest, the effect of the printing press on literacy and on the development of spelling norms, the effect of contemporary technologies such as texting and goes on to compare the contemporary state of English spelling with those of other European languages.

In this chapter the author looks at the plausible evidence that children in English-speaking countries take substantially longer to learn to read than children do elsewhere (Seymour et al. 2003; Thorsdad 1991; Oney and Goldman 1984; Landerl et al. 1997), arguing that these studies strongly suggest that English spelling, which is much less orderly than that of most European languages, seriously interferes with the ability of English-speaking children to learn to read.

In this chapter, the author surveys this experiences of the many languages that have undergone reforms, some cautious, a few revolutionary. Deliberately planned changes have brought the spelling of several European languages into closer harmony with speech, but the motives of the reformers have not always been benign. Political antagonisms have sometimes been more important than linguistic good sense in encouraging reforms. He argues that reforms that have been successful should give us hope, but the outrage that has so often met reform proposals should also make us cautious.

This chapter charts the history of English spelling reform worldwide, starting with the proposals of John Hart, who in 1569 published a book called An Orthographie. The chapter continues through the centuries to present day debates.

This chapter examines the various pitfalls impeding a route to spelling reform and the factors that would need to be overcome for any major overhaul to be successful.

In this chapter, the author begins examining the criteria that should govern the choice among alternative reforms.

Continuing his review of the criteria that should govern the choice among alternative reforms, the author here examines the case of the relatively easily reformed consonants.

In this chapter, the author takes a strong position against the current state of affairs when it comes to stressed vowels in English, arguing that the traditional spelling of vowels is in urgent need of repair.

This chapter looks at the plight of the most common of our English vowels, the unstressed Schwa.The schwa is the most frequent vowel of spoken English, so we need a way to represent it in writing, but no system of spelling could possibly represent all the chaotic variability of spoken schwas. The author argues for a rule whereby whenever one variant of a vowel is recognizable as its “full” pronunciation, it is that pronunciation that should be represented by the spelling.

In this chapter the author offers two non-serious proposals, one of which may be seen as insufficiently radical, while the other may be too radical. Even though these are not meant to be serious proposals for reform, the author argues they should suggest the range of problems that any attempt to construct a better spelling system will have to deal with.

The author’s summary of his position and a call for spelling reform to be taken seriously.

This book has two parts. The first six chapters are relatively general. They review the history of English spelling and the reasons for the many irregularities of our modern language. The author argues that the irregular spelling of English contributes seriously to the disgracefully high rate of illiteracy in the English speaking world. He then reviews some of the many attempts to reform the spelling of other languages. Korean reforms required centuries, but were ultimately successful. Reforms have sometimes been successfully carried out more quickly, but other attempted reforms have been complete failures. During the first half of the 20th century there was a flurry of interest in reforms for English but since then reform has been little more than the object of humor. The reasons for opposition to reform are considered. The second part of the book is more technical. The criteria that should govern the choice among alternative reforms are described with care. The relatively easily reformed consonants and the much more difficult vowels are then considered in detail. Special attention is given to ways of designing a spelling that is equally suitable for the many and diverse dialects of spoken English. A unified spelling could not be perfect for any single dialect, but it could be very much better than our present spelling for all dialects. Possible ways by which reforms might be brought about are considered, but no particular spelling is advocated.

Spellbound considers the history of English spelling and provides suggestions for modern day reform of its irregularities. The first half of the book reviews the history of English spelling and the reasons for the many irregularities of our modern language. The author argues that the irregular spelling of English contributes seriously to the high rate of illiteracy in the English speaking world. He then reviews some of the many attempts to reform the spelling of other languages, some of which were successful and others not. During the first half of the 20th century there was a flurry of interest in reforms for English but since then reform has been little more than the object of humor. Spellbound considers the reasons for this opposition to reform. The book then turns to current proposals for the reform of English. It describes the criteria that should govern the choice among alternative reforms and considers in detail the relatively easily reformed consonants and the much more difficult vowels. Special attention is given to ways of designing a spelling that is equally suitable for the many and diverse dialects of spoken English. While the author recognises that a unified spelling could not be perfect for any single dialect, he argues that it could be very much better than our present spelling for all dialects. Spellbound concludes by looking at possible ways by which reforms might be brought about today.

This book has two parts. The first six chapters are relatively general. They review the history of English spelling and the reasons for the many irregularities of our modern language. The author argues that the irregular spelling of English contributes seriously to the disgracefully high rate of illiteracy in the English speaking world. He then reviews some of the many attempts to reform the spelling of other languages. Korean reforms required centuries, but were ultimately successful. Reforms have sometimes been successfully carried out more quickly, but other attempted reforms have been complete failures. During the first half of the 20th century there was a flurry of interest in reforms for English but since then reform has been little more than the object of humor. The reasons for opposition to reform are considered. The second part of the book is more technical. The criteria that should govern the choice among alternative reforms are described with care. The relatively easily reformed consonants and the much more difficult vowels are then considered in detail. Special attention is given to ways of designing a spelling that is equally suitable for the many and diverse dialects of spoken English. A unified spelling could not be perfect for any single dialect, but it could be very much better than our present spelling for all dialects. Possible ways by which reforms might be brought about are considered, but no particular spelling is advocated.