WRITTEN AND SPOKEN LANGUAGE:

ALPHABETS, SPELLING AND

SPELLING REFORM
Major Alphabets in the World

• Greek Alphabet • Indian Alphabet Cyrillic

• Hindu Alphabet • Alphabet Glagolitic
• Arabic Alphabet • Alphabet Etruscan
• Hebrew Alphabet • Alphabet Latin Alphabet
• Afghan Alphabet • Islamic Alphabet
Latin Alphabet Slavic Alphabet

Finno-urgic Alphabet Canaanite Alphabet

Baltic Alphabet Romanian Alphabet
Aramaic Alphabet Proto Semitic Alphabet
 The modern natural alphabet of Western
European nation are strictly speaking
adaptation of the Latin alphabet to Germanic
(English, German, Swedish, Dutch, Danish,
etc..)
 Romance (Italian, French, Spanish,
Portuguese, etc…)
 Slavic (Polish, Czech, Slovak, etc..)
 Baltic (Lithuanian, Latvian, etc..)
 Finno-Ugric (Finnish, Hungarian, etc..)
Theories of the Origin of the Alphabet

 The Phoenicians, a semitic speaking people

between 1700 and 1510 BCE the invention
consonantal writing system known as North
Semitic.
 The Greek, which invented the characters
representing vowels in the 800 and 700 BCE.
 The Greek and Romance considered the
different peoples as the possible inventers of
the Alphabet. The Phoenicians, Egyptians,
Assyrians and Hebrews.
 The Canaanite early Hebrews write three
secondary branches Moabite, Edomite and
Ammonite.
Spelling History
 Came from 14th to 16 century (were most people
couldn’t read or write well)

 St. Augustine started writing in English

-with his follower the began writing the Latin
Alphabet around 597 (year).
-which had 23 letters for around 35 English sounds.
 TheNorman French invaded England in 1066
-some spellings (French spellings) were introduced.

 Spellingand pronunciation did match.

-words pronounced the way they are spelled.
- “knight” and “night are the same pronounced.
 Johannes Gutenberg began to standardized spelling.
 Renaissance scholars changed the spelling not to be
more like pronunciation but instead to be more like
classical languages, creating the silent letters in
words.
 Even silent letters like the word “Falcon” was
pronounced “F-A-U-C-0-N” to look more a Latin
word because of the letter L.
 Noah Webster made some Spelling changes.
-he was hoping to strengthen the cultural divide
between the British and the American but many of his
proposed changes was rejected.
 From today’s standpoint, it is not really appropriate
to actively make spelling changes to divide speech
community.
A Brief History of Spelling Reform

 Theway we spell words seems integral to our

identity, but spelling is neither fixed nor
permanent, and we have a long history of
attempts to reform it some more successful
than others.
 The term Spelling Reform refers to any organized
effort to simplify the system of English Orthography.

 Some spelling reform proposals have been adopted

partially. Many spellings preferred by Noah Webster
have become standard in the United States, but not
have been adopted elsewhere (American and British
English spelling Differences).
NOAH WEBSTER
Born October 16,1758 in West
Hartford Connecticut, has been
called the “Father of American
Scholarship and Education” and
“Father of the Modern
Dictionary” he was a Teacher,
Textbook Pioneer,
Lexicographer, English
Spelling Reformer, Editor and
Prolific Author.
 Noah Webster proposed the removal of all silent
letters and regularization of certain other
common sounds. So, give would be giv, built
would be bilt, speak would be speek, examin and
medicin though these suggestions obviously
didn’t take hold, but many of Webster’s American
English spellings did:
 colour-color, honour-honor, defence-defense,
draught-draft, and centre-center, etc..
 Noah Webster successfully introduced new
spellings in the US, although not all his proposals
caught on. However, as Webster’s reforms are the
main cause of the spelling differences between
British and American versions of English.
• DOUBT • HONEST
• KNEE • KNIGHT
• ISLAND • SWORD
• WHEN • TWO
• GHOST • ANSWER
• LISTEN • KNOB