{"id":32043,"date":"2021-04-09T15:34:33","date_gmt":"2021-04-09T19:34:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/?p=32043"},"modified":"2021-04-21T19:59:16","modified_gmt":"2021-04-21T23:59:16","slug":"english-spelling-reform","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/english-spelling-reform\/","title":{"rendered":"Why Did English Spelling Reform Efforts Fail?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

What was the English spelling reform? And what were the reasons behind the efforts to standardize the conventions of English spelling?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The incongruity between English spelling and pronunciation has been a defining feature of the English language for most of its history. This has led some notable public figures to call for the English spelling reform to bridge the two together. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Keep reading to learn about the English spelling reform and why it failed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

A Call to Standardize English Spelling<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

For much of the history of the language, words defied standard spelling, with even Shakespeare offering a bewildering array of different and inconsistent spellings for the same words throughout his works. This incongruity has to led some notable public figures to champion more robust efforts at spelling standardization and simplification by the end of the 18th century. These figures included American Founding Father Benjamin Franklin, famed lexicographer Noah Webster (who actually advocated legal consequences for improper spelling), industrialist and philanthropist Andrew Carnegie, US President Theodore Roosevelt, and author Mark Twain. By the late 19th century, spelling reform groups like the American Philological Association even began to lobby for new spellings like tho<\/em>, wisht<\/em>, and hav <\/em>in an effort to simplify American English spelling and have it more closely align with pronunciation<\/p>\n\n\n\n

These groups decried the irrationality of spelling. After all, what good reason was there to call the money you owe to someone else a debt<\/em> rather than a det? <\/em>Leaders of this time belonged to the Progressive Era, which focused on efficiency and rationality and saw little need to pay deference to outdated custom and tradition. Why should they respect the hoary old conventions of English spelling?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Difficulties of Spelling Reform<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Despite the great passion and energy poured into spelling reform efforts, however, they mostly failed in their mission. Language is such a fluid and organic tool, used differently by so many people and susceptible to innumerable internal and external influences, that it is quite impossible for some centrally directed body to impose reforms top-down<\/strong>. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The pretensions of political and cultural leaders notwithstanding, the development and evolution of language<\/a> has always been a bottom-up process<\/strong>. Two hundred years ago, people spelled shoppe<\/em> and musick<\/em>. No state mandate ordered people to change the way these words were spelled\u2014on their own, people took the initiative to drop the unnecessary letters from them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Today, we are used to the non-phonetic spellings of words like bread<\/em>. It would be deeply strange and unnatural for us to write bred. <\/em>And of course, bred<\/em> is itself a word, which would merely create confusion. Bread<\/em> and bred<\/em> are homophones, words that sound the same but are spelled differently. The high number of homophones in English gives the non-phonetic spellings of many words a useful purpose. Thus can we distinguish might<\/em> from mite<\/em>, great <\/em>from grate<\/em>, and sure<\/em> from shore<\/em>. Perhaps our spelling isn\u2019t so irrational after all.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

What was the English spelling reform? And what were the reasons behind the efforts to standardize the conventions of English spelling? The incongruity between English spelling and pronunciation has been a defining feature of the English language for most of its history. This has led some notable public figures to call for the English spelling reform to bridge the two together. Keep reading to learn about the English spelling reform and why it failed.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":32535,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[39,42,24],"tags":[261],"class_list":["post-32043","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-history","category-motivation","category-society","tag-the-mother-tongue","","tg-column-two"],"yoast_head":"\nWhy Did English Spelling Reform Efforts Fail? - Shortform Books<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Despite the passion and energy poured into attempts to reform the English spelling, they mostly failed in their mission. Learn why.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/english-spelling-reform\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Why Did English Spelling Reform Efforts Fail?\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Despite the passion and energy poured into attempts to reform the English spelling, they mostly failed in their mission. Learn why.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/english-spelling-reform\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Shortform Books\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2021-04-09T19:34:33+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2021-04-21T23:59:16+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/s3.amazonaws.com\/wordpress.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/alphabet-vowel-english-language-.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"1920\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"1080\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Darya Sinusoid\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Darya Sinusoid\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/english-spelling-reform\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/english-spelling-reform\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Darya Sinusoid\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/0421cce75bc249b11e2517b3a91f9c46\"},\"headline\":\"Why Did English Spelling Reform Efforts Fail?\",\"datePublished\":\"2021-04-09T19:34:33+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2021-04-21T23:59:16+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/english-spelling-reform\/\"},\"wordCount\":493,\"commentCount\":0,\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#organization\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/english-spelling-reform\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/alphabet-vowel-english-language-.jpg\",\"keywords\":[\"The Mother Tongue\"],\"articleSection\":[\"History\",\"Motivation\",\"Society\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/english-spelling-reform\/#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/english-spelling-reform\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/english-spelling-reform\/\",\"name\":\"Why Did English Spelling Reform Efforts Fail? - Shortform Books\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/english-spelling-reform\/#primaryimage\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/english-spelling-reform\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/alphabet-vowel-english-language-.jpg\",\"datePublished\":\"2021-04-09T19:34:33+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2021-04-21T23:59:16+00:00\",\"description\":\"Despite the passion and energy poured into attempts to reform the English spelling, they mostly failed in their mission. Learn why.\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/english-spelling-reform\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/english-spelling-reform\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/english-spelling-reform\/#primaryimage\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/alphabet-vowel-english-language-.jpg\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/alphabet-vowel-english-language-.jpg\",\"width\":1920,\"height\":1080},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/english-spelling-reform\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"Why Did English Spelling Reform Efforts Fail?\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/\",\"name\":\"Shortform Books\",\"description\":\"The World's Best Book Summaries\",\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#organization\"},\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":{\"@type\":\"PropertyValueSpecification\",\"valueRequired\":true,\"valueName\":\"search_term_string\"}}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Organization\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#organization\",\"name\":\"Shortform Books\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/\",\"logo\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/06\/logo-equilateral-with-text-no-bg.png\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/06\/logo-equilateral-with-text-no-bg.png\",\"width\":500,\"height\":74,\"caption\":\"Shortform Books\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/\"}},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/0421cce75bc249b11e2517b3a91f9c46\",\"name\":\"Darya Sinusoid\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/07\/Untitled-design-1.png\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/07\/Untitled-design-1.png\",\"caption\":\"Darya Sinusoid\"},\"description\":\"Darya\u2019s love for reading started with fantasy novels (The LOTR trilogy is still her all-time-favorite). Growing up, however, she found herself transitioning to non-fiction, psychological, and self-help books. She has a degree in Psychology and a deep passion for the subject. She likes reading research-informed books that distill the workings of the human brain\/mind\/consciousness and thinking of ways to apply the insights to her own life. Some of her favorites include Thinking, Fast and Slow, How We Decide, and The Wisdom of the Enneagram.\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/author\/darya\/\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO Premium plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Why Did English Spelling Reform Efforts Fail? - Shortform Books","description":"Despite the passion and energy poured into attempts to reform the English spelling, they mostly failed in their mission. Learn why.","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/english-spelling-reform\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Why Did English Spelling Reform Efforts Fail?","og_description":"Despite the passion and energy poured into attempts to reform the English spelling, they mostly failed in their mission. Learn why.","og_url":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/english-spelling-reform\/","og_site_name":"Shortform Books","article_published_time":"2021-04-09T19:34:33+00:00","article_modified_time":"2021-04-21T23:59:16+00:00","og_image":[{"width":1920,"height":1080,"url":"https:\/\/s3.amazonaws.com\/wordpress.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/alphabet-vowel-english-language-.jpg","type":"image\/jpeg"}],"author":"Darya Sinusoid","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"Darya Sinusoid","Est. reading time":"2 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Article","@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/english-spelling-reform\/#article","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/english-spelling-reform\/"},"author":{"name":"Darya Sinusoid","@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/0421cce75bc249b11e2517b3a91f9c46"},"headline":"Why Did English Spelling Reform Efforts Fail?","datePublished":"2021-04-09T19:34:33+00:00","dateModified":"2021-04-21T23:59:16+00:00","mainEntityOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/english-spelling-reform\/"},"wordCount":493,"commentCount":0,"publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#organization"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/english-spelling-reform\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/alphabet-vowel-english-language-.jpg","keywords":["The Mother Tongue"],"articleSection":["History","Motivation","Society"],"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"CommentAction","name":"Comment","target":["https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/english-spelling-reform\/#respond"]}]},{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/english-spelling-reform\/","url":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/english-spelling-reform\/","name":"Why Did English Spelling Reform Efforts Fail? - Shortform Books","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/english-spelling-reform\/#primaryimage"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/english-spelling-reform\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/alphabet-vowel-english-language-.jpg","datePublished":"2021-04-09T19:34:33+00:00","dateModified":"2021-04-21T23:59:16+00:00","description":"Despite the passion and energy poured into attempts to reform the English spelling, they mostly failed in their mission. Learn why.","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/english-spelling-reform\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/english-spelling-reform\/"]}]},{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/english-spelling-reform\/#primaryimage","url":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/alphabet-vowel-english-language-.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/alphabet-vowel-english-language-.jpg","width":1920,"height":1080},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/english-spelling-reform\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Why Did English Spelling Reform Efforts Fail?"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/","name":"Shortform Books","description":"The World's Best Book Summaries","publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#organization"},"potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Organization","@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#organization","name":"Shortform Books","url":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/06\/logo-equilateral-with-text-no-bg.png","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/06\/logo-equilateral-with-text-no-bg.png","width":500,"height":74,"caption":"Shortform Books"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/"}},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/0421cce75bc249b11e2517b3a91f9c46","name":"Darya Sinusoid","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/07\/Untitled-design-1.png","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/07\/Untitled-design-1.png","caption":"Darya Sinusoid"},"description":"Darya\u2019s love for reading started with fantasy novels (The LOTR trilogy is still her all-time-favorite). Growing up, however, she found herself transitioning to non-fiction, psychological, and self-help books. She has a degree in Psychology and a deep passion for the subject. She likes reading research-informed books that distill the workings of the human brain\/mind\/consciousness and thinking of ways to apply the insights to her own life. Some of her favorites include Thinking, Fast and Slow, How We Decide, and The Wisdom of the Enneagram.","url":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/author\/darya\/"}]}},"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/alphabet-vowel-english-language-.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32043","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=32043"}],"version-history":[{"count":14,"href":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32043\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":33175,"href":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32043\/revisions\/33175"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/32535"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=32043"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=32043"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=32043"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}