English needs more letters.

Seriously, there's all this cool shit out there like Þ, Ŋ, Ɔ, Ƣ, and Ѧ, and we're limiting ourselves to A through Z? Come on!

I'm not sure of what use could be Ѧ and Ƣ since English lacks these sounds...

>>1
Agreed. We шould at least get letters for some of ðe common phonemes ðat digraphs are uжually used for, lackiŋ letters as ðey currently do. Perhaps in ðis þread we could begin a reform.

I'd love to see þorn come back as a symbol in the English languaџe, but I don't þink we need many more symbols; what's wrong with /ng/, for instance?

>>4
Ŋ is probably superfluous. Why did you use џ when j is the same? It would make more sense to have neither, and use dж. We do need þ, ð, ш, and maybe ж.

>>5

Hold over from fucking with the German language, my bad.

Would be good if English used just ðe þ and ð of ðe new letters. People will finally realize that voiced and unvoiced dental fricative are different sounds. Though and through will be spelled ðough and þrough.

Agreed partially.

Latin alphabet only works really great for ONE language: Classical Latin.

That "put H after letter and OMG we have a cool new sound" shit started with Greek loanwords. Greek had aspirated stops (ϕ, θ and χ - sounded like English Pit, Till and Kill, contrast with sPit, sTill and sKill). in English, aspirating or not isn't a great shit, but in Greek it DOES make a difference. Latin borrowed Greek words, but hadn't the letters for them... solution: "aspirated P, T and C is now PH, TH and CH).

It was logical at the time, but Greek evolved. PH started to sound like Food, TH like English THink and CH like Scottish loCH. The digraphs not only remained but grow in quantity: Occitan and Portuguese uses NH and LH, English uses SH...[+]

It's OK to use that -H digraphs shit in Portuguese or Occitan because H is mute in those languages. However, not in English. Worse: English allows end-syllabe T, P, S... compare THink and caTHouse, SHampoo and grasSHopper, PHylosophy and uPHill.

But it's not the greatest English spelling problem, however... Great Vowel Shi(f)t is worse.

When English spelling was more or less defined, fOOt and fEEt sounded like fOHt and fEHt. WAS and HAS rhymed. bUt sounded like bOOt, and bOOt sounded like bOHt. The vowels shifted a great deal, look at the Wikipedia for more info: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Vowel_Shift

Is this the biggest problem? No. I can has more.[+]

The biggest and crazyest trouble in English spelling is INCONSISTENCY, guys.

Loanwords are great, they give a language flexbility. English is a Germanic language, with Latin and French borrowings. However, there are so much Latin and French words that they're spelled as if it were French and Latin!

It's plain retard that French uses "CE and CI sound like SE and SI", but at least it's ethymological: Latin /ke/ and /ki/ become French /se/ and /si/.

But, what about English? That palatization shit is part of Romance Languages. Not English. So, in English is not just "retardness", it's retardness, sillyness, pedantry and PLAIN BULLSHIT.

Wanna write Eng as a Romance lang? Pffffft, ok, but respell the native Germanic words. Was it done? NO.

SO, English uses two set rules for the orthography, the Romance and Germanic. And none of them fits English.

maCHine and CHurCH. Zeitgeist and Zero. boMB and coMB. THis and THink. pleaSure and Sure and Sorrow and... godS!

And, please, someone tells me WHY "iland" and "luve" are spelled as "iSland" and "lOve" - plain faggotry?

As I said, Latin alphabet works greats only for Classical Latin, but can be adapted to a non-Romance language like English. New letters would be GREAT, but they aren't even necessary.

English needs urgent respell. Make a dialects' study - some compromise with GA and RP would already works. Define how is spelled each phoneme. Make sure which alphabet will be used - I don't recommend Latin, however, it would work anyway, and with these steps, phonemes w/o letter will just stare at you and say "make me a samm... a digraph or a new letter". If you're too lazy to make new letters, reserve one inuseful (like Q, C, Y or X) to make only digraphs.

Or, continue with this archaic spelling. While the rest of the world is teaching his kids something useful (like grammar or literature or even phylosophy), yours are learning... HAW TO SPEL INGLISH.

Eŋliʃ needs more letters, riƣt.

Eŋliʃ
Forgetting a letter there?

>>13
In your world, maybe, but not in mine.

Should be Eŋgliʃ. Þere is still a g after þe ŋ.

>>12 and >>13

Well done, you two have managed to stumble on one of the problems with a standardised orthography, there are subtle but important geographically-based differences in pronunciation.  I would actually go as far as to say it should be Iŋgliʃ for where I live.

>>9

Ever notice how in all your examples the examples of T an H being separate sounds are when the T is at the end of a syllable and the H is at the beginning of one?

I like ð and þ. I þink we need þose.

>>15
You might want to use eth for the word there. Standardizing the other way would be counterintuitive.

>>17
Implying ere's any way to tell “th” as in “hothead” from “bother” if you don't already know.

>>16
Me too, which is why I only replaced certain digraphs, and did not attempt phonetic spelling overall. But where do people lose the g in that word?

>>18
Don't you mean ðose?

>>18
Your post just proved þat þere better be only one letter.

>>21
But ðere are two sounds.

>>22
People have trouble distinguishing þem. Besides I don't like how ð is a d wiþ diacritic, especially in þe uppercase form.

>>17
(Forgot my tripcode ¬¬ )
Yes, I noticed. However, orthography should make syllabication clear, not not the other way.

>>16
As rule of thumb: if a considerable number of speakers make the distinction or add the sound, include it in the word.
Using "word" as example: spelling "wod" would be a tard thing - GA still uses -r in coda.

>>22
I would vote for using dhis, dhat, dhe. No additional letters, just one more pigraph. What do you think?

>>23
People only have trouble because the ortography renders both the same.

>>25
I þink it's dumb.

Look aþ me I'm þrolling /laŋ/ wiþ þe letter þ

>>23
Đat's no diacritic.

>>28
You can see Ð like D+diacritic or like another letter.
I þink it depends how much you use it.
If you use just Ð, it's a new letter.
If you use Ð, Ł, Ø, Ŧ, ðe bar is a diacritic.
(By ðe way, ŧ looks cooler ðan þ just for me? :D)

>>11
>phylosophy
>implying philosophy is useful
>spelled philosophy wrong
>dumbass

>>27
faggoð

I do með

>>25
No, no, no more digrafs. H is for aspiration. Let's keep it ðat waȝ.

>>33
Don't get rid of digraphs we already have a single letter for. ðhat's just confusing.

>>34
ðhat
Crap.

>>30
I did it. Spelled it wrong.
See? English spelling is confusing.
"Filozofi", what do you þink?

>>33
Dhat or ðat... both/boþ works well.

>>36
you so gay bruh

Ever notice how, in America, the "Zhu Zhu" "Zhu Zhu Pets" is pronounced, "Zoo Zoo?" That's because Americunts can't pronounce the Zh sound.

Iiŋliʃ speliŋ iz stupid.
Down wiþ pointles konsonant daigræfs.
Up wiþ ðe nu orþografii!

(Iz it just mi, or iz þis a kwait industrial wei ov speliŋ?)

>>38
I can pronounce that shit and I'm American

>>38
You're fucking retarded. Anyone older than 3 can pronounce that.

>Iŋgliʃ
I love it. þough, ʃall looks like "fall"
Also what ʃould I use for "gh"?

Then what would we use in our maths to confuse retards?

>>43
þ=(2ð+3ç)/(4ø-æ)

>>42
More correct as "Iŋliʃ" no ?
Also, english spelling is hard for foreigners, because it obeys to "no" rules.

>>42
ƣ is the gh letter

A a - /ah/
Æ æ - /aa/
B b - /be/
D d - /de/
Ð ð - /dth/
E e - /e/
Ē ē - /ae/
F f - /fe/
G g - /ge/
H h - /he/
I ı - /ih/
Ī ī - /ee/
Ʌ ʌ - /ai/
J j - /ye/
L l - /le/
M m - /me/
N n - /ne/
Ɲ ŋ - /ng/
O o - /o/
Ō ō - /oe/
Œ œ - /ur/
P p - /pe/
R r - /re/
ʃ ſ - /se/
Ϣ ϣ - /sh/
T t - /te/
Ɵ ϑ - /th/
U u - /uh/
Ū ū - /uu/
V v - /ve/
Ƿ ƿ - /we/
X ϰ - /ke/
Z z - /ze/
Ʒ ʒ - /zch/
` ` - glottal stop

>>47
NO ÞORN?

Glad to see some people into spelin reform.
I think little corrections like changing/replacing few letters won't get it anywhere. It will be like attempt to introduce metric back in the 70s, it will confuse people and create more nonsense. 

if spelling reform should happen it should be fully implemented with strong phonemic orthography. Hopefully sometime in the future countries with de facto or official english language usage will consider establishing global iingliš language academy and reform the spelling based on neutral accent (old english?) and keep it updated as it ever evolves.

I think the English writing system does need a reform.

Not being phonetic is stupid.

hvinot du boθ, it iz veri έzi?

>>48
I had thorn in my old revisions but I've since gotten sick of it. However I do truly believe that English should include thorn and eth if any major revisions were to take place. Won't happen though, people are too close-minded.

"Modern English has anywhere from 14 to 22 separate vowel and diphthong phonemes, depending on dialect, and 26 or 27 consonants. A simple phoneme-letter representation of this language within the 26 letters of the English alphabet is impossible"

Seriously, if there was spelling reform, literacy rates would rise and learning difficulties would diminish.

English has 44 sounds, consisting of 20 vowels and 24 consonants, as exemplified in the following words and graphemes:
19 vowels as in at, aim, fair, cart, autumn, end, eel, term, it, tie, on, toe, oil, too, fort, up, due, out, could
and the unstressed, barely audible half vowel (or schwa) as in 'flatten, decide, abandon;
and the 24 consonants b, ch, d, f, g, h, j, k, l, m, n, ng, p, r, s, sh, t, v, w, y, z, voiced th (this), unvoiced th (think), and zh (as in vision).

Many people have tried spelling reform (including Benjamin Franklin and Andrew Carnegie). It has never caught on (read The Mother Tongue for moar info).
And we'd have to retranslate all of our shit we have now.

Vowel Phoneme    Approximation    Replacement    Letter
a    at        A a
aeye    aim        Ä ä
air    fair    eh   
aa    cart        Æ æ
augh    autumn        Å å
eh    end        E e
ee    see        Ë ë
er    term        Œ œ
ih    it        I i
ai    tie        Ï ï
o    rock        O o
oe    toe        Ö ö
oi    oil        Ó ó
oo    too    uu   
or    fort    augh   
uh    up        U u
uu    due        Ü ü
au    out        Á á
uoh    could        Ú ú

Consonant Phoneme    Approximation    Replacement    Letter    Alternative Letters    Alt. Lettering Reason
b    boat        B b       
ch    church    t + sh           
d    dance        D d       
f    found        F f       
g    game        G g       
h    hard        H h       
j    jump    d + zh           
k    king        K k       
l    life        L l       
m    man        M m       
n    now        N n       
ng    sing        Ŋ ŋ    Ń ń, Ņ ņ, Ň ň    Too similar to "N"
p    pass        P p       
r    read        R r       
s    said        S s       
sh    should        ʃ ſ    Ś ś, Ŝ ŝ, Ş ş, Š š, Ƨ ƨ    Too similar to "f and r"
t    time        T t       
v    vice        V v       
w    would        W w       
y    yes        Y y       
z    zoo        Z z       
dth    the        Ð ð       
th    thing        Þ þ    Θ θ, Ɵ ϑ    Too similar to "p"
zh    genre        Ʒ ʒ    Ƶ ƶ, Ź ź, Ż ż, Ž ž    Too similar to the number "3"
[glottal stop]    uh-oh        `  `       


A Ä Á E Ë I Ï O Ö Ó U Ü Ú Æ Œ                       
B D Ð F G H K L M N Ŋ P R S ʃ T V W Y Z Ʒ Þ                       
A Ä Á B D Ð E Ë F G H I Ï K L M N Ŋ O Ö Ó P R S ʃ T U Ü Ú V W Y Z Ʒ Þ Æ Œ                       


at    -    at   
aim    -    äm   
fair    -    fer   
cart    -    kæt   
autumn    -    åtum   
end    -    end   
see    -    së   
term    -    tœm   
it    -    it   
tie    -    tï   
rock    -    rok   
toe    -    tö   
oil    -    óil   
too    -    *tüü   
fort    -    *f `åt   
up    -    up   
due    -    dyü   
out    -    át   
could    -    kúd   
*contains two u-umlauts to diffrientiate between the word "to" which would be "tü" *the word for "fort"'s homonym (fought) would be  "fåt" which does not contain the glottal stop. (Nouns have priority of glottal stop).

dance    -    dæns   
found    -    fánd   
game    -    gäm   
hard    -    hæd   
jump    -    dʒump   
king    -    kiŋ   
life    -    lïf   
man    -    man   
now    -    ná   
sing    -    siŋ   
pass    -    pæs   
read    -    ^rëd   
said    -    sed   
should    -    ſúd   
time    -    tïm   
vice    -    vïs   
would    -    wúd   
yes    -    yes   
zoo    -    zü   
the    -    ðu   
thing    -    þiŋ   
genre    -    ʒonru   
uh-oh    -    `u-ö   
^ read's homonym, "reed" would be spelt "rëëd".

>>56

Kinda dig it, but I think /dzh/ should have a single letter -- one letter per sound would be the simplest thing to shoot for

Žž seems a good one to me.  Śś might be a good one for /sh/ and Ćć for /ch/, maybe Ąą for /ai/ in air.  Qu /kv/ probably needs to be changed too Ķ seems pretty good.

Something like:
Śúd wē go tǔ Ķać?
"Should we go to Kvatch"

Guys, guys. Let's not go to far wiþ ðis. Ðere's noþiŋ wrong wiþ yusiŋ letterklusters. But wile wi'r at it, wy not remov unnesessary redundansy?

>>58
O, Ai almost forgot, it's nise to be eibel to writ it yusiŋ a normal kibord.

>>58

Nothing wrong with clusters, but I don't think a good phonetic spelling system would use letter clusters to produce a single sound (like useing Qu, Sh, Wh, Ch, Th, and so on).  That doesn't mean that I can't use clusters for a combination of two different sounds like throw or school or something.  Wen rather than when makes sense.  using a symbol for every lettercluster isn't sensible.  I mean how fucking long do we want the alphabet to be.

???? ???????????????????????????? ???????????? ???????? ???????? ???????????? ???????? ???????????????????????? ????????????????????????. ???????? ???????????? ???????????????????????????? ???????? ???????? ???? SMP ???????????? ???????? ???????????? ???? ???????????? ???????? ????????????.

I also like how Deseret shortens common words like "the" to "????." That would be pretty handy even in a Latin-based orthography.

>>61
All I see in boxes and hexdigits in them. Let's take as rule of thumb that everthing that is everything with uncode >0xffff should not be used because it's lesbi.

>>60
"Wen" rather than "when" does not make sense because /w/ and /hw/ are not the same sound.

>>62
No, let's take it as a rule of thumb that your computer just has shitty support for supplementary planes.

>>63
/hw/ is for faggots
everybody says /w/

>>47
What the hell is this? Did you just scroll through Character Map looking for "cool" letters?

Ɲ and ŋ are not a case pair! Neither are ʃ and ſ; hell, ʃ is already lowercase!

Why bring in Ϣ and ϣ from Coptic? Why bring in Ɵ and ϑ from Greek symbols? (They're not a case pair either!) Why the hell would you try to use ϰ as a lowercase for X?!

And let's not forget how many of your letters are being used for sounds they never represent...

>>66

>And let's not forget how many of your letters are being used for sounds they never represent...

So what you'll propose? Rip symbols from IPA?

>>66
Not all characters are uniform for one phoneme you fucking tool. You are a boring linguistics student. You should kill yourself.

the fuck is a glottal stop?

>>69
The fu' is a glo'al sto'?

Does that help?

>>70
A little.
Niggers.

>>71
^* African Americans

>>72
* African Australians

>>72

>>73

Nigerz.
Ðis is spelin reform.

>>74
* Spelling revision

>>75
*SpeliŊ revißon

It wud bi greit tu taip ingliš džast laik it is pronounc'd! Ænd wi siriousli níd ðís kúl Nordik rúnletters Ð ænd Þ.

Grítiŋs (jús 'ng'-digræf if jú wiš) from Finlænd!

I used to think that English spelling should be completely done up from scratch so that each spelling would properly represent the pronunciation of its word, but now I think that truly phonetic spelling isn't possible. Every accent and dialect has a very different way of pronouncing each word, so a universally accepted form of spelling is necessary for people to understand each other.

However,  I do think English could benefit from some new letters, like ð/Ð and þ/Þ.

>>78
You don't need to aim for a PHONETIC spelling... but a PHONEMIC one. Like, the K in Kill and in sKill sounds pretty different, but it's the same phoneme (sound building block), so it's OK to use the same letter for both... most dialectal variation is just about this, and, if you consider a lot of different dialects while making your spelling, it'll probably be OK.

About ð and þ: just using "dh" and "th" would be the best bet... if English didn't already used "h" for a sound and didn't allowed words like "courthouse". So, these letters can be really useful...

I would suggest "make slow, make small, make progressive". Changing first things that are already against English orthography rules (like island>iland, piranha>piranya, machine>makine, etc.). After this, tweaking the rules a bit until they're acceptable.

One thing I never understood is, why English tries to write loanwords as they were in their native language? Does writing "filozofy" instead of "philosophy" wouldn't be already a progress?

(Samefag as >>79 )
inb4 "piranha is a Portuguese loanword", so does "breeze", "emu", "tank", but I've never seen someone proposing write them in English as "brisa", "ema" and "tanque".

>>79
Piranha isn't pronounced piranya and machine isn't pronounced makine, also
Does writing "filozofy" instead of "philosophy" wouldn't be already a progress?
Your English is fucking terrible, stop giving us native speakers recommendations on how we should use it.

>>81
1)First of all, this topic was made by some native speaker, about changing English orthography. So, I'm completely on topic and not "guivin you netives speackers recumemdashoms haw you shoold uze it", even if you didn't like my proposes.

2)[i]Ad hominem[i] fallacy ("you are no nevite speacka so you canot opeine loloollo") doesn't invalidate arguments.

3)I proposed "piranya" because doesn't change so much English spelling, yet using "ny" is better than "nh" in this case (there's no fucking /h/ sound in this word). If you have some better solution, SHOW IT or just go back to /b/.

4)I made a retarded mistake with "machine", but CH is still plain stupid in it - /məˈʃiːn/ has no /tʃ/ sound.

5)Yes, some NATIVE SPEAKERS pronounce "philosophy" with a plain /z/ sound.

TL;DR: lern2troll, butthurt newfag... kkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkk

Ahmmmm, forgot:
6)The /z/ sound is because English spelling is retarded and misleading EVEN FOR NATIVES. I heard it and am dead serious.

>>82
1) I'm not denying it was made by a native speaker
2) You are fucking stupid
3) Better suggestion? There's no /h/ or /y/ in piranha, so "pirana" or "piranna"
4) Mashine then
5)I'm not saying some don't, (I don't, oddly enough) but that sentence I quoted was grammatically incorrect.
6)Cool

What the fuck? You don't even know what you're arguing about

>>84
1) OK.

2)Trying to save your ad hominem with another ad hominem. Cool, this is smartness! Oh yes, I am the stupid one here... LOL.

3)Protip: you didn't mean /y/ sound but /j/, as in "yes" /jɛs/ - front unrounded semivowel. There's no /y/ in English (unlike German "ü" or French "u"). And yes, there is a /j/ sound in "piranha" for some dialects.

The "nha" in the word is pronounced as /nə/ or /-njə/, and the first "a" is pronounced as /æ/ or /ɑː/ (check Wikipedia). Since there's dialectal variation, you can just pick the spelling that sounds nearer the original [piˈɾɐ̃ɲɐ] - in this case, "piranya". Or propose another tiebreaker than etymology.

4)OK.

5)Sleep deprivation fucks my grammar. Not only with English.

| What the fuck? You don't even know what you're arguing about
Yes, I do. I'm showing that English orthography's worst problem is not lack of letters or something like that, is LACK OF CONSISTENCY.

>>85
1)This has been solved
2) Fuck you buddy
3) Yeah, I dunno IPA, just assumed it was the same.
4)Cool
5)Go to sleep then
Yes, I do. I'm showing that English orthography's worst problem is not lack of letters or something like that, is LACK OF CONSISTENCY.
8=========================D HUEHUEHUEU YOU SUCK ÞAT

>>86
Learn a bit about IPA if you want to contribute.

If you just want with your "imma a newfag fron united nigerlamd of merkins imma but hurt so i pozt a dikk askii art", just continue!

Protip: /bæk tə biː ænd ləːn tə trɒl/

Hah hah! FACKIN' BIG PENIS! Heheheheh. Alright, now listen to me.

>>79
Where are you from? If you'd rather not dicuss this here, email me.

Hahahahahahahahahah. Ah yea man, COCKIN' OUT MAXIMUM. And I just want to let you know that I'm not the same person as >>81

>>88
8============================================================================================================================================================================================================================================================================D