Also Somewat Against Diskarding Symbolz from Anglisist Riting—But in a Kompletely
Different Way
Jacqueline Xóchitl
Xaviera Concepción
Wołoszczak, PhD and
Dzhakalin
Sotsheetluh Zaiveeëra
Konsepseeyown Vowoshtshak, PeeAitshDee
Dr. Thik W. Trals, in hiz skreed against diskarding symbolz from Anglisist riting—entitled “Against Discarding Symbols from Anglicist Writing”—haz konstrukted a very weak strawman hu nonedheless bested him.
Most ridikulously, he defendz ⟨z⟩—haz anywon serious about spelling reform aktshually sugdzhested removing ⟨z⟩ from dhe alfabet? It providez a voist kounterpart to ⟨s⟩, and hu woudn’t want dhat?
On dhe odher hand, ⟨c⟩, ⟨q⟩, and ⟨x⟩ really aren’t doing anywon any favorz. Eliminating dhem—with a possible, personal eksepshon for tradishonal or forein spellingz of proper nounz—iz good for Engglish and good for Engglish speakerz.
Dhat leavez ⟨h⟩—dhe “little grafeme soldyer”, az it haz been kalled. Related to ⟨h⟩, we support kommon-sense digraf reform. Dhe tradishonal, unambigyuous, and non-redundant digraf ⟨sh⟩ iz nesessary and eazily understood, and dhe semi-tradishonal but ekwally unambigyuous, and non-redundant ⟨zh⟩ iz its obvious kounterpart. Historikal ⟨ch⟩ needz to go dhe way of ⟨c⟩, replaste by ⟨tsh⟩ or ⟨sh⟩ az appropriate. Dhis impliez dhat dhe obvious voist kounterpart of ⟨tsh⟩ to replase dhe most kommon yuse of ⟨j⟩ iz ⟨dzh⟩. Wile ⟨ph⟩ iz dzhenerally unambigyuous, it iz also dzhenerally unnesessary, and shoud be replaste with simple ⟨f⟩. Dhe ambigyuous ⟨th⟩ shoud be split into ⟨th⟩ and ⟨dh⟩ for its voiseless and voist variants, respektively.
More broadly, ⟨gn⟩ for /n/ shoud be simplified, all instansez of ⟨gh⟩ rendered in a less ambigyuous manner, az ⟨g⟩, ⟨f⟩, or even ⟨⟩, az appropriate, ⟨wr⟩ simplified to ⟨r⟩, and ⟨wh⟩ simplified to ⟨w⟩, eksept in ⟨who⟩, witsh needz more drastik reformulashon az ⟨hu⟩. Dhe ridikulousness dhat iz ⟨ti⟩, ⟨si⟩, and ⟨xi⟩ before ⟨on⟩ (and elsewere) shoud be rektified to ⟨sh⟩ az well. Doubled letterz are fine, az dhey often give addishonal hints to dhe pronunsiashon of nearby vowelz.
Despite Dr. Trals’ snarky komments about ⟨h⟩ and ⟨ng⟩, we take dhe matter seriously. Dhe suppozed underlying yunified foneme—“heng”—appealz to us. And wile we propoze no offishal ⟨h⟩/⟨ng⟩ reform, we woud sugdzhest—baste on dhe strength of dhe appeal of heng’z kwirky karakter—dhat informal riting—at, say, dhe level were “u”, “ur”, “idk”, and “lol” woud be appropriate—allow heng in dhe form of eidher ⟨ng⟩ or non-digrafik ⟨h⟩ in free variashon. Lol, u no ngeng iz hahin with hiz ngomiez!
Wile we agree with Dr. Trals dhat Engglish “vokoidz” are a bit more tshallendzhing—we do not share hiz kowardise towardz dhem. A kommon-sense approatsh dhat leveradzhez dhe predominant orthografik konvenshonz of Engglish to render relatively unambigyuous spellingz iz kwite tenable—espeshally with dhe reïntrodukshon of dhe diakritikal diaeresis—dhou we will leave dhat until sutsh time az our more straitforward kall to reform Engglish konsonants haz gained more trakshon.
For more informashon, rite to us at:
Dhe /Vowoʃtʃæk/ Sisterz
Spelling Reform Informashon Katalog
Pweblo, Kolorado 81009
About dhe Authorz: “Dhe /Vowoʃtʃæk/ Sisterz”—az dhey are known profeshonally—are identikal twinz hu have kommitted dheir livez to kommon-sense spelling reform. Born Jacqueline Concepción and Xóchitl Xaviera Wołoszczak, dheir onomastik identitiez merdzhed at an early adzhe wen—after an unfortshunate toddler-dzhuggling–related aksident—dheir parents lost trak of witsh youngster waz witsh. Dheir modher waz konvinst dhat dheir identitiez were assined won way, wile dheir fadher waz konvinst of dhe opposite. Az inseparable young twinz, dhey seem not to have properly internalized dhe fakt dhat dhey had different namez at dhat point and, wen askt “Are you Jacqueline?” or “Are you Xóchitl?”, both replied affirmatively to both. Eventshually, dheir work with spelling reform led to an ideal way to distingwish dhemselvez from eatsh odher. Jacqueline Xóchitl, az kommitted to spelling reform az her sister, feelz dhat eksepshonz shoud be allowed for proper namez, espeshally dhoze of non-Engglish oridzhin. Dzhakalin Sotsheetluh respektfully disagreez with her sister. Eatsh had already adopted /dʒækᵊlɪn sotʃitlᵊ/ az her nom de la réforme de l’orthographe, but now dhey are able to eatsh spell dhe name in a way dhat best reflekts dheir personal orthografik valuez.
