Random Thoughts on Spelling

Today I have been thinking about Spelling.

Why, with all the lab work for school, writing for the school paper and job seeking with which I have been preoccupied, did this come to the forefront of my mind? I have no idea, but it was what I was thinking about.

Spelling - that horrible part of Language Arts when I was a kid, where I had to remember the difference between long vowels and short vowels, where the teacher made us all stand up in front of the room and have weekly Spelling Bees. I never won. In fact, I was generally one of the first to sit back down for misspelling a word.

I remember with a complete lack of fondness writing my spelling lists over and over, looking up definitions and then having my Mom or Dad quiz me on the words. At least I had parents who helped me study.

When I eventually had the opportunity to study other languages I briefly decided that English would have been better if we adopted a more phonetic spelling like a lot of other languages have. Then it wouldn't have been so confusing to learn rough, through, bough, etc, and had to deal with their homophones of ruff, threw, and bow. (Though [there's that -ough again] the latter are not nearly as niffty looking without all the wasted letters of the former. Just a thought [again that -ough!].)

In time the etymology of words began to interest me, such that now I learn most new terms in Geology with more ease and find it interesting when I see all the desert terms with Arabic or Spanish origins and other terms with distinct French or German origins, aside from the purely scientific term with their mixed Greek and Latin roots. If I can break the words down they are actually easier for me to understand.

So today with this in mind, I decided I liked Racquetball as a better spelling than Racket ball. While both are technically correct. The first is closer to its roots and to me more elegant.

Oh, and by the way. The long, short vowel thing. Once I read a how-to on Dutch spelling and pronunciation, our spelling rules became clear. At least in regard to words of Anglo-Saxon origin.

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Also, some of those geology terms with foreign origins include: sabka, arroyo, mélange, fenster. There's plenty more, but I thought I should at least support my statement with a word from each language I mentioned.