It’s no secret that the English language has heaps of crazy grammar rules, and the way we pronounce words is no exception. While there are 26 letters in the alphabet, they share at least 44 different pronunciations between them. The letter A, for example, has seven different English pronunciations alone.
The complexity of English spelling has very little to do with pronunciation. It’s about how the words are represented in writing. To say that the written language is primary is to get it backwards. The word “wrestle” is not represented in our brains with an initial sound that disappears before we pronounce it.
I see your point, Goofy. On the other hand, the complexity of pronunciation in English is difficult for novice speakers. Spanish, for example, is so much more logical.
Originally posted by Kalleh: I see your point, Goofy. On the other hand, the complexity of pronunciation in English is difficult for novice speakers. Spanish, for example, is so much more logical.
The letter A, for example, has seven different English pronunciations alone.
No, English has a lot of vowels and sometimes some of them are represented with the same letter. They could be spelled differently if English had a different writing system. This isn’t a problem with pronunciation, it’s a problem with the spelling system we are currently stuck with.
Sometimes spelling does influence pronunciation, for example some people pronounce “often” with /t/ even tho /t/ was normally lost in this environment - compare “soften”.
And ESL students sometimes let spelling interfere with their pronunciation, for instance they might pronounce “edition” and “addition” differently because they are spelled differently. But this isn’t because English pronunciation is difficult or illogical, it’s because the spelling is.This message has been edited. Last edited by: goofy,
In A History of English Spelling by Upward and Davison, they mention a study that found that English spelling was 84% regular, and only 3% of words were so irregular and unpredictable that they had to be individually learned.
Originally posted by Kalleh: Spanish words, for the most part, follow the pronunciation rules. Many English words do, though many don't. I gave examples.
But your examples show that there are problems with English spelling, not pronunciation. /ənʌf/, /tʌf/, /trɑf/, /ðo/, /nu/, /ni/ don't contain any sounds that are particularly difficult for Spanish speakers except maybe /ð/.
Us literate English speakers fetishize spelling. We seem to think that the written form of the word is the word’s real representation, and that the rules of pronunciation convert this written form into the spoken form. But this is not true. I know it’s not true because illiterate people speak language too.This message has been edited. Last edited by: goofy,
