@ Cybil. Btw there are quite a few words that are spelled differently in Canadian English than in U.S. English.

Sometimes unstressed consonants are pronounced differently also, such as the /t/ in the word water, which in many dialects is commonly pronounced with a "flap" sound that's more like a /d/ sound, but when the speaker is making an effort to stress the word, it goes back to sounding like a /t/. And of course many dialects don't pronounce the /r/ in ordinary speech either. *sigh*

i suppose that's the beauty of the language, and the importance of the written word. the english language may sound different from country to country and of course even within countries, but (excepting of course our american cousins) we all write the same.

A real English spelling reform would require 30+ letters. Anything less than that would be silly, and wouldn't really make the language easier.

In English proper spelling and grammar fallows the literature not the speech.

English spelling difficulty is more than overcome with its grammatical simplicity.

I mean, name another language with only two conjugated forms of "to be" in the present & past tense.

*by its, it'd be helpful if I wasn't terrible at grammar anyway.

*if I weren't

;)

English spelling might make more sense if we went back to our Germanic roots and purged it of its Latin vocabulary.

Is that subjunctive? I hate subjunctive.

""We're going to spell colour as color" said America. "Fuck u""

I'm amazed the British, after the 100 years & Napoleonic wars, uses Frenchy spellings.

That was subjunctive, it's archaic and pisses everyone off so don't worry about it. lol

I love subjunctive, but mainly because I have a couple of linguistics students* for friends who love to nitpick every obscure grammatical function possible but consistently fail to get subjunctive right.

*: to be read as "pretentious uptight grammar Nazis of the worst sort"

Plus, there's something pleasing about the sound of "if I/he/she/it were" vs "___ was." Mainly because "was" comes out "WUHZ" around these parts, and "were" sounds so much more elegant and refined by comparison...

Subjunctive rocks.

Otherwise, though, I agree with what Putin said. I wanted to memorialize this rather touching (to me anyway) moment.

I can't stand it when people don't use the subjunctive, it bugs the hell out of me. Unfortunately, very few people correctly use the subjunctive, which is really sad because it's so much more simple in English than in many other languages.

I say langwidge.

Regional accents within the United States mean that having written language follow spoken form will result in written language varying regionally. For example, some people say "wash" like "warsh" or "park" like "pahk".

Indeed, subjonctive and Konjunktiv I are quite different beasts than subjunctive. Even though English has only 3 moods, I wouldn't say it is grammatically THAT easy; how many tenses are there? 12? 16? Some aspects are easier than elsewhere but all in all, most European languages are comparable in this aspect. Certainly more difficult than Chinese, to name the only non-European language I have some experience with.

And I say lengwhich – with nasal n merging with g.

NO.

1. It's really not that hard to learn the language as it is

2. It ALREADY is constantly changing, so if you reform spelling, really, it won't matter, people will just continue to evolve the way they write and say things, and once the pronunciation changes, you'll have to change the spelling again to fit phonetically...

3. Frankly, I LIKE the variety of ways letters can be combined, and not always how you'd expect in a purely-phonetic language...after all, Chaucer and even Shakespeare would have fun with spellings, they didn't start to become standardized until Dr. Johnson...who eventually, after all that time working o the first great dictionary, HIMSELF conceded it was a losing battle of sorts, as new words and ways of spelling are always cropping up.

4. Besides, I love the way the language is right now...WHY change it? It's easy enough, and sounds great, so what's the problem that's so pressing?

5. Teddy Roosevelt actually moved for this in his term...and very quickly dropped it after he found no one else liked the idea...so...

6. Finally, a BIT of a stretch here, perhaps, but:

Newpseak, anyone?

Maybe not a direct correlation, but still, that's part of how it starts, to "simplify" and "help" the language and all...and look what happens...

7. Finally--

The kids I tutor are confused ALREADY when I go over Chaucer and Shakespeare...

If "It iz a tale tuld bi an ideeit, full uv sownd and fyery, signifiing nuthing" is there...instead of "It is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing," how much harder will it be?

(And that's Shakespeare, CHAUCER or BEOWULF would be a nightmare for them!) ;)

Jeez... "Was" is singular and "were" is plural. For "you" which is both singular and plural second person, always use "were". It's easy.

I, he, she, it "was"
We, you, they "were"

And on the whole"how we pronounce it" thing...

I'd say I pronounce it about "langwudge" or "langwitch" both of which are close enough to "language," so...

"Certainly more difficult than Chinese, to name the only non-European language I have some experience with."

How many Hanzi can you write?

Around 120 but that includes the ones where I don't remember the stroke sequence, i.e. those I have no chance of founding in a dictionary if I ever searched for their additional meanings. I hope to learn the major radicals first, then it should add up rather quickly – if I find the time for further study of the language that is. I learned the grammar in pinyin of course.

@Draugnar
That's only true in the indicative, the subjunctive is always "were."

Well I guess the language is changing gradually over time such as the Sulphur incident how the official English spelling was changed to Sulfur. Ugh... But as a trade with the Americans they needed to start saying Aluminium correctly.

It would be too difficult to change the language altogether because of different accents and dialects. Listening to Scots I noticed that Scottish people tend to pronounce words a lot more phonetically than English people.

So personally I don't think a change would be a good Idea. I also enjoy listening to people from phonetically speaking countries trying to learn english, provides a good laugh.

^ Yes, for example, "If I were you" not "if I was you". At least that is the way it is in standard English. Personally I am no grammar nazi. Lots of people break the "rules" and yet have no difficulty being understood.

But we don't spell it aluminium. We spell it aluminum.

I forgot about the "If I were you". Yes, I do always say were in that case. If I use "If", I use "were".

You have to use the subjunctive in indirect commands, expression of wishes, and counterfactual conditions.

But if it be not freakin' awesome, I'll be a monkey's uncle.