Linguistic Reform

[jume]

I was reading this article in The Atlantic over the weekend; it insinuates that the reason the US doesn't have more engineers, doctors, teachers, lawyers, etc is because as kids, we spend too much of our time learning to read and write, memorizing and internalizing all of the pits and foibles of the English language

Comments

[meistergedanken]

" the US doesn't have more engineers, doctors, teachers, lawyers, etc is because as kids, we spend too much of our time learning to read and write, memorizing and internalizing all of the pits and foibles of the English language

[jume]

yeah, I don't entirely buy their conclusions either, but it was a fun thought experiment!

Sometimes I think my ideal use of Y would be to turn it into the long-I sound, reserving I to represent the long-E, but then what do we do with the "yuh" sound; we could increase compatibility with northern european languages by using J to represent that, but then what about the soft G/J sound? argh

it's why I loved learning japanese kana, because there's just sounds, and sometimes they're voiced and you just put the voice mark on them.