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[leeroy]

for my essay Some might call this cheating, but I'd prefer to call it "research"...

In total, I'm evaluating the motives and effectiveness of various attempts to reform the English spelling system.

So, from the 16th to the 19th century, a lot of people put forward ideas for making the English alphabet and spelling system more phonetic. There were some cool ideas (lots involving creating new characters, or "borrowing" them from other languages) but mostly nothing ever came to anything until the 20th century. (Then a chap invented a sort of phonetic short-hand which changed a few things, blah blah....)

What I'm trying to ascertain is why? Why did (presumably) society resist any change to English spelling - even if it did (in the long run) lead to a more sensible and efficient system of writing?

Is it simply because the frustrations of a few academics and literal types over the inconsistency of English spelling didn't carry enough weight to instigate national/global change?

Was it because there was no real commercial application for such a change?

Or perhaps it was more the general principle of the Weberian top-down principle of imposing linguistic rules from above?

Thoughts welcome

[ls650]

[guest of Japan]

Have you ever realized how awkward the keys are on your computer? They were actually designed that way as to slow down typing speed. In the early days of typewriters jamming would occur if typing was to fast. Jamming is no longer a problem but the keyboard remains the same. More than a hundred years ago better ergonomically designed keyboard were introduced to the market and failed miserably. The big killer was the secretaries of the world who were unwilling to change their ways. They probably all　developed carpal tunnel syndrome, but they never had to learn a new keyboard. Sometimes logic just isn't enough.