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Interim Basic Policy for Mild Spelling Reform of English

 

Not every silent letter will be cut. 

Short vowels are spelled with a, e, i, o, and u.

Deal with unphonetic digraphs and trigraphs.

Deal with "gh"/f/.

Deal with "ch"/k/.

Others.

Avoid "split digraphs". (Derivatives are affected.)

◎a-e⇒ae (make→maek)

◎e-e⇒ee (extreme→extreem)

◎i-e⇒-y-e (nice→nyce)

◎o-e⇒oe (home→hoem)

◎u-e⇒ue (cute→cuet)

 

Retain good digraphs.

/eɪ/ a(e), ai, -ay, ei(gh)

/iː/ e(e), ea, (i), (y)

/aɪ/ i(e), -y(e), -igh ; eye, buy

/oʊ/ o(e), oa, oh ; (eau)

/juː/ u(e), eu, ew ; (-ugh)

/uː/ oo ; u(e), eu, ew

/ʊ/ oo, u

 

Fix bad digraphs & trigraphs, OUGH & AUGH.



Avoid split digraphs.(Derivatives are affected.)

Split digraphs : a_e, e_e, i_e, o_e, u_e.

Why split?  Why not put them together?

Why not ae, ee, ie, oe, ue?  They wood merge with "polite vowels".

(However, "nice" cannot be "niec".  Wood be "nyce".)

 

Avoid "split digraphs". (Derivatives are affected.)

◎a-e⇒ae (make→maek)

◎e-e⇒ee (extreme→extreem)

◎i-e⇒-y-e (nice→nyce)

◎o-e⇒oe (home→hoem)

◎u-e⇒ue (cute→cuet)

Retain the dubbled consonant letters occasionally.

Retain the dubbled consonant letters in words when followed by endings such as -e, -ed, -en, -er, -est, -et, -ing, -a, -o, -y. For example: steppe, missed, sudden, supper, biggest, bonnet, cutting, gonna, hippo, happy, etc. 

 

Retain the dubbled consonant letters at word end. For example: add, butt, err, inn, jazz, miss, off, purr, sell, etc. 

 

Fix "GH" when it sounds like "ff"/f/.

cough == coff

enough == enuff

laugh == laff

rough == ruff

tough == tuff

trough == troff

 

Fix "CH" when it sounds like /k/.

archive == arkive

chameleon == cameleon

chaos == caos

chaotic == caotic

character == caracter

 

Optionally, fix "PH" when it has the /f/ sound.

Optionally, use "f" for the "ph" when it has the /f/ sound.

apostrophe == apostrofy

catastrophe == catastrofy

cenotaph == cenotaf

elephant == elefant

epitaph == epitaf

phantom == fantom

photograph == fotograf

sophisticate == sofisticate

telephone == telefoen

  

(However, we retain "phat" and "phishing", for example)

Not every silent letter will be cut.

Remoove surplus letters.  Not every silent letter will be cut.  Retain initial letters.  Retain ck, tch, and wh.

alignment == (alinement)

asthma == asma

beauty == beuty

bureaucracy == burocracy

chaos == caos

comb == coam ("Cut one, add one.")

feather == fether

juice == juice (to avoid a split digraph "u_e")

juicy == juicy (to avoid a split digraph "u_e")

knight == knight (Retain an initial silent letter.)

night == night (Retain a mixed trigraph "-igh".)

pleasure == plesure

ready == reddy ("Cut one, add one.")

realm == relm

steady == steddy ("Cut one, add one.")

tomb == toom ("Cut one, add one.")

womb == woom ("Cut one, add one.")