Newsgroups: sci.lang
Path: cantaloupe.srv.cs.cmu.edu!das-news2.harvard.edu!news2.near.net!news.mathworks.com!udel!gatech!howland.reston.ans.net!pipex!uknet!festival!kthier
From: kthier@festival.ed.ac.uk (K Thier)
Subject: Re: German spelling reform
X-Newsreader: TIN [version 1.1 PL8]
References: <Pine.SUN.3.91.950122171758.2828A-100000-100000-100000-100000@suntan>
Message-ID: <D2x5A9.Auv@festival.ed.ac.uk>
Organization: Edinburgh University
Date: Tue, 24 Jan 1995 16:46:56 GMT
Lines: 126



Just a couple of comments, which are certainly incomplete, as I do not
live in Germany right now and thus miss a lot of the current information
I am a native speaker, though.

: :    Photo -> Foto, Asphalt -> Asfalt, Katastrophe -> Katastrofe.

: What is the advantage to losing the connection to the greek 'ph'?

Not much. it has just been going on for a while and is regularized now.
Foto is actually a bad example as most Germans spell it with an f
anyway. Greek th and rh are made redundant, too.

: :    (\"Uberschwang) \"uberschwenglich -> \"uberschw\"anglich.

: Oh, swell... another umlaut.  :)

True, but a sensible one. While previously some derivatives from words
with a had ae (umlaut) and others had e, all have ae now.

: :    irgend etwas -> irgendetwas.
: :    radfahren -> Rad fahren.

: More compounds?

: And how about some verbs that have particles that behave like seperable 
: prefixes but don't attach them to the verb in writing an infinitive?

: :    da\ss -> dass, w\"a\ssrig -> w\"assrig.

: Why are they getting rid of the es-zet?

they aren't. es-zet is preserved following long vowels, while short
vowels are followed by double s, parallel to other geminates (doubles)
after short vowels.

: :    numerieren -> nummerieren.

: What is the point in doubling the m?  For that matter, why have ANY 
: double letters in places where the pronounciation isn't changed?

Because Nummer (number) is spelt with double mm, and strictly speaking, the
spelling numerieren (to number) does not reflect the pronunciation with
a short vowel.

: Here's an example:

Not for the same problem, though.

: leeren
: lehren

: No difference in pronounciation, so why difference in spelling?

Good question. Aren't they doing anything about it?

: :    Schiff-fahrt (Schiffahrt) -> Schiff-fahrt (Schifffahrt).

: Why does Schiff have a double f anyway?

because it has a short i.

: :    Zuk-ker -> Zuc-ker.

: Is there a DIFFERENCE between 'kk' and 'ck'?

Zucker was spelt with ck anyway, just when split at the end ot a line
(as in the example) was the k substituted for the c, for whatever silly
reason.
Good to stick with c-k then!

: :    8fach -> 8-fach.   

: This almost makes sense.

: : For a little broader description, have a look into e.g. January's
: : 'Spektrum der Wissenschaft', pp. 106, where I took these examples from.

: If I'd been involved in the original German spelling reform, I'd have 
: made a few differences:

: now       my way
: ss/s      s
singles or geminates make a difference in the pronunciation of the
preceding vowel, thus the distinction is necessary
: s (vcd)   z
represented by s allright. voiceless s is ss or es-zet. z represents ts.
: tz/z      c
rather vice versa where c is pronounced z.
: w         v
: v         f
v could do with rearranging, but your version is too simplistic. It
would be sensible to substitute v by w or f acc. to pronunciation.
: u(for w)  w
where's that??? it might exist phonetically, but it is phonemically irrelevant.
: sch       sh    (where did they come up with sch anyway?  3 letters for 
:                  one sound???)
it was historically s-ch and developed into the present sound.
: schw      sv
: schm      sm    (etc... like /St/ is spelled <st>)
: sm        ssm   (to compensate)
: /st/      sst
: /St/      st  (stay the same as it is now)
Nonsense. If you want to do anything , change st and sp into scht and
schp respectively.

: We could even go so far as:
: ch        x
: x         ks
: chs       ks/xs (depending on circumstances)

ch to x is absolute nonsense, if you do that you can as well introduce
IPA as compulsory letters. chs could be sensibly substituted by x, but i
see no need to get rid of x=ks.

: Ix moexte etvas cu esen.  Ich svime gern.

Looks like /iks moekste etwas ku e:zen  ... svi:me ../ trying to write
IPA on the Computer

Catriona




