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>> makes the language better > Do you plan to resume using the word "hôtel"? ("The French spelling, with the circumflex, was also used in English, but is now r

>> makes the language better > Do you plan to resume using the word "hôtel"? ("The French spelling, with the circumflex, was also used in English, but is now rare" - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hotel https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hotel .) How does that actually archaic spelling of "hotel" help make the language better? The diaresis helps disambiguate the words coop (housing for chickens) and coöp (a business built as a coöperative). That's just one example. The rest of your post has some interesting points, though it's most interesting to me here because it seems to directly conflict with the "old" sense of the word "archaic" from the above discussion if it's a 19th/20th Century invention. It would imply to me the use of the word "archaic" is a bad editorial choice in the Wikipedia article and its primary sources on that word choice maybe not be the most reliable. (Of two citations, the one that actually uses the word "archaic" is a personal blog post, versus the Fowler's Modern English citation simply says "often dropped" and doesn't editorialize but does "blame" "often not on modern keyboards".)

eesmith 5y ago
You wrote "it is time we bring back the common usage of the diareses in English." When was it in common usage? You can't "go back" to something that never existed. And I showed it doesn't appear to be common in the 1800s. I can totally blame printing for contributing to the loss of Þ, but by the 1400s it was growing less common. It in turn had replaced ð in Old English, showing the printing press isn't the only thing which can change orthography. But I don't see how the printing press a contributing factor to the change in popularity of ö, which you asserted was the case. > The diaresis helps disambiguate FWIW, I use "co-op" when I want to disambiguate that case. There are two issues here. One is "use the diareses in teaching", and the other is "bring back the common usage." Your example only justifies the first. Consider Hebrew orthography. It does not indicate vowels. However, niqqud "is a system of diacritical signs used to represent vowels or distinguish between alternative pronunciations of letters of the Hebrew alphabet. ... In modern Israeli orthography niqqud is seldom used, except in specialised texts such as dictionaries, poetry, or texts for children or for new immigrants to Israel ... [although] it no longer reflects the current pronunciation.." - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Niqqud https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Niqqud Arabic orthography is similar. "Tashkīl is optional to represent missing vowels and consonant length. Modern Arabic is always written with the i‘jām—consonant pointing, but only religious texts, children's books and works for learners are written with the full tashkīl—vowel guides and consonant length." - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arabic_diacritics#harakat https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arabic_diacritics#harakat Clearly pedagogy can use a variant orthography that is not in common use! But if you go that route, why limit yourself to diaresis? English can use a grave accent to indicate if a vowel is to be pronounced ("learned" vs. "learnèd"). This is mostly in poetry and lyrics. A unified pedagogy might use "coôp" instead of "coöp". English can use an acute accent to indicate when an vowel is not silent. (The drink "maté", when the original Spanish is "mate"). For teaching, the acute can be used to disambiguate between words with the same spelling but different stress ("cónvert" vs. "convért" or "désert" vs. "desért"). And if we're talking about teaching ambiguous words, what about words like "bow" ("ribbon and bow" vs. "the ship's bow") and "close" ("close the door" vs "it was a close games")? I don't even have a notation, outside of IPA, to represent those. This means diaresis addresses only a small fraction of the ambiguity in English orthography. Is it really worthwhile to give extra attention on this one facet, and reduce time spent on other facets?
- WorldMaker 5y ago
  > You wrote "it is time we bring back the common usage of the diareses in English." No I wrote "make cases that think it is time". I'm much more ambivalent about it than the arguments I had heard from others. I agreed in the post you are responding too that I hadn't realized it was much closer to a modern reform movement than a "bring back". That's my uncritical understanding that I'll admit I was wrong about. Is it the right orthography reform movement to fight for expanding into common use? I don't know and I don't really have anywhere near as strong as opinion on this as you seem to have, but I do know people that think it is a useful reform movement to fight for with existing publication style guides to point to on how/when to use (the New Yorker's) and presumably an "easy win" with good precedence that would do some good, and that is all I was ever pointing out. I'm just pointing out the opinions of other people I've known, whether or not you agree with them is fine. These aren't my own opinions so while I've heard good arguments for them over the years, I certainly never internalized them and can't do justice in defending them. But I appreciate that you seem to be looking for much more of an argument here than I can muster.
  - eesmith 5y ago
    Then I misunderstood your earlier comment " ... there is a strong case to be made that it makes the language better and fell out of favor not because it wasn't useful but because it was more expensive." I don't see how you think there's a strong case. I don't see why you think ö fell out of favor because of cost. I didn't get from your earlier comment that these weren't personal beliefs at all but were forwarded from others. > existing publication style guides to point to That's not the basis for good pedagogy at the elementary school level. Publication style guides are for people with years of experience. In elementary school you learn how to alphabetize names. In 6th grade I learned a new rule - the library collated Mac and Mc together card catalog. (This was in 1981, before computers.) Turns out this was A.L.A. Rules for Filing Catalog Cards, rule 13) b), see https://archive.org/details/in.gov.ignca.15145/page/n19/mode/2up https://archive.org/details/in.gov.ignca.15145/page/n19/mode... . That link goes into far more detail than anything an elementary student should have to know about sorting names. For similar reasons, elementary students aren't expected to format their book reports in MLA style.

eesmith 5y ago

You wrote "it is time we bring back the common usage of the diareses in English." When was it in common usage? You can't "go back" to something that never existed. And I showed it doesn't appear to be common in the 1800s. I can totally blame printing for contributing to the loss of Þ, but by the 1400s it was growing less common. It in turn had replaced ð in Old English, showing the printing press isn't the only thing which can change orthography. But I don't see how the printing press a contributing factor to the change in popularity of ö, which you asserted was the case. > The diaresis helps disambiguate FWIW, I use "co-op" when I want to disambiguate that case. There are two issues here. One is "use the diareses in teaching", and the other is "bring back the common usage." Your example only justifies the first. Consider Hebrew orthography. It does not indicate vowels. However, niqqud "is a system of diacritical signs used to represent vowels or distinguish between alternative pronunciations of letters of the Hebrew alphabet. ... In modern Israeli orthography niqqud is seldom used, except in specialised texts such as dictionaries, poetry, or texts for children or for new immigrants to Israel ... [although] it no longer reflects the current pronunciation.." - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Niqqud https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Niqqud Arabic orthography is similar. "Tashkīl is optional to represent missing vowels and consonant length. Modern Arabic is always written with the i‘jām—consonant pointing, but only religious texts, children's books and works for learners are written with the full tashkīl—vowel guides and consonant length." - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arabic_diacritics#harakat https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arabic_diacritics#harakat Clearly pedagogy can use a variant orthography that is not in common use! But if you go that route, why limit yourself to diaresis? English can use a grave accent to indicate if a vowel is to be pronounced ("learned" vs. "learnèd"). This is mostly in poetry and lyrics. A unified pedagogy might use "coôp" instead of "coöp". English can use an acute accent to indicate when an vowel is not silent. (The drink "maté", when the original Spanish is "mate"). For teaching, the acute can be used to disambiguate between words with the same spelling but different stress ("cónvert" vs. "convért" or "désert" vs. "desért"). And if we're talking about teaching ambiguous words, what about words like "bow" ("ribbon and bow" vs. "the ship's bow") and "close" ("close the door" vs "it was a close games")? I don't even have a notation, outside of IPA, to represent those. This means diaresis addresses only a small fraction of the ambiguity in English orthography. Is it really worthwhile to give extra attention on this one facet, and reduce time spent on other facets?

WorldMaker 5y ago
> You wrote "it is time we bring back the common usage of the diareses in English." No I wrote "make cases that think it is time". I'm much more ambivalent about it than the arguments I had heard from others. I agreed in the post you are responding too that I hadn't realized it was much closer to a modern reform movement than a "bring back". That's my uncritical understanding that I'll admit I was wrong about. Is it the right orthography reform movement to fight for expanding into common use? I don't know and I don't really have anywhere near as strong as opinion on this as you seem to have, but I do know people that think it is a useful reform movement to fight for with existing publication style guides to point to on how/when to use (the New Yorker's) and presumably an "easy win" with good precedence that would do some good, and that is all I was ever pointing out. I'm just pointing out the opinions of other people I've known, whether or not you agree with them is fine. These aren't my own opinions so while I've heard good arguments for them over the years, I certainly never internalized them and can't do justice in defending them. But I appreciate that you seem to be looking for much more of an argument here than I can muster.
- eesmith 5y ago
  Then I misunderstood your earlier comment " ... there is a strong case to be made that it makes the language better and fell out of favor not because it wasn't useful but because it was more expensive." I don't see how you think there's a strong case. I don't see why you think ö fell out of favor because of cost. I didn't get from your earlier comment that these weren't personal beliefs at all but were forwarded from others. > existing publication style guides to point to That's not the basis for good pedagogy at the elementary school level. Publication style guides are for people with years of experience. In elementary school you learn how to alphabetize names. In 6th grade I learned a new rule - the library collated Mac and Mc together card catalog. (This was in 1981, before computers.) Turns out this was A.L.A. Rules for Filing Catalog Cards, rule 13) b), see https://archive.org/details/in.gov.ignca.15145/page/n19/mode/2up https://archive.org/details/in.gov.ignca.15145/page/n19/mode... . That link goes into far more detail than anything an elementary student should have to know about sorting names. For similar reasons, elementary students aren't expected to format their book reports in MLA style.