Reforming English Spelling
The President of the English Spelling Society discusses the historical struggle to reform English orthography. Despite long-standing efforts to simplify spelling, the movement faces ongoing challenges in gaining traction in the modern era.
Why it matters
The debate over English spelling reform highlights the tension between linguistic tradition and the practical needs of a globalized, digital world.
Anatoly Liberman's column on word origins, The Oxford Etymologist , appears on the OUPblog each Wednesday. Subscribe to Anatoly Liberman’s weekly etymology articles via email or RSS .
The English Spelling Society was founded in 1908. This was a good time for the reformers. Great people, like G. B. Shaw and Walter W. Skeat , among quite a few others, supported the movement and hoped that it would be possible to make English spelling look more humane. But time worked against the reformers. The World War, the Bolshevik takeover in Russia, and the triumph of the Nazis in Germany, followed by another, even more devastating war, pushed many worthy projects into the background.
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