i heard a story on npr last week that i thought was really interesting. the interview was with John Morse, president and publisher of the Merriam-Webster Dictionary about the first Webster's dictionary. This led me to find this information at www.merriam-webster.com.
Two hundred years ago the company’s namesake, Noah Webster, created A Compendious Dictionary of the English Language—the very first dictionary to reflect the unique culture and vocabulary of the American people. Along with introducing a reform of British spelling, the volume included thousands of words (chowder, hickory, skunk) which were in daily use in America but not listed in any other lexicon.
Noah Webster was struck by the inconsistencies of English spelling and the obstacles it presented to learners (young and old alike) and resented that American classrooms were filled only with British textbooks. The spelling reform featured in his Compendious Dictionary of the English Language was based on the author’s combined vision of logic and aesthetics. He changed the –ce in words like defence, offence, and pretence to –se; abandoned the second, silent “l” in verbs such as travel and cancel when forming the past tense; dropped the “u” from words such as humour and colour; and dropped the “k” from words such as publick and musick. The “publick” readily accepted many of these changes and just as readily rejected some of the others.
WEBSTER WON SOME:
Before Webster, after Webster’s change
gaol, jail
mould, mold
traveled, traveled
honour, honor
centre, center
humour, humor
masque, mask
publick, public
...AND LOST SOME:
Before Webster, Webster’s suggested change
ache, ake
soup, soop
sleigh, sley
sponge, spunge
tongue, tung
cloak, cloke
determine, determin
women, wimmen
yes, if there was any doubt, i am a nerd.
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4 comments:
Are you making fun of my "damn" spelling? Kyle. PS: Your not as nerdy as my friend, who reads the phonebook!
I found this really interesting. It sparked a discussion with my nerd supreme counterpart about this one man having the ability to control language as "we" know it and also serving as a facet for the then new Americans to establish a separate identity. Good stuff.
I heard a speaker a few weeks ago who talked about the most misused words in the English language. One word she pointed out was podium. Apparently a podium is what a person stands on, not behind. The object a person stands behind and puts materials on is a lecturn. But I think that most people call the thing the you stand at a podium. Which makes me think - at what point (if 90% of the population calls something a particular thing) does the definition change. Does it only occur when the "dictionary folks" decide it's changed and who are these important word people? Just something I was thinking about.
Good point. I know little about linguistics but I do think popular concensus certainly has a significant bearing on how we view and define words. Lectern just sounds like an upgraded podium!
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