The Spelling Bee -- unique to the English-speaking world*, a ritual
celebration of the intransigent irrationality of English orthography.
Noah Webster made his fortune with a "speller". He actually introduced
some very sensible reforms, a few of which have survived in USEng.

*Crystal says the Dutch have spelling bees. Is this true?

The present series of "Nationals" began in 1925. I really enjoyed the documentary "Spellbound", about the 1999 competition, profiling a
selection of the contestants from quite varied backgrounds. Fell in love
with Nupur Lala, who was the winner; 25 years later she's doing fine, thankfully not as a professional speller.

https://www.instagram.com/scrippsnationalspellingbee/p/C3ArBC0MutN/

But even then there were some contestants being turned into little
spell-bots by their ambitious parents. Stuffed with words like foie gras
geese. This year I heard a short clip in which one of them spelled a
whole lot of words I didn't know at incredible speed. That's
pathological. But then, Americans take a similar approach to eating.

Further linguistic point: There used to be other kinds of "bees" --
sociable community gatherings to do some kind of work (quilting,
husking...). OED from 1769, etymology obscure.

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)

On 2024-07-02, Ross Clark <[email protected]> wrote:

The Spelling Bee -- unique to the English-speaking world*, a ritual

I'm pretty sure there have been spelling contests on French TV.

Basically any language where getting from pronunciation to spelling
involves a lot of ambiguity is a candidate.
Thai? Chinese??

--
Christian "naddy" Weisgerber [email protected]

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)

On 2024-07-02 14:06:40 +0000, Christian Weisgerber said:

On 2024-07-02, Ross Clark <[email protected]> wrote:

The Spelling Bee -- unique to the English-speaking world*, a ritual

I'm pretty sure there have been spelling contests on French TV.

Definitely. The late Bernard Pivot ran a very popular series of
progammes called Les Dicos d'Or around 30 years ago. Errors in French
spelling proved to depend a lot on the obscure rules of gramamatical
agreement that plague efforts to write in French. One episode annoyed
me. It was filmed in Strasbourg and one question concerned someone who
had taken a trip on the �le. Now, anyone who doesn't know Strasbourg
will naturally interpret it as �le. People who do know Strasbourg will
know that there is no island that could be relevant, and that the local
river is the Ill.

My recollection is that the series was inspired by a dictation
constructed by Prosper M�rim�e in the 19th century, so the idea is far
from being modern.

I don't think that sort of programme would work in Spanish, where a lot
would depend on possibilities of confusion between b and v and between
y and ll. Similarly with German. (I had just one year of German at
school, but right from the beginning I could do a dictation with almost
no errors, despite not understanding what the text was saying.)

Basically any language where getting from pronunciation to spelling
involves a lot of ambiguity is a candidate.
Thai? Chinese??

Spelling to pronunciation works well in French (much better than in
English), apart from a few oddities like po�le and oignon;
pronunciation to spelling, on the other hand, is just as bad as in
English.

--
Athel -- French and British, living in Marseilles for 37 years; mainly
in England until 1987.

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)

On 2024-07-02, Christian Weisgerber wrote:

On 2024-07-02, Ross Clark <[email protected]> wrote:

The Spelling Bee -- unique to the English-speaking world*, a ritual

I'm pretty sure there have been spelling contests on French TV.

Basically any language where getting from pronunciation to spelling
involves a lot of ambiguity is a candidate.
Thai? Chinese??

How do you name the characters in Chinese other than by pronouncing
them?

Also, how do they distinguish (orally) two characters that have the
same pronunciation?


--
Now you're climbing to the top of the company ladder
Hope it doesn't take too long
Can't you see there'll come a day when it won't matter?
Come a day when you'll be gone ---Boston

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)

On 2024-07-02, Ross Clark wrote:

The Spelling Bee -- unique to the English-speaking world*, a ritual celebration of the intransigent irrationality of English orthography.
Noah Webster made his fortune with a "speller". He actually introduced
some very sensible reforms, a few of which have survived in USEng.

*Crystal says the Dutch have spelling bees. Is this true?

The present series of "Nationals" began in 1925. I really enjoyed the documentary "Spellbound", about the 1999 competition, profiling a
selection of the contestants from quite varied backgrounds. Fell in love
with Nupur Lala, who was the winner; 25 years later she's doing fine, thankfully not as a professional speller.

https://www.instagram.com/scrippsnationalspellingbee/p/C3ArBC0MutN/

But even then there were some contestants being turned into little
spell-bots by their ambitious parents. Stuffed with words like foie gras geese. This year I heard a short clip in which one of them spelled a
whole lot of words I didn't know at incredible speed. That's
pathological. But then, Americans take a similar approach to eating.

Further linguistic point: There used to be other kinds of "bees" --
sociable community gatherings to do some kind of work (quilting,
husking...). OED from 1769, etymology obscure.

Interesting. I have vaguely heard of "quilting bee" but I didn't know
it was older than "spelling bee".

There is currently a British TV show called "The Great British Sewing
Bee".

<https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b03myqj2>



--
Science isn't about WHY. It's about WHY NOT.
(Cave Johnson)

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)

On 2024-07-02, Athel Cornish-Bowden <[email protected]> wrote:

Definitely. The late Bernard Pivot ran a very popular series of
progammes called Les Dicos d'Or around 30 years ago. Errors in French spelling proved to depend a lot on the obscure rules of gramamatical agreement that plague efforts to write in French. One episode annoyed

They wouldn't be so obscure if they weren't silent for the most part...

me. It was filmed in Strasbourg and one question concerned someone who
had taken a trip on the île.

*frowns*

Now, anyone who doesn't know Strasbourg
will naturally interpret it as île. People who do know Strasbourg will
know that there is no island that could be relevant, and that the local
river is the Ill.

Right.

I don't think that sort of programme would work in Spanish, where a lot
would depend on possibilities of confusion between b and v and between
y and ll.

As well as s and c-z. H, too, but I suppose it doesn't occur in
too many words and in some (e.g. huevo, hielo) it's actually
predictable.

Similarly with German. (I had just one year of German at
school, but right from the beginning I could do a dictation with almost
no errors, despite not understanding what the text was saying.)

Well, there are quite a number of ambiguities (some homonyms to
give you an idea: Wal/Wahl, Laib/Leib, Lid/Lied), but the customary
terrors of German dictation are capitalization, compounds (groß
schreiben? großschreiben?), and comma placement.

Spelling to pronunciation works well in French (much better than in
English), apart from a few oddities like poêle and oignon;

And that is no coincidence, but the result of centuries of concerted
reform effort by the Academy. One systematic issue remains: Whether
final consonants are silent or not is poorly predictable; from what
I understand the French themselves have been somewhat confused about
this over the centuries, which has contributed to the current
situation.

pronunciation to spelling, on the other hand, is just as bad as in
English.

Sort of true, but at least there's no reduction of unstressed vowels.

--
Christian "naddy" Weisgerber [email protected]

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)