RE: [ImmoderateHeroQuest] Re: Hamsters

From: Jane Williams <janewilliams20_at_ZAwyGuMtCm1wJfbp1m6eyXrp0HIvmXhJgQh5UEIDx5HFJd8O9Tww4-ptRYUNa>
Date: Wed, 6 Apr 2005 08:17:58 +0100


> When in doubt, check out whether someone uses "-ize" or
> "-ise". We Americans value the letter "z" (for all letters
> are capable of a contribution to our great enterprise - one
> must merely give them the opportunity)

And you want to make Scrabble easier?

> and use it for words like "organize", "utilize"
> and so on. We also tend to refrain from a gratuitous use of
> the letter "u"
> in words like "armor", "color", and what not (the letter "u"
> gets sufficient use already).

Yeah, yeah, I know. Noah Webster. And his two great aims: A) change to be different from Britain, just to be awkward B) can't expect Americans to cope with anything complicated, poor dears. (Why is it that so many Americans assume that other Americans are stupid? They can't be right, can they? Or is it a self-fulfilling prophecy?)

At least the Philological Association in 1886 stuck to the second of those principles, not the first, and added a bit of sanity.

Possibly also shows a total lack of interest in the linguistic history of words and how that can make it easier to learn other languages - "colour" is the French spelling, since that's where the word came from.

And, having just checked, the difference between "ize" and "ise" is that the "ize" spelling is derived from the Greek "izein" while "ise" is the French version which comes from the Latin "izare". I wonder why the French changed the Z to an S...?            

Powered by hypermail