Translator: Tomás Guarna Reviewer: Sebastian Betti We have lost a lot of time at the school, learning spelling. Kids are still losing a lot of time at school with spelling. That's why I want to share with you a question: "Do we need a new spelling?
" I believe that yes, we do. Or even better, I think we need to simplify the one we already have. Neither the question nor the answer are new in the Spanish language.
They have been bouncing around from century to century since 1492, when in the first grammar of the Spanish language, Antonio de Nebrija set a clear and simple principle for our spelling: "Thus, we have to write words as we pronounce them, and pronounce words as we write them. " Each sound had to answer to a letter, and each letter had to represent a single sound, and those which did not represent any sound should be removed. This approach, the phonetic approach, -the one that says we have to write words as we pronounce them- it is and it is not present in the basis of spelling as we practice it today.
It is, because the Spanish language, in contrast to English, French or others, always had a strong resistance to writing words too differently to how we pronounce them. But it is not present, because when in the 18th century we decided how we would standardize our writing, there was another approach which guided a good part of the decisions. This approach was the etymological one, the one that says we have to write words according to how they were written in their original language, in Latin, in Greek.
That's how we're left with silent H's, which we write but don't pronounce. That's how we're left with B's and V's, that contrary to what many people believe, were never differentiated in Spanish pronunciation. That's how we're left with G's, that sound hard as in "gente", and other times soft as in "gato".
That's how we're left with C's, S's, and Z's, three letters that in some places correspond to one sound, and in others to two, but nowhere to three. I'm not here to tell you anything you don't know from your own experience. We all went to school, we all invested big amounts of learning time, big amounts of that plastic and childlike brain time in dictation, in the memorization of spelling rules filled, however, with exceptions.
We were conveyed in many ways, implicitly and explicitly, the idea that in spelling, something fundamental of our upbringing was at stake. Yet, I have the feeling that teachers didn't ask themselves why it was so important. In fact, they didn't ask themselves a previous question: what was the purpose that spelling played?
What do we need spelling for? And the truth is that when someone asks themselves this question the answer is much more simple and less momentous than we'd usually believe. We use spelling to unify the way we write, so we can all write the same way.
So it is easier for us to understand when we read each other. But opposed to other aspects of language, such as punctuation, there is no individual expressive ability involved in spelling. In contrast to punctuation.
With punctuation, I can choose to change the meaning of a phrase. With punctuation I can impose a particular rhythm to what I am writing, but not with spelling. When it comes to spelling, it's either wrong or right, according to whether it conforms or not to the current rules.
But then, wouldn't it be more sensible to simplify the current rules so it is easier to teach, learn, and use spelling correctly? Wouldn't it be more sensible to simplify the current rules so that all that time we devote today to teaching spelling, we can devote it to other issues of language whose complexities do deserve the time and effort? What I propose is not to abolish spelling, not that everyone writes as they like.
Language is a tool of common use, and therefore I believe it's fundamental that we use it following common criteria. But I also find it fundamental that those common criteria be as simple as they can be, especially because if we simplify our spelling we're not leveling down; when spelling is simplified, the quality of the language doesn't suffer at all. I work every day with Spanish Golden Age literature, I read Garcilaso, Cervantes, Góngora, Quevedo, who sometimes write "hombre" without H, sometimes write "escribir" with V, and it's absolutely clear to me that the difference between those texts and ours is one of convention, or rather, of a lack of convention during their time.
But not one of quality. But let me go back to the masters, because they are key characters in this story. Earlier, I mentioned this slightly thoughtless insistence with which teachers pester and pester us with spelling.
But the truth is that, being things as they are, this makes perfect sense. In our society, spelling works as a privileged index that tells the cultured from the brute, the educated from the ignorant, independently from the content that's being written. One can get or not get a job because of an h that one put or did not.
One can become an object of public ridicule because of a misplaced B. Therefore, in this context, of course, it makes sense to dedicate all this time to spelling. But we don't have to forget that throughout the history of our language it was always teachers or people linked to the early learning of language those who promoted spelling reforms, those who realized that in our spelling there was often an obstacle to the transmission of knowledge.
In our case, for example, Sarmiento, together with Andrés Bello, promoted the biggest spelling reform that effectively took place in the Spanish language: the Chilean one in mid-19th century. Then, why not take over the task of those teachers and start making progress in our spelling? Here, in the intimacy of us 10,000, I'd like to bring to the table some changes that I find reasonable to start discussing.
Let's remove the silent H. There where we write an H, but pronounce nothing, let's not write anything. (Applause) It's hard for me to think what sentimental attachment can justify to someone all the hassle caused by the silent H.
B and V, as we said before, were never distinguished in the Spanish language, (Applause) let's choose one, it could be either, we can discuss it, talk it over, each will have their preferences, each can have their arguments. Let's keep one, remove the other. G and J, let's separate their roles, G should keep the soft sound, "gato", "mago", "águila", and J should keep the hard sound, "jarabe", "jirafa", "gente", "argentino".
The case of C, S, and Z is interesting, because it shows that the phonetic approach must be a guide, but can't be an absolute principle. In some cases, the differences in pronunciation must be addressed. As I said before, C, S, and Z in some places correspond to one sound, in others to two.
If we lower it down from three letters to two, we're all better. To some, these changes may seem a bit drastic. They are not so much.
The Royal Spanish Academy, all of language academies, also believe that spelling should be progressively modified, that language is linked to history, tradition and custom, but that at the same time it is a practical everyday tool and that sometimes this attachment to history, tradition and custom turns into an obstacle for its current usage. Indeed, this explains the fact that our language, much more than the others we are geographically close to, has been historically modifying itself based on us, for example, we went from "ortographia" to "ortografía", we went from "theatro" to "teatro", we went from "quantidad" to "cantidad", we went from "symbolo" to "símbolo", and slowly some silent H's are being stealthily removed, in the Dictionary of the Royal Academy "arpa", "armonía" can be written with or without H and we're all okay. I also believe that this is a particularly appropriate moment to face this discussion.
It's always said that language changes spontaneously, from the bottom up, that users are the ones that incorporate new words, the ones that introduce grammatical changes, and that the authority, in some places an academy, in others a dictionary in others a ministry, a long time after, accepts them and incorporates them. This is true only for some levels of language, it is true for the lexical level, for the level of words, it is less true for the grammatical level, and almost, I would say, it is not true for the spelling level, that has historically changed from top to bottom. Institutions have always been those who set the rules and proposed changes.
Why do I say this is a particularly appropriate moment? Until today, writing always had a much more restricted and private use than speech, but in our time, the age of social networks, this is going through a revolutionary change. Never before have people written so much, never before have people written for so many others.
And in these social networks, for the first time, we're seeing at a large scale innovative uses of spelling where even people of impeccable, more than educated spelling, when using social networks, behave a lot like the majority of users in social networks behave. That is to say, they loosen spellchecking and prioritize speed and efficacy in communicating. For now, over there, there are chaotic, individual usages, but I think we have to pay attention to them as they're probably telling us that a time that assigns a new place to writing is asking new criteria for that writing.
I think we'd be doing wrong in rejecting them, in discarding them, because we identify them with symptoms of the cultural decay of our times. No, I believe we have to observe them, arrange them, and channel them within a regulation more related to the needs of our times. I can anticipate some objections.
There will be those who'll say that if we simplify spelling we'll lose etymology. Strictly speaking, if we wanted to preserve etymology it wouldn't be enough with spelling, we'd also have to learn Latin, Greek, Arabic -- With a simplified spelling we'll go to recover etymology to the same place we go now, to etymological dictionaries. A second objection will be that of those who will say: "If we simplify spelling, we'll stop distinguishing between words that now are different in just one letter.
" That is true, but it's not a problem. Our language has homonyms, words with more than one meaning, and we don't confuse the 'banco' where we sit with the 'banco' where we deposit money, the 'traje' that we wear with the things we 'trajimos'. In the enormous majority of situations, context dispels any confusion.
But there's a third objection, to me the most understandable, even the most moving, that is the one of those who'll say: "I don't want to change, I was brought up like this, I got used to this way, when I read a written word in simplified spelling my eyes hurt. " This objection is, in part, in all of us. What do I believe we have to do?
Do as is always done in these cases, changes are made onwards, children are taught the new rules; to those of us who don't want to adapt, they let us write as we're used to and it's expected that time will cement the new rules. The success of every spelling reform that touches upon such rooted habits lays in caution, agreement, gradualism, and tolerance. But we still can't allow the attachment to old costumes to impede us from moving forward.
The best tribute we can pay to the past is to improve upon what we received. So I believe that we must reach an agreement, that academies must reach an agreement and clear our spelling of the habits we use because we received them, even if they are useless. I'm convinced that if we do that in the humble, but extremely important sphere of language, we'll be leaving a better future to the next generations.
