I’m picking “Colonel” needs to be respelled to match how it’s pronounced.
Try to pick a word no one else has picked. What word are you respelling?
Thou shalt spell the word “Pheonix” P-H-E-O-N-I-X, not P-H-O-E-N-I-X, regardless of what the Oxford English Dictionary tells you.
feenicks
English orthography is awful. Hard “c” AND soft “c”? Are you crazy? How about that “k” that is already the hard c sound? It should be “kat” and “kar”. And it only goes downhill from there (or their?!?).
We should clean it up someday. But we’ll probably end up with LOL-WTF-speak.
Some of the low hanging fruit would just be to pick one pronunciation of “oo” and stick with it:
- book
- blood
- floor
- brooch
- boot
The problem is that English has far more vowel sounds than vowels. And that’s without even having certain sounds that are common in other languages like “ü”.
Nesscary
…Neccisary
…Neseccary
Fuck it, it’s now “Nesisary”
“Needed”
Ressepee
I like this one because I instantly knew what word it was despite it having a brand new spelling. Almost like letters should have meanings.
In this thread, a lot of folks who would use their one wish to make the language better.
But I would change “their” to be spelled “the’re” and pronounced “all’y’all’s”.
I hope I do grow up to be more like the rest of you, and make better choices, in the future.
Arkinsaw
“Arkansas” and “Kansas” are both from the Osage language, but the former passed through French on its way to English.
Comfterble
Kumfirtubble
Might start an argument but:
GIF -> GHIFIt’s actually pronounced “JIF”
It stands for the Jraphics Interchange Format
Giraffics? 🦒
I just wish we spelled things in a more German-‘esk’ fashion. They use K more appropriately. Examples such as “panik” and “akkordeon” for accordion. I find their spelling to be more straightforward and sensical.
Since Queue has already been posted: Quay. Now spelled Kee.
You and I pronounce ‘quay’ very differently.
How do you pronounce it? I had some American tourists ask me for directions to the “kway” before. Only time I’ve ever heard a different pronunciation.
I’ve always heard it pronounced kway… Is that wrong?
That’s wrong, even in the US.
It’s pronounced kway in a Pavement song.
It’s pronounced “kaye” in a Pogues song, but songs aren’t a good indication of pronunciation…poetic license reigns.
Hell, “reigns” is another candidate word.
I can’t say really. Where I live (Ireland) it’s definitely pronounced “kee” but where you live “kway” might be correct. Fascinating stuff!
