Variants in English on the English Citizendium.

[Profrap]

Variety is the spice of life -- so let 'color' and 'colour' be!

As a scholar of the history of English, though, I should like to correct several inaccuracies in this thread:

1) British English spelling was indeed influenced by French, but this happened way back in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, as English returned as the prestige language of a nation dominated for three centuries by a Norman French-speaking aristocracy.  The clerks of the Courts of Chancery, who for years turned out official documents in Norman French, stuck with many of its conventions when writing out vowels, and this has been maintained in British usage (and in Canada, but this has nothing whatever to do with the Québecois, it is due to the lengthy period of time Canada was ruled by Britain, and its status as a Commonwealth nation).

2) American English conventions have nothing whatever to do with Latin, any more than British ones, for many centuries, have had anything to do with "French" influence.  The change from "ou" to "o" in words such as "colour" was instigated by spelling reformers in early 19th-century America both as a proposed simplification of spelling and as a matter of signalling our difference from our British forebears.  Noah Webster was one of the chief of these reformers, and used these spelling reforms in his dictionary, which proved to be influential.  It took time to take hold, since as late at the 1830's most Engish-language books in the United States were printed in Britain!

3) The differences between formal U.S. English and its British counterpart are neither few nor trivial.  In addition to several hundred variants in spelling, there are several thousand different lexical items and idioms, ranging from "take out" (US) v.s "take away" (UK), to "zucchinini" (US) v.s "corgettes" (UK) and with quite a few technological items (cars, appliances, etc.) developed since the linguistic drift having different names (e.g. the UK's usage of "windscreen," "boot," and "bonnet" for US "windshield," "trunk," and "hood").

All this means that, should one wish to "translate" US to UK standards on the fly, one would have to write quite a complex bit of software, one which would need constant tweaking and updating. 

I would suggest simply flagging articles which use US or UK English with a standards flag reflecting the usage of the primary writers, and leaving it to authors and editors to ensure consistency.

RP

[christian liem]

Of course "few" itself is very relative. There are a lot of differences between BE and AE but when it's compared to the other language variants (like my examples above Nynorsk/Bokmal and Chinese Traditional/Simplified) it pales in comparison.

[Profrap]

Yes, it's true, compared to your examples, the differences are *relatively* few -- though still too many, and too subtle, to easily manage them with software code, as opposed to human editorial intervention.

As George Bernard Shaw once said, Britain and the United States remain "two countries separated by a common language" 

RP

[christian liem]

The problem if we have two CZ versions, one for BE and one for AE, then an editor would have to update both versions for new informations. And that's assuming there will only be 2 versions, since this precendence would also trigger other countries to start their own CZ: Canadian English, Australian English, Indian English, Singlish, Pidgin English, Scottish English, Welsh English, Irish English, etc.

[Zachary Pruckowski]

The problem if we have two CZ versions, one for BE and one for AE, then an editor would have to update both versions for new informations. And that's assuming there will only be 2 versions, since this precendence would also trigger other countries to start their own CZ: Canadian English, Australian English, Indian English, Singlish, Pidgin English, Scottish English, Welsh English, Irish English, etc.

There's a software solution involving XML, CSS, databases and massive armies of robots* that we would try before even considering splitting the wiki into 2+ dialetic-variants.


* = I can't believe I used the phrase "massive armies of robots" in a serious sentence.

[Profrap]

Would those be US robots or UK robots? 

Or perhas the Czech "robota"?

On a more serious note, with some print encyclopedias to which I've contributed recently, the editorial guidelines support both UK and US conventions, depending on the home country of the contributor.  On the other hand, with one of these -- the Cambridge Encyclopedia of Pop and Rock -- I was somewhat taken aback to see my reference to Hip-hop samples of gunshots and screeching tires silently emended to "screeching tyres"!

RP

[briandelaney]

Has this question been resolved? I just took a look around, and didn't find any indication that a decision has been reached. I'd love to start contributing to CZ, but not if there's a significant chance of spelling wars developing, since that's one of the reasons I left Wikipedia. -Brian

[Russell Potter]

I think that Editors ought to be able to set a language standard for a given artice -- based not so much on content, as on who have been its major contributors. We could have a little flag icon idenfying an article's conventions.  It should not create any brouhahas (or rows, if you speak UK), I hope!!

But as to "translating" these differences with software, that would be very complex indeed -- there are in fact quite a few.   I have two guidebooks, the lightly humorous "Knickers in a Twist" and Jeremy Smith's more extensive "Bum Bags and Fanny Packs" (ISBN 0786717025).  Smith has two dictionaries, each with well over 2,000 entries, of variant lexical items, as well as a 20+ page summary of grammatical and idiomatic differences ("Take out" or "Take away"?  "to hospital" or "to the hospital"?), and this only touches on spelling 'in passing'. 

I think it best just to have a single standard for any one given article, as needed; if an entry attracts a lot of UK or AU or CA authors, then let UK/Commonwealth spelling prevail!

[briandelaney]

Ok, so I gather the answer to my question is No. Good to know.

By the way, here's an example -- perhaps innocent -- of the sort of thing that starts spelling wars --

http://en.citizendium.org/wiki?title=Philosophy&diff=100038983&oldid=100037996

Why did this person change endeavor to endeavour? It's hard to imagine that an educated native English speaker isn't aware that -or spellings are correct in the U.S. and (in many cases) Canada.

-Brian

[Derek Harkness]

Why did this person change endeavor to endeavour? It's hard to imagine that an educated native English speaker isn't aware that -or spellings are correct in the U.S. and (in many cases) Canada.

It's actually very easy to imagine. Many people have been taught that there is only one correct spelling. The other spelling is not a cultural thing, but rather a common mistake. Many people are not aware of the many differences and assume that if it's not done the way I was taught in school, then it's wrong. Many people don't know that there is more than one way to spell 'Medieval'.

Another major item to blame is the spellchecker. This tool will quickly let you convert all the spellings in an article to American spellings. It's too easy for people to just click through the spell check without really thinking about what they are changing.

[Derek Harkness]

Oh and another thing, spelling wars only happen because people go and change the spelling back again. If someone edits and re-spells your article, leave it be. Don't revert it. As long as the spelling is consistent throughout the whole article then there is no need to change it back. You only end up with a war if you revert.

[briandelaney]

It's very hard for me to imagine a Ph.D. in philosophy from England doesn't know that endeavor is a correct spelling of what, for him, is spelled endeavour. American -or spellings are all over the world -- the academic world, the general publishing world, and the Internet world.

Either way, I think you're wrong that spelling wars start when someone changes a spelling back. You may not have spent much time on Wikipedia. Spelling wars start when someone believes that their way of spelling is more appropriate (be it because -- depending on the preferred spelling -- the servers are in the U.S., or because Americans are fat and stupid or whatever) and seeks to exploit loopholes and or general chaos in the community's guidelines about spelling.

That's why I'm interested in how CZ will be handling this.

Brian

[Derek Harkness]

No, spelling wars require 3 factor to be present.

Spelling wars start when someone believes that their way of spelling is more appropriate.
and
Someone disagrees with them.
and
Both parties are willing to spend time reverting each other.

Remove any one of the above and the spelling war vanishes.

Given I think changing spellings just for the sake of conforming to a person taste is pointless, changing them back for the same reason it even more pointless. You might wonder at why the philosophy editor changed that word, I wonder as to why anyone changed it back?

[briandelaney]

No, spelling wars require 3 factor to be present.

Spelling wars start when someone believes that their way of spelling is more appropriate.
and Someone disagrees with them.
and
Both parties are willing to spend time reverting each other.

Remove any one of the above and the spelling war vanishes.

No, a war is still a war even if one side attacks and the other capitulates without a fight; it's just a very short war (though perhaps one would call it an "attack" -- either way, not nice.)

Given I think changing spellings just for the sake of conforming to a person taste is pointless, changing them back for the same reason it even more pointless.

I'd say it's equally pointless, not more.

You might wonder at why the philosophy editor changed that word, I wonder as to why anyone changed it back?

Many possible reasons:

1) Same reason the first editor changed it. ("My way is better.")

2) Belief that (possible) orthographic imperialists shouldn't be tolerated.

3) Belief that the original article should be maintained in its original dialect.

4) Belief that consistency within an article is better than lack thereof.

In my view, 1 and 2 would generally count as pretty bad reasons (though I think that might depend); 3 and 4 as pretty good reasons.

Brian

[Aleta Curry]

I actually think Brian's No. 2 is a pretty good reason

2) Belief that (possible) orthographic imperialists [or dogmatists, or people who are just plain rude] shouldn't be tolerated.  [Or, I might add, belief that the ignorant should be enlightened.]

I agree with your analysis to a point, Derek, but not your conclusion.

We cannot allow dogmatists to run amok and remain professionable and credible. 

If someone edits and re-spells your article, leave it be.

This will not work as as hard-and-fast rule (well, of course it will "work", but it won't work).  A mean-sprited person or one with a calculated agenda can exploit this "rule" and simply have his own way.

I'm returning to this issue because andrew8 is discussing it in a new thread, and as far as I can see there has been no resolution.