I’m guessing that the majority of you are scratching your head at the moment, wondering what a racker of orthography is. Some of you, however, may already know. And, unfortunately, some of you may indeed be rackers of orthography.
In Love’s Labour’s Lost by William Shakespeare the character Holofernes is a Schoolmaster obssessed to the point of absurdity with language. Holofernes is used as an ironic comedy device, complaining about the dialogue of another while his own speech, which tests the delivery of the actor playing him with its stops and starts, verges on the inarticulate as indicated in the following quotation.
I abhor such fanatical phantasms, such insociable and point-device companions; such rackers of orthography, as to speak dout, fine, when he should say doubt; det, when he should pronounce debt - d, e, b, t, not d, e, t; he clepeth a calf, cauf; half, hauf; neighbour vocatur nebour, neigh abbreviated ne. This is abhominable - which he would call abbominable; it insinuateth me of insanie…
Of course, I’m not advocating a Holofernes level of dogma, but rackers of orthography do, to quote Peter Griffen, perhaps the bipolar opposite of Holofernes, grind my gears.
Language errors in a written medium such as blogging can destroy your credibility. It’s easier than you think to make someone unsubscribe from your blog.
I’ve clicked the close button more times than I can remember because something has irritated me. Most recently I have unsubscribed from a blog because of the continued use of the phrase “I could care less” which, as discussed here, is senseless and used incorrectly with alarming frequency instead of the phrase “I couldn’t care less”. Furthermore I’ve stopped listening to a podcast because of the speaker’s mispronunciation of the letter ‘H’. His insistence on adding a superfluous ‘H’ to the front of the word, saying ‘Haitch’ instead of ‘Aitch’ was enough to make me not want to listen to him again.
Perhaps that sounds harsh but it’s absolutely true. If you speak or write like an uneducated fool people it follows that people will think you are an uneducated fool. Especially if they have nothing else with which to judge you.
Consider a George W Bush speech. Put your political views to one side for a moment and imagine reading something he had written or listening to his spoken words without knowing anything else about him. Imagine reading or hearing the following quote, if you had not heard it before.
Our enemies are innovative and resourceful, and so are we. They never stop thinking about new ways to harm our country and our people, and neither do we.
How would he come across? Would you consider him to be credible? Would you want to listen to him again?
People judge you by the way you talk, the way you write, the way you dress and hundreds of other ways besides. When they read your blog or listen to your podcast they can only judge you, at first at least, by the way you write or by the way you talk.
As a blogger or podcaster it’s all too easy to give people the wrong impression.
I thoroughly recommend that every blogger or podcaster browses the free online version of Common Errors in English Usage.
You may be surprised at the number of mistakes you are already making, and by the increase in traffic you will get if you correct them.
One might actually increase traffic by using misspellings, as there would be less competition for those phrases in search engines :P
Ofcourse, by doing so, you are attracting a different type of reader (you might not want?)
But for me personally, with English being my third language and probably making alot of spelling errors myself, I do not mind this as much.
If the content (the idea behind it) is good, I will not unsubscribe.
For the record, some dialects pronounce words differently. “Haitch”, for example, is the common pronunciation in Irish English and some flavors of British English. It is irritating to me when people presume their pronunciation is the only pedantically valid pronunciation.
Granted, I’m with you as far as orthography is concerned (pointing out that “orthography” is not technically synonymous with “spelling”). To me, I expect some level of proofreading to be involved when publishing anywhere, however casual or informal the venue. With online dictionaries a click away, there’s really no excuse for misspelled words.
Unless you’re American, then it’s just tradition.
Bush is an idiot.
“Rackers of orthography”
What a great marriage of words!
I agree, I have a good friend who’s brother can’t spell to save his life, yet he is extremely well spoken. I love conversing with him, but refuse to read his emails.
Heh, nice one Ahsley. I could definitely do with that.
I too have found myself frothing at the mouth upon noticing such errors. And, I’m sorry to say, this has sometimes occurred whilst reading this blog.
Clearly you’ve been taking your own advice lately, though, since this string of words in no way irritated me.
Andrew - ‘Haitch’ is wrong whichever way you look at it. Just as wrong as saying 2+2=5. There is no ‘H’ at the beginning of ‘Aitch’ and there never has been, silent or otherwise. Any dictionary, from anywhere in the world, can confirm this.
And what is ‘British English’? Surely that’s just ‘English’ isn’t it?
Josh - No one is perfect. Please feel free to email me and point out the errors so I can correct them. Thanks.
Mathematics deals in absolutes. Language does not. In fact, the entire nature of language is inherently subjective. Suggesting any pronunciation of a word is as wrong as “2+2=5″ completely ignores the significant differences between the two concepts.
Like with “ad-ver-tahyz-muhnt” (US) and “ad-vur-tis-muhnt” (UK), pronunciations can vary between dialects. However rare the pronunciation may be, it is accepted in that region.
To answer your question, the term “British English” is commonly used to distinguish the English language of the UK from that of Ireland, Scotland (Scottish English is unique in itself) , Australia, and North America. Most people use the term “English” in reference to their own form of English, so I use it here to avoid confusion. How often do you actually use the phrase, “American English” in conversation?
The spelling of the letter ‘H’ is absolute and is ‘A I T C H’. That can’t be disputed.
Pronouncing it with an “H” sound at the beginning is therefore a mistake. No different to pronouncing ‘W’ as ‘Wubble-You’. It’s nonsense. The result of slack education.
Your definition of British English is most amusing. England is a country. So are Wales and Scotland. Britain (or Great Britain) refers to three quarters of the “United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland” (UK). It refers to the largest island within the union.
Saying British English is different from Scottish English is nonsensical. Scotland is part of Britain. The Scottish speak in a different accent to the English but both are British citizens. I think you are trying to say that people speak differently in Scotland when compared to those in England. They do. But they still speak what you seem to call British English, what most people would just call English.
And they all still spell the eighth letter of the alphabet ‘A I T C H’.
The atlas, much like the dictionary, is a great point of reference!
Finally, American English is a phrase used often here in England, to describe how Americans speak, since they use their own version of English. The bottom line is that English is just that, English. The other versions are the variants, not the original and it those those versions that require a prefix to differentiate them from what some might like to ridiculously call English English.
You want absolutes? Fine, here we go.
People who say HAITCH when they mean AITCH have been taught to say HAITCH by their parents or teachers. Whatever the reason it’s a mispronunciation. Handed down by uneducated parents or uneducated teachers. Worryingly it’s on the increase in the UK along with new words like CHIMLEY instead of CHIMNEY and AKS instead of ASK.
It’s just a sign of how bad state funded education is becoming. I’ve even heard teachers say that HAITCH is the preferred pronunciation because it is easier to teach children the alphabet this way. The English language is in decline and if it bothers you your blood pressure will rise as the years pass.
Get over it before you give yourself a heart attack!
The added H is a creeping disease and the latest scourge of the working classes.
British English?? English IS British for crying out loud. That’s an American’sm if ever I’ve seen one.
Someone needs to look at an Anglo Saxon history book.