Spelling is the writing of a word or words with all necessary letters and diacritics present in an accepted standard order. A word is a unit of Language that carries meaning and consists of one or more Morphemes which are linked more or less tightly together and has a Phonetic A letter is an element in an Alphabetic system of writing such as the Greek alphabet and its descendants A diacritic ( also called a diacritic or diacritical mark, point, or sign, is a small sign added to a letter to alter pronunciation It is one of the elements of orthography and a prescriptive element of language. The orthography of a language specifies the correct way of using a specific Writing system to write the language Most spellings attempt to approximate a transcribing of the sounds of the language into alphabetic letters; however, completely phonetic spellings are often the exception, due to drifts in pronunciations over time and irregular spellings adopted through common usage. Phonetics (from the Greek φωνή ( phonê) "sound" or "voice" is the study of the physical sounds of human speech ^[1]

Spelling standards and conventions

Whereas uniformity in the spelling of words is one of the features of a standard language in modern times, and official languages usually prescribe standard spelling, minority languages and regional languages often lack this trait. A standard language (also standard dialect, standardized dialect, or standardised dialect) is a particular variety of a Language that An official language is a Language that is given a special legal status in a particular Country, State, or other territory A minority language is a Language spoken by a Minority of the Population of a country A regional language is a Language spoken in an area of a Nation state, whether it be a small area a federal State or Province, or Furthermore, it is a relatively recent development in various major languages in national contexts, linked to the compiling of dictionaries, the founding of national academies, and other institutions of language maintenance, including compulsory mass education.

In countries such as the U. S. and U. K. without official spelling policies, many vestigial and foreign spelling conventions work simultaneously. In countries where there is a national language maintenance policy, such as France, the Netherlands and Germany, reforms were driven to make spelling a better index of pronunciation. Spelling often evolves for simple reasons of alphabetic thrift, as when British English "catalogue" becomes American English "catalog".

Methods used to teach and learn spelling

Learning proper spelling by rote is a traditional element of elementary education. In the U. S. , the ubiquity of the phonics method of teaching reading, which emphasizes the importance of "sounding out" spelling in learning to read, also puts a premium on the prescriptive learning of spelling. Phonics refers to an instructional method for teaching children to read English. For these reasons, divergence from standard spelling is often perceived as an index of stupidity, illiteracy, or lower class standing. traditional definition of literacy is considered to be the ability to read and write or the ability to use Language to read, write, listen, Working class is a term used in academic Sociology and in ordinary conversation to describe depending on context and speaker those employed in specific fields or types The intelligence of Dan Quayle, for instance, was repeatedly disparaged for his correcting a student's spelling of "potato" as the now non-standard "potatoe" (C15th spelling, O. James Danforth "Dan" Quayle (born February 4 1947 is an American politician and a former Senator from the state of Indiana. E. D. ) at an elementary school spelling bee in Trenton, New Jersey on June 15, 1992. ^[2]

The opposite view was held when spelling began to be standardized, and was voiced by President Andrew Jackson who stated "It's a damn poor mind that can only think of one way to spell a word. Andrew Jackson (March 15 1767 June 8 1845 was the seventh President of the United States (1829&ndash1837 "

Since traditional language teaching methods emphasize written language over spoken language, a second-language speaker may have a better spelling ability than a native speaker despite having a poorer command of the language. Language education includes the Teaching and Learning of a Language. A written language is the representation of a Language by means of a Writing system. A spoken language is a human Natural language in which the Words are uttered through the Mouth. A second language (L2 is any Language learned after the first language or mother tongue (L1

Spelling tests are usually used to assess a student's mastery over the words in the spelling lessons he has received so far. A spelling test is an assessment of a person's (usually a student's ability to spell words correctly They can also be an effective practice method. There are many free spelling tests on websites on the Internet.

Spelling bees are competitions to determine the best speller of a group. A spelling bee is a competition where contestants usually Children, are asked to spell English words Such events have grown in popularity and are often televised, particularly in the U. S. .

Divergent spelling

Main article: Sensational spelling

Divergent spelling is a popular advertising technique, used to attract attention or to render a trademark "suggestive" rather than "merely descriptive. Sensational spelling is the deliberate Spelling of a word in an incorrect or non-standard A trademark or trade mark, represented by the symbols ™ and ®, or mark is a distinctive sign or indicator used by an individual " The pastry chains Dunkin' Donuts and Krispy Kreme, for example, employ non-standard spellings. Dunkin' Donuts is an international donut and Coffee retailer founded in 1950 in Quincy, Massachusetts, U Krispy Kreme is a chain of Doughnut stores Its parent company is Krispy Kreme Doughnuts Inc The same technique is also popular among recording artists.

The word itself

Spelling is a notable word; it is sometimes humorously spelled as "speeling" when drawing attention to poor spelling. The past tense and past participle of spell (only in the word-related sense) have both a regular form in spelled and an irregular form in spelt. The past tense is a Verb tense expressing action activity state or being in the past of the current moment (in an Absolute tense system or prior In Linguistics, a participle (from Latin participium, a Calque of Greek μετοχη "partaking" is a derivative of a non-finite A regular verb is any verb whose Conjugation follows the typical grammatical inflections of the language it belongs to In contrast to Regular verbs irregular verbs are those Verbs that fall outside the standard patterns of conjugation in the Languages in which they British English allows both irregular and regular forms; in American English, the irregular forms are rarely used. British English or UK English ( BrE, BE, en-GB) is the broad term used to distinguish the forms of the English language used in the Phonology North American English regional phonology In many ways compared to English English, North American English is conservative in its Phonology.

Misspellings

Misspelling of–'Occasion' (Occassion [sic]) and 'Confectionery' (Confectionary [sic]) on a shopfront in the United Kingdom. Sic is a Latin word meaning "thus" "so" "as such" or "just as that" The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom, the UK or Britain,is a Sovereign state located

While some words admit multiple spellings, some spellings are clearly incorrect and thus labeled as misspellings. A misspelled word can be a series of letters that represents no correctly spelled word of the same language at all (such as "liek" for "like") or a correct spelling of another word (such as writing "here" when one means "hear", or "now" when one means "know"). Misspellings of the latter type can easily make their way into printed material because they are not caught by simple computerised spell checkers. In Computing, a spell checker is an applications program that flags words in a document that may not be spelled correctly

Misspellings may be due to either typos (e. g. typing teh for the), or lack of knowledge of the correct spelling. Also the Indonesian word for Tea. Teh is an English article based on a common misspelling of The. Whether or not a word is misspelled may depend on context, such as American / British English distinctions. Misspelling can also be a matter of opinion when variant spellings are accepted by some and not by others. For example "miniscule" (for "minuscule") is a misspelling to many, and yet it is listed as a legitimate variant in a number of dictionaries.

A well-known Internet scam involves the registration of domain names that are deliberate misspellings of well-known corporate names in order to mislead or defraud. In Computer networking, a domain name is a name given to a collection of network devices that belong to a domain which is an administrative space managed according The practice is commonly known as "typosquatting". Typosquatting, also called URL hijacking, is a form of Cybersquatting which relies on mistakes such as Typographical errors made by Internet users when inputting ^[3]

Notable misspellings

A misspelling of purchased on a service station sign.

• Cleveland, Ohio – the leader of the crew that surveyed the town's territory was Gen. Cleveland is a City in the US state of Ohio and the County seat of Cuyahoga County, the most populous county in the state Moses Cleaveland, and the region was named in his honor; reportedly the town's first newspaper could not fit the town's name in its masthead without removing the first "a" from the name. Moses Cleaveland ( January 29, 1754 &ndash November 16, 1806) was a lawyer politician soldier and surveyor from Connecticut
• Cocoa – from cacao. Cocoa is the dried and fully fermented fatty seed of the cacao tree from which Chocolate is made CACAO is a research Java Virtual Machine developed at Vienna University of Technology. Many foreign languages and foreigners speaking English still use "cacao".
• Google – accidental misspelling of googol. Google Inc is an American public corporation, earning revenue from advertising related to its Internet search, e-mail, online A googol is the Large number 10100 that is the digit 1 followed by one hundred zeros (in Decimal representation According to Google's vice president, as quoted on a BBC The Money Programme documentary, January 2006, the founders – noted for their poor spelling – registered Google as a trademark and web address before someone pointed out that it was not correct. The Money Programme is a Finance and Business affairs Television programme on BBC2.

Misspelling of the word "Chop Suey" in a menu at a restaurant in Kandy, Sri Lanka

• Hebrides is an 18th Century misunderstanding of the classical Latin name Hebudes, where u was read ri (see Hebrides#Name)^[4]. See also Hebrides (disambiguation The Hebrides (ˈhɛbrɨˌdiːz "HEB-ri-deez" Gaelic: Innse Gall) comprise a widespread and diverse See also Hebrides (disambiguation The Hebrides (ˈhɛbrɨˌdiːz "HEB-ri-deez" Gaelic: Innse Gall) comprise a widespread and diverse
• Krakatoa – actually Krakatau in Indonesian. Krakatoa ( Indonesian: Krakatau) also spelled Krakatao or Krakatowa, is a volcanic island in the Sunda Strait The origin of the spelling Krakatoa is unclear, but may have been the result of a typographical error made in a British source reporting on the massive eruption of 1883.
• Middlesbrough, a town in the north-east of England. Middlesbrough ( IPA ( Received pronunciation) is a Town in the Tees Valley sub-region of the North East of England England is a Country which is part of the United Kingdom. Its inhabitants account for more than 83% of the total UK population whilst its mainland It is apocryphally suggested that it is missing a second 'o' due to a clerk typing the town's registration form incorrectly (making the "correct" spelling "Middlesborough").
• Montezuma – erroneous spelling of the Aztec emperor's name, Moctezuma. Aztec is a term used to refer to certain ethnic groups of central Mexico, particularly those groups who spoke the Nahuatl language and who achieved political The commonly used name is more easily pronounced by English speakers.
• Nome, a town in western Alaska. Nome is a city located on the southern Seward Peninsula coast on Norton Sound of the Bering Sea Alaska ( Аляска Alyaska) is a state in the United States of America, in the northwest of the North American continent A British cartographer wrote "Name ?" on a map, as a request to clarify the region's name. The map's transcribers mistook the side note as the name of the cape adjacent to the region and misinterpreted "Name" as "Nome".
• Ovaltine, a popular bedtime drink in the UK, came about because someone misspelled the original name Ovomaltine on the trademark documentation. Ovaltine is a brand of Milk flavoring product made with Sugar (except in Switzerland Malt extract Cocoa, and Whey. The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom, the UK or Britain,is a Sovereign state located
• Referer – common misspelling of the word referrer. It is so common, in fact, that it made it into the official specification of HTTP – the communication protocol of the World Wide Web – and has therefore become the standard industry spelling when discussing HTTP referers. The referer, or HTTP referer, identifies from the point of view of an Internet Webpage or resource the address of the webpage (commonly the URL ^[5]
• Quartzsite, a mining town in Arizona, had its name spelled incorrectly. Quartzsite is a town in La Paz County, Arizona, United States. It should be Quartzite, after the mineral quartzite. Quartzite (from German Quarzit) not to be confused with the Mineral Quartz, is a hard Metamorphic rock which was originally
• Zenith – Arabic zamt was misread; in Latin letters, at the time, the letter i was never dotted, so "m" looked like "ni". In broad terms the zenith is the direction pointing directly above a particular location ( Perpendicular, Orthogonal)

References

See also

English spelling

Other languages

External links

Spell checkers

• Spellcheck.net, an online spell checker
• Spellometer, measures frequency of common errors on websites
• Spellery, checks for spelling mistakes on websites
• Ghotit, an online contextual spell checker for dyslectics

Spelling tests

• Espindle, a website with free quizzes. In Orthography, eye dialect is the use of non-standard spellings (spellings considered incorrect to create the effect of a Dialectal foreign or uneducated speaker In Typography, a grapheme is the fundamental unit in written language. The orthography of a language specifies the correct way of using a specific Writing system to write the language A phonemic orthography is a Writing system where the written Graphemes correspond to Phonemes the spoken sounds of the language A phonemic orthography is a Writing system where the written Graphemes correspond to Phonemes the spoken sounds of the language A pronunciation spelling of a word is a spelling intentionally different from the standard spelling used to emphasize a particular pronunciation of the word An official script is a script that is specifically designated to be official in the Constitutions or other applicable Laws of countries, A spelling bee is a competition where contestants usually Children, are asked to spell English words In Computing, a spell checker is an applications program that flags words in a document that may not be spelled correctly A spelling pronunciation is a Pronunciation that instead of reflecting the way the word was pronounced by previous generations of speakers is a rendering in sound of the word's Many languages have undergone spelling reform, where a deliberate often officially sanctioned or mandated change to spelling takes place American and British English spelling differences are one aspect of American and British English differences. English orthography is the alphabetic spelling system used by the English language. Some English language Words have letters with Diacritical marks Pronunciation respelling is a type of notation system used to convey Pronunciation of words in a language which doesn't have a Phonemic orthography English spelling reform is the collective term for various campaigns and efforts to change the Spelling of the English language to make it simpler and more rationally This is a list of English words which are commonly misused It is meant to include only words whose misuse is deprecated by most usage writers editors and other professional linguists French Orthography encompasses the Spelling and Punctuation of the French language Hangeul matchumbeop, often romanized to Hangul Matchumbeop, could be translated to "Korean orthography (rules" German orthography, although largely phonemic, shows many instances of spellings that are historic or analogic to other spellings rather than phonemic The Orthography of the Greek language ultimately has its roots in the adoption of the Greek alphabet in the 9th century BC. The Roman alphabet or Latin alphabet, was adapted from the Old Italic alphabet, to represent the Phonemes of the Latin language, which had in Spanish orthography is one of the most phonemic among those that are written with the Latin alphabet. Russian orthography (правописание ˈpravəpʲɪˈsanʲjə is formally considered to encompass Spelling (орфография jə and Punctuation (пунктуация
• A multiple choice test of 50 commonly misspelled words

Misspellings

• Miss Spelling's Spelling Center - Most often misspelled words.
• Correcting Misspellings - How to help students correct misspellings
• Misspellilizer - Takes a sentence and misspells all the words, but the sentence should still be readable.
• Dumbtionary.com - Dictionary of misspelled words.