TYPOGLYCEMIA by Daniel Ryu

RAED THE BRAIN’S NATURAL SPELL CHECK The brain gets meaning of word from first and last letter in reading. Even though letters between first and last are mixed, human brain still gets the meaning through mis-spelled word. It’s automatical brain movement in reading. However, spell check is still important because it helps to read faster, to deliver clear, and to be profesional. PROMOTIONAL PIECE FOR TYPOGRAPHY CONFERENCE 2013 OCT 10 +12 2013 MOSCONE CENTER< SAN FRANCISCO

RAED THE BRAINâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;S NATURAL SPELL CHECK The brain gets meaning of word from first and last letter in reading. Even though letters between first and last are mixed, human brain still gets the meaning through mis-spelled word. Itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s automatical brain movement in reading. However, spell check is still important because it helps to read faster, to deliver clear, and to be profesional.

ÂŠ 2013 DONGHWAN YOU All rights reserved, No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any for m or by any means, electronic and or mechanical without prior per mission from Donghwan You. Written and produced by Donghwan You

CONTACT Donghwan You cult1012@hotmail.com 1.415.309.0957 dannydonghwanyou.com

DEDICATION Thank you my mom, parents in law, my wife, and Jesus who is my savior.

CONTENTS //

INTRODUCTION 06_07

[

CHAPTER 01

]

BRAIN AND BRAIN MOVEMENT IN READING 08_17

CHAPTER 02

TYPOGLYCEMIA 18_31

CHAPTER 03

IMPORTANCE OF SPELLING 32_41

GLANCE 42_43

COLORPHON 44_45

INTRODUCTION Even though we really care about spell check, we sometimes miss few. That is actualy for brain work in reading. Brain doesn’t catch the meanig of word through whole. It only needs first and last letters. We call it Typoglycemia. However, typoglycemia seems like we don’t need spell check, we need wright. Also, it helps reading speed and exact deliver for speed reading.

EYE AND BRAIN MOVEMENT IN READING THE READING BRAIN: HOW YOUR BRAIN HELPS YOU READ, AND WHY IT MATTERS

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s reading a sentence silently, the eye w that not every word is fixated. Every regression (an eye movement that goes s made to re-examine a word that may lly understood the first time. This only out 10% of the fixations, depending on ext is. The more difficult the higher the gressions are made.

Figure 1: This is an example of a personâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s eye movements as the text is being read. It shows the typical patterns found in eye movement during reading, including the fact that not all words are fixated, some words receive more than one fixation and some saccades go back in the text, referred to as regressions.

Eye movement in reading involves visual processing of words. This was first described by the French ophthalmologist Louis Ă&#x2030;mile Javal in the late 19th century. He reported that eyes do not move continuously along a line of text, but make short rapid movements (saccades) intermingled with short stops (fixations). Javalâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s observations were characterised by a reliance on naked-eye observation of eye movement in the absence of technology. From the late 19th to the mid-20th century, investigators used early tracking technologies to assist their observation, in a research climate that emphasised the measurement of human behaviour and skill for educational ends. Most basic knowledge about eye movement was obtained during this period. Since the mid-20th century, there have been three major changes: the development of non-invasive eye-movement tracking equipment; the introduction of computer technology to enhance the power of this equipment to pick up, record and process the huge volume of data that eye movement generates; and the emergence of cognitive psychology as a theoretical and methodological framework within which reading processes are examined. Sereno & Rayner (2003) believed that the best current approach to discover immediate signs of word recognition is through the recordings of eye movements and event-related potential.

Visual scenes typically contain more objects than can ever be recognized or remembered in a single glance. Some kind of sequential selection of objects for detailed processing is essential if we are to cope with this wealth of information. Built into the earliest levels of vision is a powerful means of accomplishing the selection, namely, the heterogeneous RETINA. Fine grain visual resolution is possible only within the central retinal region known as the fovea, whose diameter is approximately 2 degrees of visual angle (about the size of eight letters on a typical page of text). Eye movements are important because they bring selected images to the fovea, and also keep them there for as long as needed to recognize the object.

Figure 2: Sequence of saccadic eye movements during reading. The graph on top shows horizontal (top trace) and vertical (bottom trace) eye movements over time. The abrupt changes in eye position are the saccades. The figure shows the sequences of rightward saccades (upward deflections in the trace) made to read a line of text, followed by large leftward resetting saccades made to the beginning of each successive line of text. The locations of the saccadic endpoints are shown in numbered sequence, superimposed on the text, at the bottom of the figure. The figure was made by J. Epelboim from recordings made with R. Steinmanâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Revolving Magnetic Field Sensor Coil monitor at the University of Maryland (see Epelboim et al. 1995, for a description of the instrument).

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Eye movements fall into two broad classes. Saccadic eye movements are rapid jumps of the eye used to shift gaze to any chosen object. In READING, for example, saccades typically occur about three times each second and are generally made to look from one word to the next (figure 1). Smooth eye movements keep the line of sight on the selected object during the intervals between saccades, compensating for motion on the retina that might be caused either by motion of the object or by motion of the head or body. Intervals between saccades can be as long as several seconds during steady fixation of stationary or moving objects. Saccades can be made in any chosen direction, even in total darkness, whereas directed smooth eye movements cannot be initiated or maintained without some kind of motion signal. There are two natural links between eye movements and visual attention. One is the role played by ATTENTION in OCULOMOTOR CONTROL. The other is the way in which eye movements provide overt indicators of the locus of attention during performance of complex cognitive tasks, such as reading or visual search.

Consider first the role of attention in programming smooth eye movements. When we walk forward in an otherwise stationary scene, trying to keep our gaze fixed on our goal ahead, the flow of image motion generated on the retina by our own forward motion creates a large array of motion signals that could potentially drag the line of sight away from its intended goal (a problem described originally by Ernst Mach in 1906). Laboratory simulations of this common situation show that smooth eye movements can maintain a stable line of sight on a small, attended, stationary target superimposed on a large, vivid moving background. Similarly, smooth eye movements can accurately track a target moving across a stationary background. With more complex stimuli (letters, for example), perceptual identification of tracked targets is better than identification of untracked backgrounds (a result that holds after any differences in identification due to different retinal velocities of target and background are taken into account). The greater perceptibility of the target compared to the background implies that the same attentional mechanism serves both perception and eye movements (Khurana and Kowler 1987). Attention contributes to the control of saccades in an analogous way, namely, attention is allocated to the chosen target shortly before the saccade is made to look at it (Hoffman and Subramaniam 1995; Kowler et al. 1995). Some attention can be transferred to nontargets, with no harmful effect on the latency or accuracy of the eye movements, showing that the attentional demands of eye movements are modest (Kowler et al. 1995; Khurana and Kowler 1987).

On the whole, the arrangement is very efficient. By allowing oculomotor and perceptual systems to share a common attentional filter, the eye will be directed to the object we are most interested in without the need for a separate selective attentional decision. At the same time, the modest attentional requirements of effective oculomotor control mean that it is very likely that we can look wherever we choose with little danger of the eyeâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s being drawn to background objects, regardless of how large, bright, or vivid they may be. Modest attentional requirements also imply that there will be ample cognitive resources left over for identification and recognition; all our efforts need not be devoted to targeting eye movements.

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The close link between attention and eye movements is supported by neurophysiology. Cortical centers containing neurons that are active before eye movements also contain neurons (sometimes the same ones) that are active before shifts of attention while the eye is stationary (Colby and Duhamel 1996; Andersen and Gnadt 1989). Some have gone so far as to consider whether shifting attention to an eccentric location while the eye remains stationary is equivalent to planning a saccadic eye movement (Kustov and Robinson 1997; Rizzolatti et al. 1987; Klein 1980). Attention is involved in the programming of eye movements, and at the same time observations of eye movements provide a record of where someone chooses to attend during performance of complex cognitive tasks. Yarbusâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s (1967) well-known recordings of eye movements made while inspecting various paintings show systematic preferences to repeatedly look at those elements that would seem to be most relevant to evaluating the content of the picture. Despite the detailed record of preferences that eye movements provide, it has nevertheless proven to be surprisingly difficult to develop valid models of underlying cognitive processing based on eye movements alone (Viviani 1990). More recent work has taken a different tack by using highly constrained and novel tasks. Sequences of fixations have been used to study the modularity of syntactic processing during reading (Tanenhaus et al. 1995), the role of WORKING MEMORY during visual problem-solving tasks (Ballard, Hayhoe, and Pelz 1995; Epelboim and Suppes 1996), the coordination of eye and arm movements (Epelboim et al. 1995), and the size of the effective processing region during reading or search (McConkie and Rayner 1975; Motter and Belky 1998; Oâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;Regan 1990).

]

ATTENTION IS INVOLVED IN THE PROGRAMMING OF EYE MOVEMENTS, AND AT THE SAME TIME OBSERVATIONS OF EYE MOVEMENTS PROVIDE A RECORD OF WHERE SOMEONE CHOOSES TO ATTEND DURING PERFORMANCE OF COMPLEX COGNITIVE TASKS > The temporal lobe is responsible for phonological awareness and decoding/discriminating sounds.

> The frontal lobe handles speech production, reading fluency, grammatical usage, and comprehension, making it possible to understand simple and complex grammar in our native language. > The angular and supramarginal g yrus serve as a “reading integrator” a conductor of sorts, linking the different parts of the brain together to execute the action of reading. These areas of the brain connect the letters c, a, and t to the word cat that we can then read aloud.

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This article has emphasized the importance of eye movements for selecting a subset of the available information for detailed processing. The price paid for having this valuable tool is that the visual system must cope with the continual shifts of the retinal image that eye movements will produce. Remarkably, despite the retinal perturbations, the visual scene appears stable and unimpaired. Evidence from studies in which subjects look at or point to targets presented briefly during saccades suggests that stored representations of oculomotor commands (“efferent copies”) are used to take the effect of eye movements into account and create a representation of target location with respect to the head or body (Hansen and Skavenski 1977). Other evidence suggests that shifts of the retinal image are effectively ignored. According to these views, visual analysis begins anew each time the line of sight arrives at a target, with attended visual information converted rapidly to a high-level semantic code that can be remembered across sequences of saccades (e.g., O’Regan 1992). The advantages to visual and cognitive systems of having a fovea are evidently so profound that it has been worth the cost of developing both the capacity for accurate control of eye movements and a tolerance for the retinal perturbations that eye movements produce. Visual attention is crucial for accomplishing both.

MOST STRIKINGLY, A RECENT PAPER SHOWED AN 11% SLOWING WHEN PEOPLE READ WORDS WITH REORDERED INTERNAL LETTERS:

TYPOGLYCEMIA

THE ABILITY TO RECOGNIZE AND UNDERSTAND TYPED, NONSENSICAL, MISSPELLED GIBBERISH

GLYCEMI 20

POTHE BRAIN GETS MEANIG OF WORD FROM FIRST AND LAST LETTER The ability to recognize and understand typed, nonsensical, misspelled gibberish. This word is a play on words due to its rhyming reference and sound similarity to hypoglycemia, a disorder characterized by unusually low blood sugar levels. The ability to recognize and comprehend blatantly misspelled words is seen as a strange trait, so the author relates this odd proficiency to an equally odd disorder. The writer clearly wanted to convey her ideas and findings in a clever, unique way to poke fun at the astounding revelation that people are easily able to understand words despite flagrant misspellings. Hypoglycemia is an uncommon disorder, and the writer believes that the mind’s fantastic ability to conceptualize jumbled, unorganized phrases is an equally uncommon, novel discovery. In essence, she is using an analogy to compare the rarity of hypoglycemia with the brain’s recognition of misspelled words. Typo, a typographical error, is easily blended into ‘hypoglycemia’ because ‘typo’ and ‘hypo’ only differ by a beginning sound. Typo and hypoglyce-

mia easily flow together because of their strong similarity in sound. Typoglycemia sounds like a pedantic, medical term, but typoglycemia is absolutely unrelated to ‘glycemia,’ the presence of glucose in the bloodstream. By using typoglycemia, the writer sounds quite knowledgeable and bookish. However, the author certainly did not intend the neologism to evoke a sense of intelligence or medical ingenuity. Instead, the author sought to be cute and creative in relating a sugar disorder to a mental typing and cognitive phenomenon. The author was amazed at the brain’s awesome capacity of understanding and did not know of a term that described this abnormality; as a result, she thought of hypoglycemia, a medical, intelligent term and decided to blend typo and hypoglycemia to articulate the medical, amazing power of the brain.

According to a research team at Cambridge University, it doesn’t matter in what order the letters in a word are, the only important thing is that the first and last letter be in the right place. The rest can be a total mess and you can still read it without a problem. This is because the human mind does not read every letter by itself, but the word as a whole. Wikipedia explains that typoglycemia is a neologism (a word that means a coined term) “given to a purported recent discovery about the cognitive processes behind reading written text…. It is an urban legend/Internet meme that appears to have an element of truth to it.” But Wikipedia points out that although the research is true, it wasn’t Cambridge University. It was started by a letter written by a guy named Graham Rawlinson from Nottingham University to the New Scientist magazine. It’s actually his Ph.D thesis – but Rawlinson states you should keep the first two letters and the final two letters of the word. I tried to read the letter, but I can’t read much without subscribing to the magazine with my credit card. But there is enough there to legitimize it. According to the site, the letter was published in the magazine on May 29, 1999. Unfortunately, as cool as the internet meme and urban legend is, it isn’t actually “true”. The brain does read words in chunks and recognizes word shapes, which allows people to “speedread”. Matt Davis at the MRC Cognition and Brain Science Unit in Cambridge, UK, wrote about the meme and points out several cases in which the rules of the meme are followed, but it is difficult for the brain to decode the word. Also interesting, Davis has the meme in several different languages.

“I cdn’uolt blveiee taht I cluod aulaclty uesdnatnrd waht I was rdanieg: the phaonmneel pweor of the hmuan mnid. Aoccdrnig to a rseearch taem at Cmabrigde Uinervtisy, it deosn’t mttaer in waht oredr the ltteers in a wrod are, the olny iprmoatnt tihng is taht the frist and lsat ltteer be in the rghit pclae. The rset can be a taotl mses and you can sitll raed it wouthit a porbelm. Tihs is bcuseae the huamn mnid deos not raed ervey lteter by istlef, but the wrod as a wlohe. Scuh a cdonition is arppoiatrely cllaed Typoglycemia .

There’s also some websites that scramble text for you. Josh Nimroy created “The Cambridge Study Word Scrambler” and several sites use his Creative Common licensed work to create a derivative of the same idea. So does this mean spelling is important? Many young people do not think so, thanks in part to instant messengers and text message-speak. I did not win any spelling bee contests in elementary school – I was the kid who debated whether or not I should purposely misspell the word just so I could sit down and be done with the torturous thing. I still can’t spell aloud; I need to write it down. Spell-checkers save me often. But I would never turn in a final, printed copy of an assignment without looking over it myself for errors. 22

â&#x20AC;&#x153;I couldnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t believe that I could actually understand what I was reading: the phenomenal power of the human mind. According to a research team at Cambridge University, it doesnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t matter in what order the letters in a word are, the only important thing is that the first and last letter be in the right place. The rest can be a total mess and you can still read it without a problem. This is because the human mind does not read every letter by itself, but the word as a whole. Such a condition is appropriately called Typoglycemia.

THIS IS BCEASUE THE HUAMN MIND DOES NOT RAED ERVEY LETETR BY ITSELF BY THE WORD AS A WLOHE. 24

According to a researcher (sic) at Cambridge University, it doesn’t matter in what order the letters in a word are, the only important thing is that the first and last letter be at the right place. The rest can be a total mess and you can still read it without problem. This is because the human mind does not read every letter by itself but the word as a whole. This text circulated on the internet in September 2003. I first became aware of it when a journalist contacted a my colleague Sian Miller on 16th September, trying to track down the original source. It’s been passed on many times, and in the way of most internet memes has mutated along the way. It struck me as interesting - especially when I received a version that mentioned Cambridge University! I work at Cognition and Brain Sciences Unit, in Cambridge, UK, a Medical Research Council unit that includes a large group investigating how the brain processes language. If there’s a new piece of research on reading that’s been conducted in Cambridge, I thought I should have heard of it before... I’ve written this page, to try to explain the science behind this meme. There are elements of truth in this, but also some things which scientists studying the psychology of language (psycholinguists) know to be incorrect. I’m going to break down the meme, one line at a time to illustrate these points, pointing out what I think is the relevant research on the role of letter order on reading. Again, this is only my view of the current state of reading research, as it relates to this meme. If you think I’ve missed something important, let me know.

[ ] 27

My colleagues and I are also aware of versions in Spanish and French which Iâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;ve appended below. There are, no doubt, versions in many other languages as well. If you know of any others let me know and Iâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;ll add them to the list. I would be especially interested by versions of this text in languages that (to my knowledge, at least) work very differently in their written form from English. For example:

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semitic languages (such as Hebrew or Arabic) where vowels tend not to be written in text

agglutanative languages (like Finnish or Turkish) where words are dramatically longer than in English

languages such as Thai which do not (conventionally) put spaces between words

logographic languages such as Chinese in which complex symbols represent a whole word or concept.

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] 32

IMPORTANCE OF SPELLING

RIGHT SPELL ORDER HELPS TO READ TEXT, AND DELIVERS CLEAR MEANING AS PROFESSIONAL.

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THE title of Simon Horobin’s book, Does spelling matter?, poses what, at first blush, seems a banal question. I imagine most readers would answer “Yes, spelling matters”, perhaps adding “though not as much as some believe”. Yet if the question of how words should be written is not uppermost in many people’s minds, its nagging everyday presence is nonetheless evident in the existence of spell-checkers and school spelling tests, as well as in mnemonics designed to help us with spellings, such as the venerable “i before e except after c”. Phenomena of this kind betray an unease about the irregularities of spelling, and English spelling (Horobin’s focus, though he does say a bit about spelling reform in French, Dutch and German) has long drawn complaint. Horobin, an Oxford professor whose previous work has mainly been about Chaucer, doesn’t go that far. But he does argue against spelling reform, on the grounds that the complex and inconsistent detail of English spelling is “testimony to the richness of our linguistic heritage and a connection with our literary past”. He begins with some remarks on the social stigma that is so often attached to misspelling. A good command of spelling is generally regarded as evidence of a tidy mind. Meanwhile people who are poor at spelling are treated as if they are stupid, whatever the evidence to the contrary, and are also suspected of not knowing they can’t spell. Horobin notices that iffy spelling is “often viewed as a reflection of a person’s... morality”. It’s true that we see other people’s wayward spelling as evidence of other forms of waywardness. Having raised some nice questions about attitudes to correctness, Horobin then takes a different tack: he provides a solid history of English spelling, which highlights the role of enterprising individuals in shaping the standard. There’s plenty of interesting information here. Horobin identifies a book called The Hoosier Schoolmaster (1871) as the inspiration for the modern spelling bee though he doesn’t mention that it was a novel, a sentimental effort by the Methodist pastor Edward Eggleston.

<<<

iffy spelling is “often viewed as a reflection of a person’s... morality”. It’s true that we see other people’s wayward spelling as evidence of other forms of waywardness. While Horobin is a sane, sensible guide to such matters, he doesn’t probe the more philosophical aspects of the question he asks in the book’s title. Why do we feel we need an invariant system of orthography? The standard response is that consistency equals clarity; inconsistencies are distracting. A different answer, of a kind that wouldn’t have been given 50 years ago, is that invariant spelling makes it easier to search through data that has been stored electronically. If I want to look for every instance of the word “change” in the online text of a speech by Barack Obama, it helps if “change” isn’t spelled five different ways. The defenders of rigidly invariant spelling assert that it is a repository of authority and expressive elegance. The British linguist Mark Sebba has written acutely on this subject and is worth quoting at length: “We spell because orthography is part of the elaboration of our culture; because there is a natural tendency for all human activities which involve choice to take on social meaning; because literacy itself is embedded in and important to our culture and social actions, and orthography is essentially bound up with literacy.” Yet not everyone feels that an ironclad standard of spelling is necessary. Deliberately unconventional spelling can be a means of advertising one’s rebelliousness (“Nicccy woz ere”), marking one’s membership of a group, or making a name stand out Krispy Kreme, Ludacris, Inglourious Basterds. It can have propitious consequences: Google and Ovaltine both owe their names to misspellings of googol and Ovomaltine, respectively. And misspelling doesn’t necessarily prevent comprehension. Yu can undrestand tis. Und proberly allso vis. To those who recoil from such wilful wonkiness, cyberspace can look an awful lot like the graveyard of spelling. In a trenchant final chapter, Horobin examines the way new technologies, among them the endlessly hyped Twitter, are leading us to communicate in a more casual style. For Horobin, spelling matters and, more to the point, our existing spelling matters. Spelling is commonly treated as if it is a tool, a technology which, at its best, creates a one-to-one correspondence between sounds and letters. But really it is a cultural achievement and a record of the language’s history. 35

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Learning to spell helps to cement the connection between the letters and their sounds, and learning high-frequency “sight words” to mastery level improves both reading and writing. Joshi, Treiman, Carreker and Moats describe this connection: “The correlation between spelling and reading comprehension is high because both depend on a common denominator: proficiency with language. The more deeply and thoroughly a student knows a word, the more likely he or she is to recognize it, spell it, define it, and use it appropriately in speech and writing.” They also note that “the major goal of the English writing system is not merely to ensure accurate pronunciation of the written word – it is to convey meaning. If words that sound the same (e.g., rain, rein and reign) were spelled the same way, their meanings would be harder to differentiate.” 3 Teaching spelling systematically can also dispel the myth that spelling is unpredictable and too confusing for all but those with a natural gift for it , which often happens when a “correct mistakes as they happen” approach is taken. The idea that English is too mixed up to make sense of is a myth perpetuated by lack of instruction and poor teacher preparation. Spelling is not simple, but when people understand its structure, it is perfectly decodable and not limited to people “born to spell” to understand. For example, many people struggle with spelling the word “broccoli.” Which letter should be doubled? If a student – or teacher or parent - understands the syllable types of the English language, the word makes sense. “Closed” syllables end in a consonant and have a short vowel sound. Open syllables end in a vowel. Often, a consonant is doubled so that a vowel is clearly short, including when we add suffixes. Examples are bagged, collie, and broccoli, which would be divided into syllables as broc – co – li. Perhaps it’s unfortunate that people who are naturally good at spelling and reading are likely to be teaching it; they may not have needed to have these rules explained, or perhaps don’t remember the explanations because they did not have to practice them. Understanding the rules and patterns helps the student who doesn’t intuitively pick them up and enables the teacher to clear up confusion instead of having to resort to “it’s just how it’s spelled.”

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Others might acknowledge the value of learning to spell, but think that learning the rules and patterns is the stuff of drudgery. When students are practicing in ways that are effective, and getting appropriate feedback and experiencing success, practice is not drudgery. It may not be as fun as recess – but often it can be satisfying and even enjoyable, especially when technology is used creatively so that students can use their strengths with individualized lessons. For instance, students can choose games and activities at sites such as spellingcity.com to practice their words as much as they need. By including language-rich experiences with the words, students use auditory and visual pathways in the learning task. This helps students conquer the challenge of remembering the spellings of words, because the “working memory” can be used more efficiently if both the visual and auditory channels are engaged in the learning task.4 Technology is a powerful tool that can make learning easier. Some would argue that it’s powerful enough to make learning to spell unnecessary. After all, what are spell checkers for? Spell checkers are wonderful tools for the small mistakes that good spellers make and for common typographical errors such as typing “t e h” instead of “the.” In the hands of the student with good language skills, the spell checker is a real timesaver. However, it can actually interfere with the learning process. The writer must rely on starting the word correctly and getting most letters right, and the spell checker will not correct when a misspelling is another legitimate word. Therefore, the student who spells “does” as “dose” will not see the red “correct me” line, and will continue to entrench the misspelling habit, and the reader will be confused. The more advanced the writing task, the more likely we’ll need to use exactly the right word. When a college student writes “lessening” instead of “listening,” that student has not learned to think about the relationship between the meaning and spelling of words. His writing is suffering for the lack, and perhaps his reading is as well. Spell checkers also can’t be counted on for giving the right word even when they recognize an incorrect spelling. If a writer types “definantly” instead of definitely, Microsoft Word will suggest “defiantly.” “Surpised” will yield “surpassed.” The language learner will be more confused, not less. In other words, spell checkers give us reason to teach spelling and precise word usage *more* thoroughly, not less. 5 Good use, even mastery, of our complex language does not have to be a thing of the past or reserved for a few. By using the knowledge from years of research and experience and our ever-developing technological tools, we can teach each student to spell well and enable them to read and write fluently. We owe it to our students to give them the skills that are the tools to learning and communication throughout their education and their lives.

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SCRABLE HELPS TO UNDERSTAND AND DEVELOP SPELLING WITH FUN <<<

ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ

Phenomena of this kind betray an unease about the irregularities of spelling, and English spelling (Horobin’s focus, though he does say a bit about spelling reform in French, Dutch and German) has long drawn complaint. Horobin, an Oxford professor whose previous work has mainly been about Chaucer, doesn’t go that far. But he does argue against spelling reform, on the grounds that the complex and inconsistent detail of English spelling is “testimony to the richness of our linguistic heritage and a connection with our literary past”. He begins with some remarks on the social stigma that is so often attached to misspelling. A good command of spelling is generally regarded as evidence of a tidy mind.

different tack: he provides a solid history of English spelling, which highlights the role of enterprising individuals in shaping the standard. There’s plenty of interesting information here. Horobin identifies a book called The Hoosier Schoolmaster (1871) as the inspiration for the modern spelling bee though he doesn’t mention that it was a novel, a sentimental effort by the Methodist pastor Edward Eggleston.

Meanwhile people who are poor at spelling are treated as if they are stupid, whatever the evidence to the contrary, and are also suspected of not knowing they can’t spell. Horobin notices that iffy spelling is “often viewed as a reflection of a person’s... morality”. It’s true that we see other people’s wayward spelling as evidence of other forms of waywardness. Having raised some nice questions about attitudes to correctness, Horobin then takes a

A different answer, of a kind that wouldn’t have been given 50 years ago, is that invariant spelling makes it easier to search through data that has been stored electronically. If I want to look for every instance of the word “change” in the online text of a speech by Barack Obama, it helps if “change” isn’t spelled five different ways. The defenders of rigidly invariant spelling assert that it is a repository of authority and expressive elegance. The British linguist Mark Sebba has written acutely on this subject and is worth quoting at length: “We spell because orthography is part of the elaboration of our culture; because there is a natural tendency for all human activities which involve choice to take on social meaning; because literacy itself is embedded in and important to our culture and social actions, and orthography is essentially bound up with literacy.”

<<<

While Horobin is a sane, sensible guide to such matters, he doesn’t probe the more philosophical aspects of the question he asks in the book’s title. Why do we feel we need an invariant system of orthography? The standard response is that consistency equals clarity; inconsistencies are distracting.

Yet not everyone feels that an ironclad standard of spelling is necessary. Deliberately unconventional spelling can be a means of advertising one’s rebelliousness (“Nicccy woz ere”), marking one’s membership of a group, or making a name stand out Krispy Kreme, Ludacris, Inglourious Basterds. It can have propitious consequences: Google and Ovaltine both owe their names to misspellings of googol and Ovomaltine, respectively. And misspelling doesn’t necessarily prevent comprehension. Yu can undrestand tis. Und proberly allso vis. To those who recoil from such wilful wonkiness, cyberspace can look an awful lot like the graveyard of spelling. In a trenchant final chapter, Horobin examines the way new technologies, among them the endlessly hyped Twitter, are leading us to communicate in a more casual style. For Horobin, spelling matters and, more to the point, our existing spelling matters. Spelling is commonly treated as if it is a tool, a technology which, at its best, creates a one-to-one correspondence between sounds and letters. But really it is a cultural achievement and a record of the language’s history.

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GLANCE

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LOCATION

MOSCONE CENTER, 747 Howard St San Francisco, CA 94103

<<< DAY 1 [

OCT 10 02PM

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HILLMAN CURTIS

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OCT 10 04PM

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JENNIFER STERLING

[

OCT 10 07PM PAULA SCHER

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OCT 11 10AM

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RICK POYNOR

[

OCT 11 12PM

OCT 11 02PM

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[

OCT 11 04PM

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OCT 11 07PM

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[

OCT 12 02PM

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MICHAEL BIERUT

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MILTON GLASER

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OCT 12 12PM

TOBIAS FRERE-JONES

CHIP KIDD

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]

NEVILLE BRODY

JOHN MAEDA

[

OCT 12 10AM

[

OCT 12 04PM

]

STEVEN SEGMASTER

]

ERIK SPIEKERMANN

COLORPHON

[

TYPEFACE

]

DinPro Light / Regular / Medium ITC New Baskerville Roman / Itaic [

PRINTER

]

EPSON R1280

[

PROGRAM

]

Adobe Indesign / Photoshop / Illustrator CS 6

[

CAMERA

]

Canon 40D / EF 17-85mm 4.0 Canon AE-1P / 35mm 1.8F

THE BRAIN’S NATURAL SPELL CHECK

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