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Spelling is a set of conventions that regulate the way of using
grapheme In linguistics, a grapheme is the smallest functional unit of a writing system. The word ''grapheme'' is derived and the suffix ''-eme'' by analogy with ''phoneme'' and other names of emic units. The study of graphemes is called ''graphemics' ...
s (writing system) to represent a language in its
written form A writing system is a method of visually representing verbal communication, based on a script and a set of rules regulating its use. While both writing and speech are useful in conveying messages, writing differs in also being a reliable form ...
. In other words, spelling is the rendering of speech sound (phoneme) into writing (grapheme). Spelling is one of the elements of
orthography An orthography is a set of conventions for writing a language, including norms of spelling, hyphenation, capitalization, word breaks, emphasis, and punctuation. Most transnational languages in the modern period have a writing system, and mos ...
, and highly standardized spelling is a
prescriptive Linguistic prescription, or prescriptive grammar, is the establishment of rules defining preferred usage of language. These rules may address such linguistic aspects as spelling, pronunciation, vocabulary, syntax, and semantics. Sometimes infor ...
element. Spellings originated as
transcription Transcription refers to the process of converting sounds (voice, music etc.) into letters or musical notes, or producing a copy of something in another medium, including: Genetics * Transcription (biology), the copying of DNA into RNA, the fir ...
s of the sounds of spoken language according to the
alphabetic principle According to the alphabetic principle, letters and combinations of letters are the symbols used to represent the speech sounds of a language based on systematic and predictable relationships between written letters, symbols, and spoken words. The ...
. They remain largely reflective of the sounds, although fully phonemic spelling is an ideal that most languages' orthographies only approximate, some more closely than others. This is true for various reasons, including that pronunciation changes over time in all languages, yet spellings as visual norms may resist change. In addition, words from other languages may be adopted without being adapted to the spelling system, and different meanings of a word or
homophone A homophone () is a word that is pronounced the same (to varying extent) as another word but differs in meaning. A ''homophone'' may also differ in spelling. The two words may be spelled the same, for example ''rose'' (flower) and ''rose'' (p ...
s may be deliberately spelled in different ways to differentiate them visually.


Spelling standards and conventions

Standardization of spelling is connected with the development of writing and the establishment of modern standard dialects. Languages with established orthography are those languages that enjoy an official status and a degree of institutional support in a country. Therefore, normative spelling is a relatively recent development linked to the compiling of dictionaries (in many languages, special spelling dictionaries, also called orthographic dictionaries, are compiled, showing prescribed spelling of words but not their meanings), the founding of national academies and other institutions of language maintenance, including widespread
education Education is a purposeful activity directed at achieving certain aims, such as transmitting knowledge or fostering skills and character traits. These aims may include the development of understanding, rationality, kindness, and honesty. Va ...
and
literacy Literacy in its broadest sense describes "particular ways of thinking about and doing reading and writing" with the purpose of understanding or expressing thoughts or ideas in written form in some specific context of use. In other words, huma ...
, and often does not apply to
minority Minority may refer to: Politics * Minority government, formed when a political party does not have a majority of overall seats in parliament * Minority leader, in American politics, the floor leader of the second largest caucus in a legislative b ...
and
regional language * A regional language is a language spoken in a region of a sovereign state, whether it be a small area, a federated state or province or some wider area. Internationally, for the purposes of the European Charter for Regional or Minority Lan ...
s. In countries or regions where there is an authoritative
language academy This is a list of bodies that consider themselves to be authorities on standard languages, often called language academies. Language academies are motivated by, or closely associated with, linguistic purism and prestige, and typically publish pr ...
, such as France, the Netherlands, and the German-speaking areas, reforms are regularly made so that spelling better matches the changing pronunciation. Examples include: *
German orthography reform of 1996 The German orthography reform of 1996 (') was a change to German spelling and punctuation that was intended to simplify German orthography and thus to make it easier to learn, without substantially changing the rules familiar to users of the lang ...
* Portuguese spelling reform * French ''rectifications orthographiques'' of 1990.
English-language spelling reform For centuries, there have been movements to reform the spelling of the English language. It seeks to change English orthography so that it is more consistent, matches pronunciation better, and follows the alphabetic principle. Common motives for ...
proposals have been regularly made since the 16th century, but have made little impact apart from a few spellings preferred by
Noah Webster Noah ''Nukh''; am, ኖህ, ''Noḥ''; ar, نُوح '; grc, Νῶε ''Nôe'' () is the tenth and last of the pre-Flood patriarchs in the traditions of Abrahamic religions. His story appears in the Hebrew Bible (Book of Genesis, chapters 5– ...
having contributed to
American and British English spelling differences Despite the various List of dialects of English, English dialects spoken from country to country and within different regions of the same country, there are only slight regional variations in English orthography, the two most notable variatio ...
.


Methodology


Learning

Learning proper spelling by rote is a traditional element of elementary education and divergence from standard spelling is often perceived as an indicator of low intelligence,
illiteracy Literacy in its broadest sense describes "particular ways of thinking about and doing reading and writing" with the purpose of understanding or expressing thoughts or ideas in written form in some specific context of use. In other words, huma ...
, or lower class standing.
Spelling test A spelling test is an assessment of a person's (usually a student's) ability to spell words correctly. Spelling tests are usually given in school during language arts class, to see how well each student has learned the most recent spelling lesson. ...
s are commonly used to assess a student's mastery over the words in the spelling lessons the student has received so far. They can also be an effective practice method.
Spelling bee A spelling bee is a competition in which contestants are asked to spell a broad selection of words, usually with a varying degree of difficulty. To compete, contestants must memorize the spellings of words as written in dictionaries, and recite ...
s are competitions to determine the best speller of a group. Prominent spelling bees are even televised, such as the
National Spelling Bee The Scripps National Spelling Bee (formerly the Scripps Howard National Spelling Bee and commonly called the National Spelling Bee) is an annual spelling bee held in the United States. The bee is run on a not-for-profit basis by The E. W. Scrip ...
in the United States.


Alteration

Divergent spelling is a popular advertising technique, used to attract attention or to render a
trademark A trademark (also written trade mark or trade-mark) is a type of intellectual property consisting of a recognizable sign, design, or expression that identifies products or services from a particular source and distinguishes them from others ...
"suggestive" rather than "merely descriptive". The pastry chains
Dunkin' Donuts Dunkin' Donuts LLC, also known as Dunkin' and by the initials DD, is an American multinational coffee and doughnut company, as well as a quick service restaurant. It was founded by Bill Rosenberg (1916–2002) in Quincy, Massachusetts, in 195 ...
and
Krispy Kreme Krispy Kreme, Inc. (previously Krispy Kreme Doughnuts, Inc.) is an American multinational doughnut company and coffeehouse chain. Krispy Kreme was founded by Vernon Rudolph (1915–1973), who bought a yeast-raised recipe from a New Orleans ch ...
, for example, employ non-standard spellings.


Misspellings

While some words admit multiple spellings, some spellings are not considered standard. These are commonly called "misspellings". A misspelled word can be a series of letters that represents no correctly spelled word of the same language at all (such as "leik" for "like") or a correct spelling of another word (such as writing "here" when one means "hear", or "no" when one means "know"). Misspellings of the latter type is called "
atomic typo A typographical error (often shortened to typo), also called a misprint, is a mistake (such as a spelling mistake) made in the typing of printed (or electronic) material. Historically, this referred to mistakes in manual type-setting (typography) ...
" and it can easily make their way into printed material because they are not caught by simple computerized
spell checker In software, a spell checker (or spelling checker or spell check) is a software feature that checks for misspellings in a text. Spell-checking features are often embedded in software or services, such as a word processor, email client, electronic di ...
s. Misspellings may be due to typing errors (e.g. the transposition error ''
teh ''Teh'' is an Internet slang neologism most frequently used as an English article, based on a common typographical error of "''the".'' ''Teh'' has subsequently developed grammatical usages distinct from ''the''. It is not common in spoken or writt ...
'' for ''the''), lack of knowledge of the normative spelling, or lack of concern over spelling rules at all. Whether or not a word is misspelled may depend on context and the orthographic conventions adopted, as is the case with 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 an acceptable variant in some dictionaries. A well-known Internet scam involves the registration of
domain names A domain name is a string that identifies a realm of administrative autonomy, authority or control within the Internet. Domain names are often used to identify services provided through the Internet, such as websites, email services and more. As ...
that are deliberate misspellings of well-known corporate names to mislead or defraud. The practice is commonly known as "
typosquatting Typosquatting, also called URL hijacking, a sting site, or a fake URL, is a form of cybersquatting, and possibly brandjacking which relies on mistakes such as typos made by Internet users when inputting a website address into a web browser. Shoul ...
".


Notable English misspellings in history

*
Arab, Alabama Arab () is a city in Marshall and Cullman counties in the northern part of the U.S. state of Alabama, located from Guntersville Lake and Guntersville Dam, and is included in the Huntsville-Decatur Combined Statistical Area. As of the 2020 cen ...
– This town in north Alabama was named Arad, after its founder, Arad Thompson, but the name was misspelled on a US Post Office map as "Arab", and the misspelled name stuck. *
Cleveland, Ohio Cleveland ( ), officially the City of Cleveland, is a city in the U.S. state of Ohio and the county seat of Cuyahoga County. Located in the northeastern part of the state, it is situated along the southern shore of Lake Erie, across the U.S. ...
– the leader of the crew that surveyed the town's territory was General
Moses Cleaveland Moses Cleaveland (January 29, 1754 – November 16, 1806) was an American lawyer, politician, soldier, and surveyor from Connecticut who founded the city of Cleveland, Ohio, while surveying the Connecticut Western Reserve in 1796. During the Ame ...
, and the region was named in his honor; reportedly the town's first newspaper, the ''Cleveland Advertiser'', could not fit the town's name in its masthead without removing the first "a" from the name. *
Google Google LLC () is an American multinational technology company focusing on search engine technology, online advertising, cloud computing, computer software, quantum computing, e-commerce, artificial intelligence, and consumer electronics. ...
– accidental misspelling of
googol A googol is the large number 10100. In decimal notation, it is written as the digit 1 followed by one hundred zeroes: 10,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000, ...
. According to Google's vice president, as quoted on a
BBC #REDIRECT BBC #REDIRECT BBC #REDIRECT BBC Here i going to introduce about the best teacher of my life b BALAJI sir. He is the precious gift that I got befor 2yrs . How has helped and thought all the concept and made my success in the 10th board ex ...
''
The Money Programme ''The Money Programme'' is a finance and business affairs television programme on BBC Two which ran between April 1966 and November 2010. It was first broadcast on 5 April 1966 and presented by "commentators" (financial journalists) William Davis ...
'' 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. *
Ovaltine Ovaltine (also known by its original name Ovomaltine) is a brand of milk flavoring product made with malt extract (except in the blue packaging in the United States), sugar (except in Switzerland), and whey. Some flavors also have cocoa. Ovaltin ...
, a popular bedtime drink in the UK and
Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a Sovereign state, sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous List of islands of Australia, sma ...
, came about because someone misspelled the original name ''Ovomaltine'' on the trademark documentation. * Referer – common misspelling of the word referrer. It is so common 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 referer In HTTP, "" (a misspelling of Referrer) is an optional HTTP header field that identifies the address of the web page (i.e., the URI or IRI), from which the resource has been requested. By checking the referrer, the server providing the new web p ...
s. *
Sequim, Washington Sequim ( ) is a city in Clallam County, Washington, United States. It is located along the Dungeness River near the base of the Olympic Mountains. The 2010 United States Census, 2010 census counted a population of 6,606. Sequim lies within the ra ...
– "In 1879 the first post office was built and named 'Seguin' for the surrounding area. ..In 1907, due to a Postal Official's error in reading an official report, the post office was titled 'Seguim' for approximately a month. With the next report, the Official read the letter 'g' as a 'q', and the post office here became known as 'Sequim.' The name change did not worry the residents enough to protest. It has been known as Sequim ever since." * According to some, the name of
Quartzsite Quartzsite is a town in La Paz County, Arizona, United States. According to the 2020 census, the population was 2,413. Interstate 10 runs directly through Quartzsite which is at the intersection of U.S. Route 95 and Arizona State Route 95 wi ...
, a mining town in Arizona, was spelled wrongly. It should be Quartzite, after the mineral
quartzite Quartzite is a hard, non- foliated metamorphic rock which was originally pure quartz sandstone.Essentials of Geology, 3rd Edition, Stephen Marshak, p 182 Sandstone is converted into quartzite through heating and pressure usually related to tect ...
. *
Zenith The zenith (, ) is an imaginary point directly "above" a particular location, on the celestial sphere. "Above" means in the vertical direction (plumb line) opposite to the gravity direction at that location (nadir). The zenith is the "highest" ...
– Arabic ''zamt'' was misread; in Latin letters, at the time, the letter ''i'' was never dotted, so "m" looked like "ni".


In English

English orthography has a broad degree of standardization. However, there are several ways to spell almost every sound and most letters have several variants of pronunciation depending on their position in the word and context. Therefore, some spelling mistakes are common even among native speakers. This is mainly due to large number of words that were borrowed from other languages with no successful attempts of complete spelling reform. Most spelling rules usually do not reflect phonetic changes that have taken place since the end of the 15th century (for example,
Great Vowel Shift The Great Vowel Shift was a series of changes in the pronunciation of the English language that took place primarily between 1400 and 1700, beginning in southern England and today having influenced effectively all dialects of English. Through ...
).


Other languages

Portuguese spelling is not strictly phonematic. It is associated with an extension of the
Portuguese language Portuguese ( or, in full, ) is a western Romance language of the Indo-European language family, originating in the Iberian Peninsula of Europe. It is an official language of Portugal, Brazil, Cape Verde, Angola, Mozambique, Guinea-Bissau and ...
and the emergence of numerous regional and dialect variants. In 2009 the global reform of the Portuguese language was initiated to eliminate 98% of inconsistencies in spelling between various countries. Orthography of the
Icelandic language Icelandic (; is, íslenska, link=no ) is a North Germanic language spoken by about 314,000 people, the vast majority of whom live in Iceland, where it is the national language. Due to being a West Scandinavian language, it is most closely re ...
is based on etymological principle, thus the Icelanders themselves experience difficulties in writing. Modern Icelandic alphabet is based on the standard introduced by the Danish philologist Rasmus Rask. The fundamental principles of the
Spanish orthography Spanish orthography is the orthography used in the Spanish language. The alphabet uses the Latin script. The spelling is fairly phonemic, especially in comparison to more opaque orthographies like English, having a relatively consistent mapping ...
are phonological and etymological, that is why there are several letters with identical phonemes. Beginning from the 17th century, various options for orthographic reforms were suggested that would create a one-to-one correspondence between grapheme and phoneme, but all of them were rejected. Most modern proposals to reform spelling are limited to the removal of homophone letters that are preserved for etymological reasons.


See also

*
Dyslexia Dyslexia, also known until the 1960s as word blindness, is a disorder characterized by reading below the expected level for one's age. Different people are affected to different degrees. Problems may include difficulties in spelling words, r ...
* Eye dialect *
Grapheme In linguistics, a grapheme is the smallest functional unit of a writing system. The word ''grapheme'' is derived and the suffix ''-eme'' by analogy with ''phoneme'' and other names of emic units. The study of graphemes is called ''graphemics' ...
*
Official script An official script is a writing system that is specifically designated to be official in the constitutions or other applicable laws of countries, states, and other jurisdictions. Akin to an official language, an official script is much rarer. It ...
*
Orthography An orthography is a set of conventions for writing a language, including norms of spelling, hyphenation, capitalization, word breaks, emphasis, and punctuation. Most transnational languages in the modern period have a writing system, and mos ...
*
Phonetic spelling A phonemic orthography is an orthography (system for writing a language) in which the graphemes (written symbols) correspond to the phonemes (significant spoken sounds) of the language. Natural languages rarely have perfectly phonemic orthographi ...
*
Pronunciation spelling A pronunciation respelling is a regular phonetic respelling of a word that has a standard spelling but whose pronunciation according to that spelling may be ambiguous, which is used to indicate the pronunciation of that word. Pronunciation respe ...
*
Register (sociolinguistics) In sociolinguistics, a register is a variety of language used for a particular purpose or in a particular communicative situation. For example, when speaking officially or in a public setting, an English speaker may be more likely to follow pres ...
*
Spell checker In software, a spell checker (or spelling checker or spell check) is a software feature that checks for misspellings in a text. Spell-checking features are often embedded in software or services, such as a word processor, email client, electronic di ...
*
Spelling bee A spelling bee is a competition in which contestants are asked to spell a broad selection of words, usually with a varying degree of difficulty. To compete, contestants must memorize the spellings of words as written in dictionaries, and recite ...
*
Spelling pronunciation A spelling pronunciation is the pronunciation of a word according to its spelling when this differs from a longstanding standard or traditional pronunciation. Words that are spelled with letters that were never pronounced or that were not pronounc ...
*
Spelling reform A spelling reform is a deliberate, often authoritatively sanctioned or mandated change to spelling rules. Proposals for such reform are fairly common, and over the years, many languages have undergone such reforms. Recent high-profile examples ar ...
;English spelling *
American and British English spelling differences Despite the various List of dialects of English, English dialects spoken from country to country and within different regions of the same country, there are only slight regional variations in English orthography, the two most notable variatio ...
*
English orthography English orthography is the writing system used to represent spoken English, allowing readers to connect the graphemes to sound and to meaning. It includes English's norms of spelling, hyphenation, capitalisation, word breaks, emphasis, and p ...
*
English terms with diacritical marks English rarely uses diacritics, which are symbols indicating the modification of a vowel's sound when spoken. Most of the affected words are in terms imported from other languages The diaeresis mark, the grave accent and the acute accent are the o ...
*
English spelling reform For centuries, there have been movements to reform the spelling of the English language. It seeks to change English orthography so that it is more consistent, matches pronunciation better, and follows the alphabetic principle. Common motives for ...
*
Pronunciation respelling for English A pronunciation respelling for English is a notation used to convey the pronunciation of words in the English language, which does not have a phonemic orthography (i.e. the spelling does not reliably indicate pronunciation). There are two b ...
*
Commonly misspelled English words Commonly misspelled English words ( UK: misspelt words) are words that are often unintentionally misspelled in general writing. A selected list of common words is presented below, under '' Documented list of common misspellings''. Although the w ...
* Frequently misused words ;Other languages * *
List of languages by writing system Below is a list of languages sorted by writing system (by alphabetical order). Adlam alphabet * Fulfulde/Pular Afaka syllabary * Ndyuka (on occasion) Anatolian alphabets *Anatolian languages (extinct) Arabic script * Acehnese (on occasio ...
*
French orthography French orthography encompasses the spelling and punctuation of the French language. It is based on a combination of phoneme, phonemic and historical principles. The spelling of words is largely based on the pronunciation of Old French c. 1100–1 ...
*
German orthography German orthography is the orthography used in writing the German language, which is largely phonemic. However, it shows many instances of spellings that are historic or analogous to other spellings rather than phonemic. The pronunciation of alm ...
*
Greek orthography The orthography of the Greek language ultimately has its roots in the adoption of the Greek alphabet in the 9th century BC. Some time prior to that, one early form of Greek, Mycenaean, was written in Linear B, although there was a lapse of severa ...
*
Hangul orthography ''Hangeul matchumbeop(한글맞춤법)'' refers to the overall rules of writing the Korean language with Hangul. The current orthography was issued and established by Korean Ministry of Culture in 1998. The first of it is Hunminjungeum(훈민정 ...
*
Italian orthography Italian orthography (writing) uses a variant of the Latin alphabet consisting of 21 letters to write the Italian language. This article focuses on the writing of Standard Italian, based historically on the Florentine dialect. Italian orthography ...
*
Latin spelling and pronunciation Latin phonology continually evolved over the centuries, making it difficult for speakers in one era to know how Latin was spoken before then. A given phoneme may be represented by different letters in different periods. This article deals primar ...
*
Russian orthography Russian orthography (russian: правописа́ние, r=pravopisaniye, p=prəvəpʲɪˈsanʲɪjə) is formally considered to encompass spelling ( rus, орфогра́фия, r=orfografiya, p=ɐrfɐˈɡrafʲɪjə) and punctuation ( rus, п ...
*
Spanish orthography Spanish orthography is the orthography used in the Spanish language. The alphabet uses the Latin script. The spelling is fairly phonemic, especially in comparison to more opaque orthographies like English, having a relatively consistent mapping ...


References


Further reading

* *


External links

*Ford, O.T.
BASIC LINGUISTICS OF ENGLISH
'. The Stewardship Project. (Concept of spelling) * {{Lexicography Orthography