From: Edward Hobbs (EHOBBS@wellesley.edu)
Date: Thu Jul 04 1996 - 14:04:08 EDT
From: LUCY::EHOBBS "Edward Hobbs" 4-JUL-1996 13:02:58.70
To: IN%"cwconrad@artsci.wustl.edu"
CC: EHOBBS
Subj: RE: German Spelling Reform
Stephen Carlson has performed a great service for us who must use
German publications constantly in our efforts to study Biblical Greek. And
Carl (nicht Karl!) Conrad (nicht Adenauer!) has delightfully commented on
Stephen's posting. With hesitation bred by admiration, I suggest that the
motivation/intention behind these spelling "reforms" is not what Carl
implies: an attempt to reflect the actual pronunciation of the language.
On the contrary, I suspect it is a historicizing reform, an effort to
correct certain "errors" in etymological derivation of the words. In
English, it is comparable to Noah Webster's purging of British/French
spellings of many words in favor (not favour!) of their Latin origins.
In modern German history, we have witnessed the late 19th century
Anglophile drift in spelling (I suppose derived from Victoria's being the
mother, grandmother, aunt, or mother-in-law of many monarchs in Europe
including the new country of Germany), resulting for example in W. Wrede's
parents naming him "William" (usually mis-cited as "Wilhelm"). This was
followed in the 1930's by the Nazi effort to re-Germanize German, resulting
in the change in spelling of many names (Carl > Karl, Carolinen- >
Karolinen-, both noted by Karl Konrad [oops, Carl Conrad!]), and the massive
reprinting of every text possible in Fraktur (old black-letter, or "Old
English" [!], type) instead of the then-general use of Roman type. Children
were also frequently given old German first names instead of the previously
popular western-style ones.
We are now witnessing "reforms" by the historical linguists, rather
than by the politicians.
Edward Hobbs
Wellesley
-----------------------------------------------------------
Carl's post:
At 10:23 AM -0400 7/3/96, Stephen C Carlson wrote:
>Of only tangential relevance to this list but possibly of interest to
>those members who know German (which is a big plus in this field), there
>has been a reform of German spelling. The details (in German) are found
>at:
>
> http://www.ids-mannheim.de/pub/reformA.html
>
>The upshot of the reforms is that certain words spelled with 'e' are
>now spelled with 'a"' ('ae') where etymology warrants; double consonants
>are now used more, including in certain cases a 'ss' for 'B' (es-zet);
>triple consonants are now spelled out; and certain foreign words are now
>domesticated in their spelling. But don't take my word for it, I can
>hardly read German (except for recognizing 'alte' vs. 'neue').
Sowas verdient von uns allen einen recht schoenen Dank! Is there any other
modern people so concerned with an orthography that accurately reflects the
pronunciation of the language--perhaps the Chinese of the People's
Republic? I still remember walking down the streets of Munich and looking
at older signs such as "Carolinenstrasse" practically adjacent to newer
signs ("Karolinenstrasse").
Carl (der Alte, doch nicht Adenauer) Conrad (noch nicht Karl Konrad, weil
alt, soweie auch die Namensorthografie)
Carl W. Conrad
Department of Classics, Washington University
One Brookings Drive, St. Louis, MO, USA 63130
(314) 935-4018
cwconrad@artsci.wustl.edu OR cwc@oui.com
WWW: http://www.artsci.wustl.edu/~cwconrad/
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