[hilbert42]

OK, here it is:

"The other thing that ruins English spelling is a proclivity to borrow foreign words with foreign pronunciation and foreign spellings (even if it's not written in Latin script!),"

You're right, I can't agree more. A pet peeve of mine is the lackadaisical way English imports words and how little attention native speakers give to their correct pronunciation. For people who aren't good spellers and who don't memorize words at first glance, spelling them can be daunting given that their pronunciation often differs wildly from their spelling. I recall as kid trying to check the spelling of précis in the dictionary and going half-mad with frustration, every attempt at looking up various variations on 'praysis' failed.

Similarly, we often import words into English more out of fashion than of necessity. A quintessential example is tsunami, whilst marginally shorter than its English equivalent, it provides no descriptive meaning as do the English words, and almost no Anglophone speaker pronounces the word correctly nor even bothers do so. Instead, we get mishmashes that sound like 'sooonami', which, no doubt, not only sound terrible to Japanese speakers but also the bastardized sound pays no respect to the Japanese language. It seems very few know or bother to note that the transliterated spelling is actually very close to the original pronunciation. Given that the arrangement of its first three letters is a rather uncommon occurrence in English then one has to wonder why it doesn't automatically ring bells and alert English speakers that they need to pay careful attention to its pronunciation. Tsu, ツ - katakana, つ - hiragana, ought to be pronounced as it's written—like the sound of a hissing snake, but despite its English spelling being a good facsimile for the Japanese, one never seems to hear any pronunciation that's even close. No doubt, it takes more effort for English speakers to pronounce the unfamiliar sound but very few try—even well-spoken BBC announcers slur the word.

The question remains why we English speakers bothered to steal the word and import it into English in the first instance, especially given that we've made such a hash of using it.

Unfortunately, the bastardization of tsunami's pronunciation is yet another instance of the arrogance Anglophone speakers have in respect of English and their disregard for other languages (given, pro rata, the numbers who know English as a second language versus English speakers who've learned foreign languages). Amongst, English speakers it's a common assumption that the world only revolves around English and that everyone should speak the language to communicate with them.

Whilst English is essentially the current lingua franca many around the globe are aware of the old racist adage "if the natives don't understand then just shout a little louder", and rightly they resent such arrogance. We ought to be very cognisant of their opinion but we're often blind to the fact.

dredmorbius provides us with a good list of imported words but unlike tsunami there were no English equivalents so incorporating them into the language was just commonsense. Even here, we again see the irreverence English speakers have for some of these words. It makes sense to import the Urdu/Persian word khaki into English as it's easier than saying dust-coloured or yellowish-brown but it really grates one's sensibility to hear it being pronounced kaaake. Pronouncing Jodhpurs I reckon is more subtle and ignoring the 'h' or not trying to pronounce jodh correctly is perhaps acceptable but I'd like to hear from someone familiar with its correct pronunciation. (BTW the word conjures up bad memories, I had to wear those ugly things as a kid and hated them).

Whilst dredmorbius's list uses non-Latin scripts, the time-honoured tradition of importing words from languages that use Latin scripts continues to make sense if suitable English words don't exist or if existing phrases are long, for instance, blitzkrieg and zeitgeist. are good examples of modern imports. Whether English ought to honour the capitalized noun format for imported words that are capitalized by default on grounds of authenticity is moot (but I'd reckon it'd only have a snowball's chance). Personally, I'd agree with Mark Twain on this who thought it would be a sensible idea if English adopted the practice as a general rule for all nouns as it would help avoid confusion. But then, I'm only pipe-dreaming.

If you think I'm overly pedantic about these issues then you're likely correct, but again I'd stress I've come to these opinions because I've found languages difficult. Errors in one's texts whether they be spelling mistakes or grammatical errors detract readers' attention away from the text and lessen the impact of one's message. Excellent fluency gives one freedom of expression, without it, then it pays to be cautious.

I'll finish by saying again I'm of the opinion that the default keepers of English—those who have true fluency and excellent mastery of the language—often ignore these issues simply because they are fluent, as fluency gives them the ability to bend and manipulate the language at will (it's like riding a bike, once one knows how one never thinks about how it's done ever again, it's thus understandable why the mechanics of English receive so little attention these days).

Unfortunately, this situation leaves the rest of us to wallow around in the complexites of English without decent guidance, and I reckon this is bad. English has already fragmented noticeably in my lifetime, it's becoming more disorderly over time. Many factors have led to its increased entropy—globalization, internationalization, the Internet and because teachers have ceased to exercise its rules in a pedantic fashion as they once did—just to mention a few. Thus, I'm now of the opinion that without some ongoing method of keeping its structure coherent that in a century or two hence or perhaps even sooner it seems likely English will spilt into almost unrecognizable dialects and cease to be a dominant world language.

It'd be nice if I were to be wrong.

BTW, you'll note the mixture of US and British spellings here. Normally I'd harmonize to one or other before posting but this time I've left the text as written.