I before E...

It's vital to stay up to date Ewan. Think of the exciting new decimal coinage. So much easier and more efficient.

Bugger, you caught me in mid-edit.

Dessimul, surely?

Shawly.

Shirley.

Rite.

Orl Krekt.

Keith? I pronounce it 'Keeth' ... or does the rule not stretch to proper nouns?

jude

Anything goes with names of people and places.

Reith as in Lord Reith. Dalkeith, Leith. Mind you, they're all Scottish.

Anyway, don't most people pronounce it 'Keef'?

"Still worse though, the spelling expert appeared to be unaware of the rest of the rhyme, as was the primary school headteacher".

The former surprises me but not the latter. My sister is a deputy head. To become a teacher you need a degree and a PGCE and only a C grade in O level/ GCSE English. My sister's degree is in music, she isn't academic at all. One can assume the headteacher qualification doesn't include any basic literacy since I know lots of teachers who don't have a clue.

Too many people are semi-literate airheads with delusions of being well-educated just because they have a degree. In my work, whenever I employ a new member of administrative staff, I have to give them literacy tests as part of their interview. This usually involves giving them a dictated letter on Dictaphone to type up after I have disabled the spell-checker in the word processing programme. I also include lots of commonly misused words such as 'where, were and we're' and 'their, there and they're'. I also request they sign off appropriately to see if they know when to use faithfully rather than sincerely.

What I find depressing is that few people under the age of forty come anywhere close to a perfect score. My spelling isn't the best but at least I understand the rules and I know when to check if I am unsure.

What would be really useful is a literacy society a bit like Mensa, where you are tested under exam conditions. Membership of this would save employees having to administer tests themselves. If membership gave employees a competitive edge, more people might take the time to learn grammar, punctuation and spelling.

'My spelling isn't the best'

Whose is?

'but at least I understand the rules'

I think generations of grown-up children have been cheated of this understanding because more than one generation of teachers has told them it isn't important. The lack of this understanding and the availabilty of the extremely fallible spellchecker means it doesn't occur to them to buy a dictionary, much less use it.

I gained my degree recently courtesy of the OU. I can tell you that people get absolutely murdered for poor spelling and badly reasoned (usually due to poor grammar and punctuation usage) arguments in assignments for the OU. Even so, I have met alumni of so-called benchmark universities who would have been considered barely literate when I left school.

People tend to poke fun at MENSA, because it's a matter of membership, rather than an independent qualification.
I guess they would do the same to
any literacy society. Perhaps what's needed is something like the old RSA secretarial skills qualifications, only for literacy.

"I think generations of grown-up children have been cheated of this understanding because more than one generation of teachers has told them it isn't important."

That's why I thank God for dear old Mrs Pavi who taught me for one year when I was aged 8 to 9. She passed on two things - the importance of correct English and a love of literature, especially poetry. Even twenty years ago she was a dying breed.

I also had two very good English teachers in my first two years of secondary school but after that it was awful. However, since the seed was planted I took it upon myself to teach myself later on in life. In fact, I would say much of my learning from eighteen to starting my MA aged thirty was remedial, compensating for a very poor state education, not in some inner city deprived area but a leading Catholic comprehensive in an expensive area of Surrey. It is really quite shameful and inexcusable.

jude

Seize the day! To complete the rule you should probably state the exceptions too!

I cringe at statements of the form 'you don't have to know X to be a Y'. You don't have to know spelling to be a fireman.

Surely part of the problem is that politicians can't tell the difference between education and vocational training. Education is discussed in terms of the 'needs of industry' by people who think higher maths is a matter of doing ever longer long-divisions. Ignorant politicians, or 'politicians' as they are commonly known, have a lot to answer for.

Well, actually there's no need.

Veil is (vail), so not 'ee' and if you tried viel it would be (veel) which is actually spelled veal. So that's clear isn't it. :-)

Please name something which is not a proper noun or foreign word, which does contravene the rule as far as it goes. I'd like to hear it.

Karl Wiggins (an old regular on this site) always said the most useful thing he learned at school were the times tables. As a contruction manager he said it made his life much easier, instantly knowing what seven twelves are. Fortunately, times tables are still on the national curriculum, for now anyway.

Similarly, everyone needs basic letter writing and other literacy skills. If the fireman wants to progress to be station chief or whatever they call it, he will need to be literate. I put in a complaint about my local housing office for sending me a letter which was so lacking in literacy standard, it was disgusting. You could argue, it didn't matter because the meaning could be deciphered, but it does matter because I found it insulting (to be sent something that bad in terms of spelling, grammar and punctuation, I am not implying the meaning was insulting).

jude

Ewan: seize? Sounds pretty ee-ey to me. So according to the rule it should be 'sieze'?

Jude: everybody needs a basic set of skills just to understand what's going on around them. Few people have them.

If I might mount my hobby horse briefly, if anybody tells me that they 'can't do maths' (or computers or whatever) I'm quite inclined to announce, equally proudly, that I can't read or write. You'd be surprised (or not) how quickly people find urgent business elsewhere!

Since computers are everyday objects, not being able to 'do computers' is akin to not being able to do television, or spoons, or cheese. If you're too bloody lazy to learn how to use an item of domestic equipment, don't expect any pats on the back from me!

It's sad that in an age of universal education, there still exist groovy dream-catcher shops, astrology columns, coffee enemas, and all the pantheon of hippyshit. It just goes to show that the availablity of education doesn't mean anybody is going to take advantage of it. Most prefer to memorise the actions of other human beings - there's no possibility of not understanding it since humans throughout history have performed the same silly actions for the same silly reasons. Only the costumes and sets have changed.

Here endeth the lesson.

Unfortunately, that is too true. I wept when I saw a cauldron for sale in a pagan shop window in Glastonbury for 2K. TWO GRAND! It beggars belief.

Our only hope is cognitive enhancement, sadly the realm of sci-fi at present.

jude

Oof! Laughed so much I almost had a seizure!

Any more, I wonder?

Seize is from Old French etymologically speaking; perfect, I can blame the French!

Frieze is ok
Siege is ok... God, I'm going to waste a whole day looking for exceptions. LOL

**Codeine** might help your seizure and Google might help your quest!

I got caffeine and protein from Wiki. The article gives an extension to the British rule and the differences between the Britsh and American one.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I_before_E_except_after_C

"I before E
Except after C
when making the sound 'ee'."???

Surely there are plenty of exceptions to that rule? 'Friend' for example, is not 'freend'. 'Pie' is not 'pee'. And so forth. Basically, it's a crap rule.

"However, that will mean goodbye to visual puns, eye-rhymes and all manner of word-play."

I don't think the loss of visual puns and eye-rhymes would be a devastating blow for the English language or even for English poetry. They're a bit rubbish. Poetry is about sound, not about how it looks on a page. All that modernist stuff is balls.

The problem I have with English spelling reform is that in England we have a vast range of accents and therefore, different ways of pronouncing words. If we spelt bath 'barth', this would isolate northerners. I think it's right that we spell things inconsistently, because this allows for regional variations.

What do you mean, NWB? Maybe the 'rule' is punctuated wrongly. You are right, friend is 'frend': but the 'rule' is only about the sound 'ee'. Even so there are the other exceptions, seize, codeine etc. I called it a mnemonic in any case, which is not quite a rule.

It doesn't say - I before E and forever it shall be when making any vowel sound in the English Language except after C - does it?

So eye-rhymes are modernist rubbish, are they?

I think it's right that we spell things inconsistently, but for entirely different reasons.

Great to hear from you again.

Ewan

"I before E except after C when making the sound 'ee'."

- this, to me, says that putting I before E, except after C, always makes the sound 'ee'. It depends how you say it and how you think about it.

The confusion arises when you mention the bit about making the sound 'ee' at the end of the rhyme. Maybe the rhyme should be:

"When making the sound 'ee',
it's I before E
except after C
(and except words like seize, codeine, protein etc)."

Catchy, eh?

Yes, eye-rhymes are modernist rubbish, and modernism is, of course, an affront to the glorious principles of wife-beating National Socialism.

Wipes tear from eye... No, not so catchy, but I'm grateful to it all the same.

Hmm... Modernist = 20th Century? I think I'll go retro and start pronouncing eye-rhymes as full rhymes.

Just to prove,
it's you I love.

Is wife-beating National Socialism different from the common-or-garden sort? Don't think Goering would have gone for it somehow.

I started primary school in 1960. The priority back then was on the 'three R's'; Reading, Writing and Arithmatic - which considering that only one of them started with an 'R' was a bit bloody confusing straight away. With regard to reading and writing the emphasis was initially put on what was considered the fundamentals i.e. spelling, punctuation, tenses (past, present, future). I stress that punctuation was initially confined to 'Full stops' and 'Capital letters' and travelled a fairly shallow learning curve from there.

When going through my children's homework, I noticed a consistent lack of emphasis on these so-called fundamentals, particularly spelling. I approached the various teachers with regard to same. I was informed that, it was felt that dedicating an inordinate amount of time to correction of misspellings and/or tenses curtailed the young pupils expressive licence; it basically held them back! So a sentence that read:
'I will b cumin from dare yesterde'
should not be fussed over because the meaning was fairly clear and the expression was of more import than the grammar, spelling or tense; ridiculous!

I find the 'Americanisation' of the 'English' dictionary rather annoying too.
For my part I feel that having your 'arse kicked' should (even at this base level) mean, having your bum impacted by somebody's foot whereas having your 'ass kicked' should inform that, some reprobate has assaulted your donkey.

It would also appear that any word that we can 'make up' - as long as it becomes popular/fashionable and much used - is eligible to become entered in the English dictionary. I realise that language has evolved and will continue to do so but; New Words in the Concise Oxford English Dictionary:

noogie
n. N. Amer. informal an instance of rubbing a person's head with one's knuckles, as a prank or to express affection.

please!!!!!!

Maybe I am old fashioned, maybe I'm totally wrong but what do you think?

p.s. Amongst all the toys and 'playstation' games last Christmas, I bought my young kids a really good dictionary and there is five euro reward up for grabs every week in our house for the most interesting word and best explanation - runner up gets 2 euro and 3rd gets 1 euro. Anyone with kids, try it! It's actually fun!!

No? I always thought Goering was a rather talented wife-beater. I've heard stories about him slamming an iron into a woman's mouth from a distance of five metres. Perhaps he was practising his ironic pentameter.

Yes, Elizabethans and such types often rhymed 'love' with 'prove' or 'move', but that wasn't because they were doing eye-rhymes, it was just because they were lazy cunts. Just like Oscar Wilde in 'The Ballad of reading goal', where he rhymes 'man' with 'wan' and then 'upon'. Plain lazy buggeriness.

"Amongst all the toys and 'playstation' games last Christmas, I bought my young kids a really good dictionary ..."

Whilst I agree entirely in principle, I am terrified of ending up like 'Victorian Dad' in the Viz cartoon strip. In one episode he gives his children a stick and hoop as a Christmas present and tells them they will be attending church service for "three hours of hypocrisy in sub zero temperatures" but only after he has administered their daily beating.

I remember the resentment I harboured towards my own father who outlawed television and Mcdonalds and all other things that corrupt and gave us piles of second hand books in our stockings.

I think it is a case of balance. Glad to hear that you gave them the toys and playstation games as well Shamrock!

jude

Were Reading so bad - even then - that a goal could merit a ballad?

Yea well, old Oscar also equated a 'gay day' to sitting round naked with a few lads, sharing a hard-on. Which was quite progressive of its time when you consider that most of his peers would have immediately thought of a picnic by the river.

Sorry, I got confused. Should be "The Ballud of Redding Jail".

McDonalds is for liberals.

I'd rather eat that stupid cardboard box it comes in than a Big Mac.

Was one of Oscars mates called Big Mac? Well he was Irish.

I like McDonalds. I had a very nice Texan burger on Saturday.

Some people don't like the food which is fine. Others don't like Global Corporations which is, to an extent, also fine.

The people who annoy me though are the 'food snobs' who only boycott fast food because of its association with a lower cultural capital. These are usually the same people who think going to the Proms' last night or wandering around an art exhibition plugged into one of those audio guides is classy. Ha ha!

jude

I just think it's very poor food. I'd rather make my own burgers, and do.

Valid reason! I didn't think you were a claphamite food snob, there aren't too many of those around here fortunately.

I agree that homemade burgers are nicer but I spend entire days traipsing around jumble sales buying books and if I want hot food on the go, fast food gives best value for money. I don't think the food is poor. It isn't the best, but I still like it. So does my former Michelin restaurant chef boyfriend. I'd rather pay <£3 for a burger than £6 for a rustic sun-dried tomato bloomer sandwich from some shitty organic lifestyle deli.

jude

Well, there is that. It's criminal the premium people feel entitled to charge based on the use of certain words and phrases; 'organic', 'free-range' or 'healthy option'. It's not even as if they are true except in some kind of lip-servicable way that enables even more squeezing out of profit. It's a shame people don't have time to cook, though.

I do and often take a packed lunch but alas the portable microwave for something hot has yet to be invented though I'm sure the Japanese are working on it.

jude

So, um, what was that about i before e? Shouldn't it be me before him?

I quite like a cheesy, macky burger on occasions. I don't think it's totally nutritionally barren - they do use quite good quality beef in their patties. It's not a balanced meal, unless 'ralish' counts as one of your five-a-day, but as food to be eaten on the hoof in a railway station or a shopping centre, it's hard to beat. I can't imagine sitting down to a meal of it, though.

Now supermarket pizza, that's another story altogether. Even an organic, free-range pizza that protests new road developments and drinks only bottled water is still a misery to eat and an impossibility to digest. Long live Italian pizza, but God rot the British variety.

Meanwhile, here's my recipe for today: squid + thinly sliced peperoni (or chorizo if peperoni smacks too much of pizza) + (pre-boiled, maybe left-over) new potatoes + tomatoes, all fried up in a teaspoon of olive oil, and mixed with a serious handful of parsley, is tasty, nourishing and quick. I urge you to try it. Add as much fresh chilli as takes your fancy. Yum! And, in the unlikely event you have any left over, razz it up with a tin of tomatoes and it makes a really good soup!

Got one.... heinous.

It could be argued that 'neither' counts but only if you say it 'neether' rather than 'niyther'.

jude

How about Ayeeeeee! That's got aye befor eee.

Wot evva!

Eee I give up!