Skip to content
  • Categories
  • Recent
  • Tags
  • Popular
  • World
  • Users
  • Groups
Skins
  • Light
  • Brite
  • Cerulean
  • Cosmo
  • Flatly
  • Journal
  • Litera
  • Lumen
  • Lux
  • Materia
  • Minty
  • Morph
  • Pulse
  • Sandstone
  • Simplex
  • Sketchy
  • Spacelab
  • United
  • Yeti
  • Zephyr
  • Dark
  • Cyborg
  • Darkly
  • Quartz
  • Slate
  • Solar
  • Superhero
  • Vapor

  • Default (No Skin)
  • No Skin
Collapse
Brand Logo

agnos.is Forums

  1. Home
  2. Ask Lemmy
  3. 'Read' and its past tense are spelled the same. How should they be spelled?

'Read' and its past tense are spelled the same. How should they be spelled?

Scheduled Pinned Locked Moved Ask Lemmy
asklemmy
165 Posts 106 Posters 0 Views
  • Oldest to Newest
  • Newest to Oldest
  • Most Votes
Reply
  • Reply as topic
Log in to reply
This topic has been deleted. Only users with topic management privileges can see it.
  • I [email protected]

    What about similar oddities in English?
    (This question is inspired by this comic by https://www.exocomics.com/) (I couldn't find the link to the actual comic)
    Edit: it's to its in the title. Damn autocorrect.

    X This user is from outside of this forum
    X This user is from outside of this forum
    [email protected]
    wrote last edited by
    #91

    How about we go with reed and red... see, you already know how to pronounce them!

    1 Reply Last reply
    3
    • B [email protected]

      No it is. People were speaking for tens of thousands of years before they started writing. Modern people see the written word as more valid than spoken, but it's a historical quirk that words pronounced identically should be spelled differently in English. Words that are spelled differently in English were once pronounced differently as well, but languages change and our spelling system is frozen in the 1600s.

      B This user is from outside of this forum
      B This user is from outside of this forum
      [email protected]
      wrote last edited by [email protected]
      #92

      Modern people are the written word as more valid than spoken

      Now there's a sentence I can't make sense of.

      There is no influence of history in when kids learn to write their language or if they used it orally, they learn to write it then how it's supposed to be written.
      If your reasons were valid every Anglo would have problems, they don't.
      Since it's noticably the US specifically I can only assume it's sub standard education.
      As confirmed by their poor vocabulary compared to other Anglo's

      1 Reply Last reply
      1
      • anunusualrelic@lemmy.worldA [email protected]

        It's true that I see it more rarely with the British. I suppose they read more or something.

        B This user is from outside of this forum
        B This user is from outside of this forum
        [email protected]
        wrote last edited by
        #93

        Possibly, education is my main guess

        1 Reply Last reply
        1
        • I [email protected]

          What about similar oddities in English?
          (This question is inspired by this comic by https://www.exocomics.com/) (I couldn't find the link to the actual comic)
          Edit: it's to its in the title. Damn autocorrect.

          I This user is from outside of this forum
          I This user is from outside of this forum
          [email protected]
          wrote last edited by
          #94

          We should be consistent and say "readed". While we're on the subject, why isn't the past tense of go "goed"?

          U Z C 3 Replies Last reply
          2
          • T This user is from outside of this forum
            T This user is from outside of this forum
            [email protected]
            wrote last edited by
            #95

            And the alarm goes off means it actually starts ringing. Weird language indeed!

            C 1 Reply Last reply
            1
            • G [email protected]

              More like if the French royalty hadn't conquered England....

              England hasn't been ruled by the English for centuries bro

              I This user is from outside of this forum
              I This user is from outside of this forum
              [email protected]
              wrote last edited by
              #96

              Yup. Blame the Normans.

              G 1 Reply Last reply
              0
              • O [email protected]

                The conjugations can get as weird as English sometimes, though. Case in point: Ser.

                capuccino@lemmy.worldC This user is from outside of this forum
                capuccino@lemmy.worldC This user is from outside of this forum
                [email protected]
                wrote last edited by [email protected]
                #97

                "Me voy a ir yendo" can translate into "I'm leaving", but it is funny because you are using three times, in spanish, the same verb.

                Edit: I play with it and as a prank sometimes I translate it like if it were a chain of "going to". "I'm going to going to to"

                1 Reply Last reply
                1
                • 2 [email protected]

                  On a different note there is Reading, a football club in UK, which is pronounced "Redding". This pronunciation is akin to the Reading Railroad from Monopoly (which I mispronounced all my life until today).

                  Little details, picked up along the way.

                  mrscottytay@sh.itjust.worksM This user is from outside of this forum
                  mrscottytay@sh.itjust.worksM This user is from outside of this forum
                  [email protected]
                  wrote last edited by
                  #98

                  Reading is a place itself, the football club is the club for that place

                  merc@sh.itjust.worksM 2 2 Replies Last reply
                  2
                  • I [email protected]

                    Yup. Blame the Normans.

                    G This user is from outside of this forum
                    G This user is from outside of this forum
                    [email protected]
                    wrote last edited by [email protected]
                    #99

                    When people shit on the English, it's usually for stuff a small group of French royalty/oligarchs were doing. And they were doing bad shit to the actual English too.

                    Like the joke about "robbed the world for spices, used zero".

                    The royalty 100% used all the fancy spices and sold them to their cousins in mainland Europe. But the common Englishman sure as fuck couldn't afford them.

                    The most shit we should be giving the common English, is for not following the common French's example

                    1 Reply Last reply
                    0
                    • isyasad@lemmy.worldI [email protected]

                      What dialect of English will we base the new spelling system on?

                      C This user is from outside of this forum
                      C This user is from outside of this forum
                      [email protected]
                      wrote last edited by [email protected]
                      #100

                      All of them. If you speak some weird rural UK accent you spell it differently. And certain people from New York, for example, spell curl as coil.

                      I think this would be the same in RP as it is in most American-ish accents, though.

                      1 Reply Last reply
                      0
                      • I [email protected]

                        We should be consistent and say "readed". While we're on the subject, why isn't the past tense of go "goed"?

                        U This user is from outside of this forum
                        U This user is from outside of this forum
                        [email protected]
                        wrote last edited by
                        #101

                        Be the change you want to see. Making people cringe as bonus!

                        I 1 Reply Last reply
                        0
                        • I [email protected]

                          What about similar oddities in English?
                          (This question is inspired by this comic by https://www.exocomics.com/) (I couldn't find the link to the actual comic)
                          Edit: it's to its in the title. Damn autocorrect.

                          D This user is from outside of this forum
                          D This user is from outside of this forum
                          [email protected]
                          wrote last edited by
                          #102

                          English has so much of this sort of nonsense. Like the fish can be spelled ghoti thing.

                          samus12345@sh.itjust.worksS 1 Reply Last reply
                          1
                          • merc@sh.itjust.worksM This user is from outside of this forum
                            merc@sh.itjust.worksM This user is from outside of this forum
                            [email protected]
                            wrote last edited by
                            #103

                            English has many contronyms.

                            • Clip: to attach (clip X to Y) or detach (clip coupons)
                            • Dust: to remove dust or to add it (dust the cake with icing sugar)
                            • Fine: excellent (fine wine) or not great but decent (it's fine)
                            • Left: remaining (I have 5 left) or gone (I had some but they left)
                            • Oversight: supervision (he had oversight over the whole process) or lack of supervision (I forgot to do that, it was an oversight)
                            1 Reply Last reply
                            8
                            • N [email protected]

                              The French word for goose is Oie, pronounced "ua"

                              merc@sh.itjust.worksM This user is from outside of this forum
                              merc@sh.itjust.worksM This user is from outside of this forum
                              [email protected]
                              wrote last edited by
                              #104

                              If you look at an IPA chart, you can see how going from /i/ to /e/ to /a/ is a process of the vowel becoming more and more "open" over time (said with the mouth wider and wider).

                              In Quebec, the vowel shift that caused "oi" to have a /wa/ sound didn't fully happen. So, the word "moi" is often pronounced more like /mwe/ or /mwɛ/. But "oiseau" (bird) is still pronounced with a /wa/.

                              The modern French pronunciation of the Loire river /lwaʁ/ influences the English pronunciation /lwɑːr/. But, other languages use a spelling that matches the French but have a different pronunciation. In Italian and Spanish it's Loira. The Latin name was Liger. So, it used to have a /i/ pronunciation before the vowel shift.

                              tl;dr: modern French pronunciation vs spelling is just about as bad as English.

                              N 1 Reply Last reply
                              2
                              • W [email protected]

                                Well I say that like it's spelled. I don't make the zh sound at the end of that's what you're referencing. I know some do though.

                                merc@sh.itjust.worksM This user is from outside of this forum
                                merc@sh.itjust.worksM This user is from outside of this forum
                                [email protected]
                                wrote last edited by
                                #105

                                You pronounce the middle syllable as "me"?

                                W 1 Reply Last reply
                                0
                                • I [email protected]

                                  We should be consistent and say "readed". While we're on the subject, why isn't the past tense of go "goed"?

                                  Z This user is from outside of this forum
                                  Z This user is from outside of this forum
                                  [email protected]
                                  wrote last edited by
                                  #106

                                  We should be consistent and say “readed”.

                                  But you should still pronounce it redded.

                                  N 1 Reply Last reply
                                  1
                                  • L [email protected]

                                    And German has a word for it: Blei

                                    m137@lemmy.worldM This user is from outside of this forum
                                    m137@lemmy.worldM This user is from outside of this forum
                                    [email protected]
                                    wrote last edited by
                                    #107

                                    Bly in Swedish. But we add some weirdness to the Bly part so a "lead pencil" is blyertspenna ("penna" meaning pencil). I can't think of another word where that specific addiction is used, and I have no idea what it means.

                                    L 1 Reply Last reply
                                    0
                                    • mrscottytay@sh.itjust.worksM [email protected]

                                      Reading is a place itself, the football club is the club for that place

                                      merc@sh.itjust.worksM This user is from outside of this forum
                                      merc@sh.itjust.worksM This user is from outside of this forum
                                      [email protected]
                                      wrote last edited by
                                      #108

                                      Next you're going to tell me there are places in the UK named Manchester and Liverpool and Notts County and St Johnstone and Celtic and Rangers and Port Vale.

                                      1 Reply Last reply
                                      1
                                      • D [email protected]

                                        English has so much of this sort of nonsense. Like the fish can be spelled ghoti thing.

                                        samus12345@sh.itjust.worksS This user is from outside of this forum
                                        samus12345@sh.itjust.worksS This user is from outside of this forum
                                        [email protected]
                                        wrote last edited by
                                        #109

                                        Except that "gh" is never pronounced "f" at the start of a word and "ti" is never "sh" at the end. The "o" is perfectly correct, though. Phosh.

                                        D 1 Reply Last reply
                                        5
                                        • m137@lemmy.worldM [email protected]

                                          Bly in Swedish. But we add some weirdness to the Bly part so a "lead pencil" is blyertspenna ("penna" meaning pencil). I can't think of another word where that specific addiction is used, and I have no idea what it means.

                                          L This user is from outside of this forum
                                          L This user is from outside of this forum
                                          [email protected]
                                          wrote last edited by
                                          #110

                                          I've looked it up and "blyerts" means "black lead, graphite" from German "Bleierz" (lead-ore).

                                          source

                                          1 Reply Last reply
                                          0
                                          Reply
                                          • Reply as topic
                                          Log in to reply
                                          • Oldest to Newest
                                          • Newest to Oldest
                                          • Most Votes


                                          • Login

                                          • Login or register to search.
                                          • First post
                                            Last post
                                          0
                                          • Categories
                                          • Recent
                                          • Tags
                                          • Popular
                                          • World
                                          • Users
                                          • Groups