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manoeuvre - maneuver
manoeuvre - maneuver - I bet the last one is the americanised version... what a difficult word ! why still keeping the FRENCH spellings among thousands of english words? are you Francophone lovers ? I bet not, then at least pronounce it like in french ! or change it !!!
Don't you think that English needs a serious spelling manoeuvre ?
>>I bet not, then at least pronounce it like in french ! or change it !!! <<
Actually, "-oeuvre" and "-euvre" would be pronounced the same in French. It's like "moeurs" and "meurs".
Which pronunciation would be the basis for the new spelling? Should we use RP and eliminate final r's? Should we use Gen Am and change entre-vocal t's into d's? Which accent's vowel scheme should we use?
As you can see, a general spelling reform would inherently still not reflect pronunciation for everyone, and would only marginalize the accents not chosen. It isn't worth it.
There are some work-arounds for some of this. For example, you could use RP but include non-prevocalic <r>s. Those who speak a non-rhotic accent will just have to continue to cope with the orthography's making a distinction that is not made in their speech. Similarly you could leave the flap-/t/s as they are. But when you ask "Which accent's vowel scheme should we use?" you hit the nail on the head. The vowel systems of the various dialects are so different that any attempt to include them all would leave you with something more complex than what you've started with. Of course, we might have some hope of reform if we move away from the idea that the reform must be phonemic. Then, however, you might ask what the point would be. No, I agree it's not worth it. "Let it be." I say. That's the best manœuvre.
Oar wun kan djust sei "menúver", dhe "´" opsjeneli maarking praimarri stres. Hauêver, dho, dhis ikspêrriment in ingglisj oartogrefi mei by tu kunservativ foar sum fonelodjikli.
<<Should we use Gen Am and change entre-vocal t's into d's?>>
Just for the record, the trait your referring to in American English is actually the tendency of speakers to replace certain /t/ (voiceless alveolar plosive) and /d/ (voiced alveolar plosive) sounds with that of an alveolar tap. It's not simply the replacement of the /t/ sound with the /d/ sound.
>>Just for the record, the trait your referring to in American English is actually the tendency of speakers to replace certain /t/ (voiceless alveolar plosive) and /d/ (voiced alveolar plosive) sounds with that of an alveolar tap. It's not simply the replacement of the /t/ sound with the /d/ sound.<<
Furthermore, some dialects retain the distinction between the two in such positions via the length of preceding vowels, with vowels preceding /t/ being short and vowels preceding /d/ being long. (Of course, I am biased on this one, considering that my own dialect has this feature; it seems that many other NAE dialects, on the other hand, do not distinguish such pairs via vowel length.)
L'orthographe anglaise n'est pas tout à fait identique à la françaie : il y manque la ligature (l'E dans l'O).
Fr <manœuvre> vs An <manoeuvre>.
The O in or stuck to the E is optional in French and English.
e.g. "...l'Algérie qui pourrait à terme menacer la marge de manoeuvre des Européens." http://www.lemonde.fr/web/article/0,1-0@2-3232,36-789160,0.html
Ce n'est pas parce l'obligation d'utiliser <œ> nest pas toujours respectée (en particulier sur internet) que l'obligation n'existe pas.
En français on écrit <œuf>, <cœur>, <nœud> et <œil> pas *<oeuf> ni *<coeur> ni *<noeud> ni *<oeil>.
L'orthographe anglaise n'est pas tout à fait identique à la françaie : il y manque la ligature (l'E dans l'O).
Fr <manœuvre> vs An <manoeuvre>. ------------------------------------------------------------- yo, greg , but you can clearly see where the english "manoeuvre" comes from. don't you ? is like a 99.9 % clone.
Okay, ha ha, put it that way then. In that case, the "rule" also applies to English but is hardly ever respected. e.g. dæmon, encyclopædia, æon not demon, encyclopedia, eon.
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