Sound/Symbol Representations

Abstract

The concern to invent and thereafter establish an orthographic system more able to ‘paint’ actual pronunciation than the inherited model was one which, as we have seen, was active and ongoing throughout the first half of the eighteenth century. The problems faced by the schoolmaster in trying to teach pronunciation through the ‘stumbling block’ of the standard spelling system is nicely captured by Solomon Lowe (1755: 3): ‘ea in leaf is the common sound of this diphthong; yet, in heart, it sounds like a; in head, like e, &c. Which is much the same as to tell him [the student] (and inculcate it also) one minute, that the paper (this book is printed upon) is white; and, the next minute, that it is red; the minute after that it is green; and then yellow, and blue, &c.’.¹⁰⁸ In the early part of the century, methods employed to achieve a closer match between sound and symbol ranged across the elaborate new symbolism of John Wild of Littleleek, through the ‘alphabet scrambling’ of The Needful Attempt, to the use of fairly conventional diacritics (such as acute and grave accent marks) and straightforward re-spellings. The rationale behind such orthographic innovation seems to have centred around a genuine desire to rectify what was seen as a fossilized system, where sound and symbol showed minimal co-relation, any improvement of which would facilitate reading both for the educated adult and (more especially) for schoolchildren, whose progress in reading skills would be enhanced by a spelling system which more closely resembled the characteristics of spoken language (although the problems regional pronunciation variance was rarely taken into account).

Mansuram rudibus vocem signare figuris

Lucan