Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1903-03-09
TO AID OUR LANGUAGE
CARNEGIE WILL FINANCE EN-
GLISH REFORM MOVEMENT.
Philologists Win His Help Toward In
Producing a Pronouncing Alphabet
Mr.. Harris Talks.

A Washington special to the New York
Herald says:
Andrew Carnegie has come to the relief
of 1.-The English language as she is spoke"
He has pledged his financial support to q
movement which will bring about reform
and correct abuses In the speaking and
writing Of English.
This is In pursuance Of Mr.. Carnegies
desire to have English the principal lam
guage Of the world. The first step will be
In the direction OF reform and simplicity.
Members Of the various pathological socie-
ties. who have been laboring for phonetic
spelling and the creation of a pronunciation
alphabet, aroused Mr.. Carnegie's interest
In the matter. and he will finance the I'M
dertaking until Its completion, to the extent
of $4,000 a year.
"A meeting Of educators. presided over by
Melvil Dewey of Albany. was held In CO.
lumbia University. New York. February q.
This committee discussed the matter thor
oughly, but so far as can be learned no
definite action was decided upon.
Proaouncing Alphabet Needed.
VT Harris. United States commissioner
Of education. who was invited to attend the
meeting has been made aware of what took
place. and Of the present status OF the
movement. He says:
1.-The need of a, pronouncing alphabet for
the use of the English language has long
been felt. The movement has been fostered
by the many pathological societies, and
when the matter was brought to the atten-
ton Of Mr.. Carnegie he consented to fur
nish the necessary money II the project
were handled by responsible men.
"At present a person is not able to tell
the pronunciation of word that Is not
common because of the fact that many let
tiers have several-and In the case of the
letter "a five or six-pronunciations. For
eign words are introduced in our language.
and their pronunciation has to be guessed
at. There are many words that philologists
desired to have spelled differently or spelled
the way they sound.
Take the word though 1t is argued
that there should be sign for 'th.' and the
word would then be spelled by using the
sign determined upon for the first two let
ters and the letter o. For instance. the
English pronunciation Of the word post Is
'poust.' We pronounce it post The ac-
cent on the vowel is almost lost. That Is
due to the schoolma'ams of our land. who
for the last one hundred years have been
telling John when he came to the word
post and was inclined to drawl over the
% to hurry up and not drag 1t out.
Lots of Corrections Wanted.
There are lots Of things to be corrected.
The great result of this alphabet will be to
change the spelling Of words to the way
they sound (phonetic spelling). Pro-
gramme was and is sometimes correctly
spelled programme but 1t is more general
ly spelled program We save time and
spell correctly the word we pronounce.
There are other slight and great reforms
In English that there Is a desire to estab
lish, but they are all oyershadowed by the
move for the alphabet.
Mr.. Carnegie's move Is simply a plan to
see what can be done along this line"