Editing English-language spelling reform (section)

==Arguments against reform==
{{More citations needed|section|date=August 2019}}
Spelling reform faces many arguments against the development and implementation of a reformed orthography for English. Public acceptance to spelling reform has been consistently low, at least since the early 19th century, when spelling was codified by the influential English [[dictionary|dictionaries]] of [[Samuel Johnson]] (1755) and [[Noah Webster]] (1806). The irregular spelling of very common words, such as ''are, have, done, of, would'' makes it difficult to fix them without introducing a noticeable change to the appearance of English text.

English is the only one of the top ten [[List of languages by number of speakers|major languages]] with no associated worldwide [[Language Academy|regulatory body]] with the power to promulgate spelling changes.{{Citation needed|date=July 2023|reason=What are these 10 languages, according to which ranking, how are speakers counted? What are the regulatory bodies of the 9 other languages? What is the relevance here?}}

English is a [[West Germanic languages|West Germanic language]] that has borrowed many words from non-Germanic languages, and the spelling of a word often reflects its origin. This sometimes gives a clue as to the meaning of the word. Even if their pronunciation has strayed from the original pronunciation, the spelling is a record of the phoneme. The same is true for words of Germanic origin whose current spelling still resembles their cognates in other Germanic languages. Examples include ''light'', German {{lang|de|Licht}}; ''knight'', German {{lang|de|Knecht}}; ''ocean'', French {{lang|fr|océan}}; ''occasion'', French {{lang|fr|occasion}}. Critics argue that re-spelling such words could hide those links,<ref>{{cite book
  | last = Wijk
  | first = Axel
  | author-link = Axel Wijk
  | title = Regularised English
  | publisher = Almqvist & Wiksell
  | year = 1959
  | location = Stockholm
  | pages = 63–64 }}</ref> although not all spelling reforms necessarily require significantly re-spelling them.

Another criticism is that a reform may favor one dialect or pronunciation over others, creating a [[standard language]]. Some words have more than one acceptable pronunciation, regardless of dialect (e.g. ''economic'', ''either''). Some distinctions in regional accents are still marked in spelling. Examples include the distinguishing of [[English-language vowel changes before historic /r/#Fern–fir–fur merger|''fern'', ''fir'' and ''fur'']] that is maintained in Irish and Scottish English or the distinction between [[Phonological history of English diphthongs#Toe–tow merger|''toe'' and ''tow'']] that is maintained in a few regional dialects in England and Wales. However, dialectal accents exist even in languages whose spelling is called phonemic, such as Spanish. Some letters have [[allophone|allophonic variation]], such as how the letter ''a'' in ''bath'' currently stands for both {{IPA|/æ/}} and {{IPA|/ɑ/}} and speakers pronounce it as per their dialect.

Some words are distinguished only by non-phonetic spelling (as in ''knight'' and ''night'').