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SPELLING DEMONS

What makes them demons?

Words in the Pitman College List of 120 Worst Spelling Demons are set out here in the Table of Demons. They show nine categories of features that make them problems for spellers

1. Surplus letters that do not help to show meaning or pronunciation, and can even mislead
2. Doubled letters which cannot be predicted
3. Unpredictable spellings of vowels
4. Unpredictable spellings of consonants
5. Misleading spellings of morphemes (units of meaning)
6. Problems in spelling unstressed vowels
7. Regular spellings when you dont expect them.

As the Demon-Spelling Table shows, 67.5% of the words in this list are booby-trapped with unnecessary letters. This is a really effective wickedry, because learners and even adult spellers have little clue to knowing what the dobbed-in letters are or where to put them. It’s like walking in a garden with bare feet when you know there are spring-traps set, but now what they are or where.

acomodate asassin acknolege aquire agravate apropriat balerina becaus bilding, consius. coleags comemorate comission comittee compatibl comparativ conoissur coroborate curteus disapoint desperat disastrus disatisfied donky especialy exeption eficient embarras equipd eroneus esential fasinate feasibl Febry or Februry forin fulfild frends gage gile gardian hight iliterat iluminate imigrant indispensabl irrelevant ireparabl iresistibl imediatly liason manuver medicin Mediteranean miniture minuts morgage movabl negotiabl necessry ocasion ocasional paraleld parlament penicilin scolastic seze sience sissors separat unconsius unparaleld usualy valuabl vew Wensday

Adding a list of further demons, to bring the number up to 190, 75% could be shortened to make them less devilish.

            Further, 47.5% have no clues about how to spell obscure unstressed vowels. The spelling demon muttering, so you cant hear clearly what he is saying - it might be -ance or it might be -ence, or, for all you know, -ince, -once or -unce.

            It is hazardous to guess whether 44.2% have doubled consonants, but they have. Fowler of Fowler’s English Usage saw doubled letters as one of the greatest causes of schoolboys’ tears in spelling. The girls of course did not cry.

            There are cunning ways for 35.8% of the words to mislead you about how the vowels are misspelled.  You might expect that about English vowels, but you would not expect 31.7% to have misleading spellings of consonants.

            Then there is the linguistic savagery of 14.1% inconsistency in representing units of meaning (morphemes), which English spelling is supposed to be good at - speak/speech, fire/fiery

            Then, wait for this - 5.8% have regularities which from bitter experience are not expected.  (Little Jessica wrote ‘I like to serf,’ realised that looked too sensible, so crossed it out and wrote ‘I like to surghe’.)

The average spelling demon is a demon x 2.4, not just ornery difficult, because it will bristle with 2.4 spelling menaces, This ensures that if the poor spellers are not snagged by one difficulty, they will still be caught by others.

 

It is surprising that we still have a pandemonium of ‘spelling demons’, when English-speakers think they have thrown off superstitious fears. 
As in the infernal regions of all the demons described by the poet John Milton in Paradise Lost, there are hierarchies and categories of devilry.  This lisst of ‘Worst Spelling Demons’ is only one example of what goes on in what we would prefer to think is a heaven-blessed spelling system.