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or - our
honor - honour
humor - humour
favor - favour
labor - labourhttp://www.unifon.org/american-spelling.html
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American and British Spellings
by Valerie Yule, Ph.D. layout and editing by Steve Bett
dialect.html - british/american pronunciationCould you tell me what the responses were when Australian Style
asked respondents for their preferences for -our or -or for words like
HONOUR, HUMOUR, FAVOUR, LABOUR, SAVIOUR.As you will guess, I am writing because the Melbourne Age has just fallen into line with the Sydney Morning Herald in returning to the old English spellings of -our after years of -or, and so has the Murdoch Press. The Victorian Public Service returned back in the 1950s and 1960s, although World War I Honor Boards throughout the land have not been relabelled, and the Labor Party remains Labor.
- What is the status of -our and -or spellings in the Macquarie Dictionary?
- Does Australian Style make any recommendations?
- What would be the rationale for the recommendations?
The reason given by the Age is that some teachers and parents were complaining about the 'American spellings' confusing children who were taught the English spellings at school. A few years back the Victorian Education Department allowed both American and English spellings, because students nowadays have texts published in both USA and Britain.
Today many American texts are republished in Australia. Is this in order to change the American spellings? Sir James Pitman the publisher told me that the only original reason for having both American and English editions of books was because Englishmen had fits about American spelling.
When so much seems to be going backward, it is perhaps not surprising
that the AGE is going backwards, in returning to cumbrous English spellings
for a select few words like COLOUR, LABOUR, FAVOUR, to end in -OUR rather
than -OR. Some teachers and parents are apparently ignorant that the only
reason the spelling -OUR continues is English prejudice against
anything American, as pointed out by HWF Fowler ( FOWLER'S ENGLISH USAGE, 1937 edition, OUP). It is not for etymology. The Latin origins of the words end in -or, COLOR HONOR, LABOR, VALOR etc. or Middle English in -er.
It is not for consistency. Fowler points out HORROR, PALLOR, TREMOR etc
and confusing changes in derivatives - HUMOROUS, ODOROUS, RIGOROUS etc.
It is not consistently Johnson's Dictionary, 1755, with its AUTHOUR,
SUPERIOUR, TRANSLATOUR, ERROUR, etcIt does not follow any trend in English spelling to increase clutter. The
documented trend is increasing streamlining. It is not to encourage literacy. The inconsistencies of -OUR spellings add more briars to the learner's path, and take time from learning more profitable things.
I am disappointed about the regression for many reasons. The main reason is that it introduces yet another briar for learners, particularly those who have difficulties. As the Federal Government alone has been spending around $50 million dollars in one year alone on Adult Literacy alone, one would have thought that cultural cringe to the Old Country would not have weighed more than the need to make learning literacy easier rather than harder.
The Age had many letters of protest at the change, judging from callers
when they published an version of a letter I wrote on the irrationality
of -our. The heading given to my letter made the usual mistake of
confusing the spelling with the language itself. (New Scientist recently
published a rewritten version of a letter I wrote to them following their report of
the research of Professor Seymour of Dundee showing that English children
were held back in literacy several years by English spelling, compared to
children in countries where the spellings systems were more consistent.
The copy-editor made the common mistake of identifying the English
language with the spoken language, when I was trying to point out that English
spelling represented more than the sounds of speech. One great barrier
to improving English spelling is that so few people know anything about
it, having rote-learnt it.)However, on -our and -or, below is
1. what the great H W Fowler wrote about the topic,
2. followed by what I wrote to the Age.Do you think a note on the subject would be appropriate for Australian
Style? What do you think?With best Yuletide Greetings - which last all the year,
Valerie Y
______________________________________
from HW Fowler in FOWLER'S ENGLISH USAGE 1937 edn OUP
- OUR and -ORThe American abolition of -our in such words as HONOUR and FAVOUR has
probably retarded rather than quickened English progress in the same
direction. Our first notification that the book we are reading is not
English but American is often, nowadays, the sight of an -or. 'Yankee'
we say, & congratulate ourselves on spelling like gentlemen; we wisely
decline to regard it as a matter for argument; the English way cannot but be
better than the American way; that is enough.Most of us therefore do not come to the question with an open mind.
Those who are wiling to put national prejudice aside & examine the facts
quickly realize, first, that the British -our words are much fewer in
proportion to the -or words than they supposed, &, secondly, that there seems to be no discoverable line between the two sets so based on principle to serve
any useful purpose. By the side of FAVOUR there is HORROR, beside ARDOUR,
PALLOR, beside ODOUR, TREMOR & so forth. Of agent-nouns SAVIOUR (with
its echo PAVIOUR) is perhaps the only one that now retains -OUR, GOVERNOR
being the latest to shed its -u-. What is likely to happen is that either, when some general reform of spelling is consented to, reduction of -OUR to -OR will be one of the least disputed items, or, failing general reform, we shall see word after
word in -OUR go the way of GOVERNOUR. It is not worth while either to resist
such a gradual change or to fly in the face of national sentiment by trying
to hurry it; it would need a very open mind indeed in an Englishman to
accept ARMOR & SUCCOR with equanimity.Those who wish to satisfy themselves that the above denial of value to
the -OUR spelling is borne out by facts should go to the article -OR in the
OED [Oxford Engish Dictionary] for fuller information than there is room for here.
Even those nouns that in our usage still end in -OUR as opposed to the
American -OR, have adjectives ending in OROUS not -OUROUS e.g.CLAMOUR -
CLAMOROUS, CLANGOUR- CLANGOROUS, HUMOUR- HUMOROUS, ODOUR- ODOROUS,
RIGOUR- RIGOROUS, VALOUR- VALOROUS, VAPOUR- VAPOROUS, VIGOUR - VIGOROUSDerivatives in -ist, -ite, & -able, are regarded as formed directly
from the English words & retain the -u-, COLOURIST, HUMOURIST, LABOURITE,
COLOURABLE, HONOURABLE.But derivatives in -ATION & -IZE are best treated. like those in -ous,
as formed first in Latin, & therefore spelt without the -u; so COLORATION,
INVIGORATION, VAPORIZE & DEODORIZE.
_____________
My letter to the Melbourne Age sent Dec 4, 2001TERROR AND HORROR AT AGE SPELLINGS
When so much seems to be going backward, it is perhaps not surprising
that the AGE is going backwards, in returning to cumbrous English spellings
for a select few words like COLOUR, LABOUR, FAVOUR, to end in -OUR rather
than -OR. Some teachers and parents are apparently ignorant that the only
reason the spelling -OUR continues is English prejudice against
anything American, as pointed out by HWF Fowler ( FOWLER'S ENGLISH USAGE, 1937 edition, OUP). It is not for etymology. The Latin origins of the words end in -or, COLOR HONOR, LABOR, VALOR etc. or Middle English in -er.
It is not for consistency. Fowler points out HORROR, PALLOR, TREMOR etc
and confusing changes in derivatives - HUMOROUS, ODOROUS, RIGOROUS etc.
It is not consistently Johnson's Dictionary, 1755, with its AUTHOUR,
SUPERIOUR, TRANSLATOUR, ERROUR, etcIt does not follow any trend in English spelling to increase clutter. The
documented trend is increasing streamlining. It is not to encourage literacy. The inconsistencies of -OUR spellings add more briars to the learner's path, and take time from learning more profitable things.
Wait, are there further reasons? So that elite spellers can feel one-up, and feel safer with this further screening test to keep down the hoi polloi who cannot cope with such pedantry.'These, with earth's foundations falling, 'Honor' and 'valor' almost fled
Followed their pedantic calling, focussed on trivia, and . . .
(after ? Housman, perhaps)vy
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