<The invention of wordprocessers has
further ossified these niggly differences>
It is more important to essentially
communicate than to spell correctly, we have a word game called Countdown, I
find it fearfully silly, that they do not allow the American spellings, unless
they are in the dratted book, niggly, yes and I am SO niggled that I find I
switch it off frequently.
Subject: [norse_course] Re: A dialect
with army and navy...
> but they actually achieved to change
their English > language into a new standard, endowed not only with a
different pronunciation, > but also with a different spelling,
though not very remarkable (think of -ize > instead of -ise,
"harbor" instead of "harbour").
I get the impression that the
spelling -ize was the more normal one in Britain even in the early 20th
century. Not sure when or why - ise took over, but I think it
existed as an acceptable alternative before becoming general.
Maybe it was a case of British spelling authorities wanting to assert
their independence of the global power after WW2? But I don't
really know. The invention of wordprocessers has further ossified
these niggly differences.