Why don't "tough" and "dough" rhyme? - Arika Okrent

譯者: Lilian Chiu 審譯者: Amanda Zhu

It was June 2010.

時間是 2010 年 6 月。

Inside the Scripps National Spelling Bee,

在全美拼字比賽中，

contestants between 8- and 15-years-old wrestled words

八歲到十五歲的參賽者

like brachydactylous and leguleian.

努力地拼出像 brachydactylous 和 leguleian 等字。

Outside, a crowd protested the complexity of English spelling conventions.

場外則有一群人在抗議 英語拼寫規則太過複雜。

Indeed, spelling reformers have been around for centuries,

的確，拼字改革者 數個世紀前就存在了，

advocating for overarching changes to make English spelling more intuitive.

他們倡導讓英語拼字更直觀的 全面性的改變，

The English language is chock-full of irregularities.

英語充滿了不規則性。

One commonly used example of this: take the “g-h” sound from “enough,”

一個常用的例子是：

「enough」（足夠）中的「gh」 發成「f」的聲音，

the “o” sound from “women,” and the “t-i” sound from “action,”

「women（女人）」中的「o」 發成「i」的短音，

以及「action（行動）」 中的「ti」發成「sh」的聲音，

and you could argue that “g-h-o-t-i” spells “fish.”

那麼是不是可以說「g-h-o-t-i」

拼出的是「魚（fish）」？

So, how did English get like this?

所以，英語怎麼會變成這樣的？

English arose from old Germanic tribes that invaded the British Isles

英語源於古日耳曼部落，

這些部落在一千五百多年前 入侵不列顛群島。

more than 1,500 years ago.

Their languages coalesced and evolved into Old English.

他們的語言融合並演化成古英語。

When Roman missionaries arrived around 600 CE,

羅馬傳教士在西元 六百年左右抵達時，

they devised ways to write it down using the Latin alphabet,

他們想辦法用拉丁字母 把英語寫下來，

supplementing it with some Germanic runes for sounds they didn’t have letters for.

拉丁字母無法對應的聲音 就用日耳曼盧恩符文來補充。

Then came the Norman invasion of 1066 when French speakers conquered England.

接著，1066 年諾曼人入侵英格蘭，

他們說的是法語。

French became the language of authority and high society.

法語成為官方和上流社會的語言。

But English remained the dominant spoken language.

但英語仍然是主要的口語。

Over time, those descended from French speakers also became English speakers,

漸漸地，說法語者的後裔 也都改說英語了，

but some French words snuck into the language.

但有一些法語字滲透進英語裡。

Some English speakers were also familiar with Latin through the church

透過教堂和正式教育， 一些說英語的人對拉丁語也不陌生。

and formal education.

By the mid-1400s, people were writing in English again—

到了十五世紀中期， 大家又再次用英語書寫，

but it was unstandardized.

但並沒有標準化。

They used a mix of influences to determine word choice and spelling,

字詞的用法及拼寫方式 受到多種語言的影響，

including the French they knew, the Latin they studied,

像是他們了解的法語、 學習過的拉丁語，

and the English they spoke.

和他們平日說的英語。

So, things were already pretty messy.

所以，狀況已經很混亂了。

Then, in 1476, the printing press arrived in England.

接著，1476 年，

印刷機引入英格蘭。

Some of the people working the presses may have mainly spoken Flemish—

一些操作印刷機的人 說的可能是法蘭德斯語——

not English.

不是英語。

And they were given manuscripts that varied widely in their spelling.

他們拿到的手稿 在拼字上的變化很大。

Without standardization, different writers went with various spellings

在沒有標準化的情況下， 不同作家的拼字方式不同，

based in part on what they happened to encounter while reading.

他們的拼字有時候是 根據接觸過讀物。

Many words had a multitude of spellings.

許多字都有多種拼法。

The word “dough,” for instance,

以「dough（麵團）」為例，

used to be spelled in all these ways and was originally pronounced “dach.”

曾經拼寫成 dogh、daghe、dowhe、 dou、daugh、deaugh、deig，

且它最初的發音為「dach」。

The guttural Germanic sound it ended with was one the Latin alphabet didn’t cover.

字尾的日耳曼語喉音 無法用拉丁字母表達，

It eventually came to be represented with “g-h.”

最終，大家漸漸用「gh」來代表它。

But, for some “g-h” words,

但碰到有些含「gh」的字，

English speakers eventually dropped the guttural sound altogether;

說英語的人最後乾脆 不發這個喉音了；

for others, they ended up pronouncing it as “f” instead,

至於其他字，他們 改用「f」的發音來取代，

as exemplified in “dough” versus “tough.”

就像「dough（麵團）」的 「gh」不發音，

但「tough（困難）」的「gh」 發成「f」的聲音。

Printing presses memorialized the spelling

印刷讓這種拼法留下來，

even though the pronunciation eventually changed.

即使發音已經改掉了。

And this wasn’t just the case with “g-h.”

而「gh」不是唯一的例子。

Some letters in other words also fell silent:

其他字也有一些不發音的字母：

words like knife, gnat, and wrong

比如「knife（刀）」的「k」、

「gant（蚋）」的「g」，

和「wrong（錯）」的「w」

all contain the vestiges of past pronunciations.

都有著過往發音的痕跡。

But while the printing press was solidifying spellings,

但在印刷機讓拼法固定下來的同時，

the English language was also undergoing what scholars call the Great Vowel Shift.

英語也在經歷學者所謂的

「母音大轉變」。

Between the 14th and 18th centuries,

在十四到十八世紀間，

the way English speakers pronounced many vowels changed significantly.

英語中許多母音的發音方式 有顯著的改變。

For instance, “bawt” became “boat.”

例如，船的發音 從「bawt」變成「boat」。

This displaced the word for “boot,”

這個發音取代掉「靴子（boot）」 這個字的發音，

which had up until then been pronounced “boat,”

在那時之前，「靴子」的發音 跟現在的「船（boat）」是一樣的，

and pushed it into the high “u” vowel position it maintains today.

之後它的母音改用高舌位的「u」， 一直持續到今天。

Words that already had this high “u” often became diphthongs,

已經有高舌位「u」的字 通常變為雙母音，

with two vowels in a single syllable.

也就是在單一音節中有兩個母音。

So, “hus” became “house.”

所以，「hus」變成了 「house（房子）」。

As with so many linguistic matters, there's no clear reason why this happened.

和許多語言問題一樣，

這種轉變沒有明確的原因， 但確實就是發生了。

But it did.

And how the vowel shift affected a word depended on various things,

母音轉變對字的影響，

取決於好幾個因素，

including the other sounds in the word.

像是該字中的其他音。

The word “tough” was once “tōh,” among other variations.

「tough（困難）」過去 有多種發音，其一是「tōh」。

“Through” was once “thruch” and “dough” “dah.”

「through（穿過）」 曾經被發成「thruch」、

「dough」和「dah」。

These words all started with different vowel sounds

這些字最初的母音皆不同，

that were then affected differently by the vowel shift.

接著受到不同的母音轉變影響。

The “o-u” spelling they all adopted was a haphazardly applied French influence.

它們都有的「ou」是受法語影響， 但並沒有特別的規則可言。

So, eventually they wound up with still distinct vowel sounds,

因此，最後拼法類似 但母音發音還是不同，

but similar spellings that don’t really make much sense.

一點道理也沒有。

[管理階層對於在此機器中遺失 或變形的母音不負任何責任]

All this means English can be a difficult language

所以對於非英語母語者而言， 英語可能很難學，

for non-native speakers to learn.

And it reveals the many ways history, in all its messiness,

同時也展示了歷史在混亂當中

以許多方式影響了英語，

acted upon English, making it especially tough.

讓英語變得特別困難（tough）。