AHC/WI: Neo-Roman spelling reform in Romance countries?

Deleted member 97083

During the era of the Enlightenment when Latin was highly favored as the language of letters, or during Romanticism when the Roman Empire was absolutely idolized by states like the French Empire, could at least one Romance country (In Europe or in Latin America) engage in an orthographical reform and attempt to bring back some Latin aspects in the written form of the language; alternatively, could they either teach Latin in non-clerical schools or try to introduce a constructed language like Interlingua?
 
Of course, but Turkey, Greece, and Israel show that grand linguistic reform is possible.

All very much following the 18th/19th-century development of secular nationalism, a movement which is diametrically opposed to liturgical/transnational languages in favour of vernacular. Any time prior to 17th-century printing is way out for conscious, mass-marketed spelling reform (for the obvious reason that a spelling standard didn't exist), and any time after is reactionary in the least plausible way.
 

Deleted member 97083

All very much following the 18th/19th-century development of secular nationalism, a movement which is diametrically opposed to liturgical/transnational languages in favour of vernacular. Any time prior to 17th-century printing is way out for conscious, mass-marketed spelling reform (for the obvious reason that a spelling standard didn't exist),
The Académie française was established in 1635 and Real Academía Española in 1713. This was at the height of Neo-Latin.

Conscious analysis of language had been done since the days of the Ancient Greeks.

and any time after is reactionary in the least plausible way.
Given that Napoleon I built massive, expensive Roman temples in the middle of a massive war, and Benito Mussolini attempted to make Italy into a New Roman Empire with Mare Nostrum, then is this really the least plausible way to be reactionary?
 
The Académie française was established in 1635 and Real Academía Española in 1713. This was at the height of Neo-Latin.

But Neo-Latin was specifically marked as the language of philosophy and science (as well as Papal communiques), fundamentally international pursuits accessible at the time only to a very small section of the transnational nobility or bourgeoisie. It wasn't at any point considered plausibly vernacular, a form which the average man was expected to use personally or in his interaction with the state. In trying to find a "pure, permissible" French, the Académie were/are making a standard form of just that vernacular.

Note that none of those Neo-Latin examples come from Revolutionary or Napoleonic France. Revolutionary governments don't emphasise things like that, but revolutionary governments are also the ones that get massive social changes done.

Given that Napoleon I built massive, expensive Roman temples in the middle of a massive war, and Benito Mussolini attempted to make Italy into a New Roman Empire with Mare Nostrum, then is this really the least plausible way to be reactionary?

Despots and non-despots using massive architecture to evoke the power of their states is as old as government itself. Idealised national images to justify the creation of a particular type of state is at least as old as modern nationalism, and definitely necessary to fascist regimes. Both of those purposes in Europe had the Roman Empire as a convenient reference point, so it's no surprise that they copied its imagery in spectacular ways. But again, this says nothing whatsoever about the vernacular. By the 18th century at the very least, writing was perceived fundamentally as the representation of the actively-spoken word. The "standard language" didn't just represent the state - it was the founding myth of the whole of nationalist society, the very thing that made France or Italy distinct entities. To turn from that towards a hyper-refined internationalism is implausible without some serious social change in the meantime.

A huge building project is inconvenient and expensive, but it derives its power from that very fact. Vernacular language is easy and natural (to those deemed "average citizens" by the ruling class), and that's where it gets its power from. Add to that the practical considerations of adding multiple months (for Italian) to multiple years (for French) just to teach people to read, and you've got yourself implausibility.
 
During the era of the Enlightenment when Latin was highly favored as the language of letters, or during Romanticism when the Roman Empire was absolutely idolized by states like the French Empire, could at least one Romance country (In Europe or in Latin America) engage in an orthographical reform and attempt to bring back some Latin aspects in the written form of the language; alternatively, could they either teach Latin in non-clerical schools or try to introduce a constructed language like Interlingua?
What precisely are you after?
Most Romance languages latinised spellings during and after this period. Romanian probably did this the most and also threw out as many words of Slavic origin as possible and replacing them with French or Italian.
Latin was taught in grammar and equivalent schools into the late twentieth century.

Bringing back Latin (well, Neolatin) exclusively as a first language will probably require a Pan European Empire of sorts with large minorities of several languages. Perhaps a more reasonable and successful Napoleon could use it to reduce nationalism in favour of his pan-European ideal?
Perhaps the Franco-Spanish union is achieved, doesn't butterfly the Enlightenment, and promotes Latin.
 
Spanish did this in OTL. I am far from an expert, but reading in school El Cid or old medieval Spanish Romances at school I was surprised by how certain words were spelled.

For instance, the Spanish verb HABER (to have) was written without H and with V instead of B, that is, in the same way it is spelled in modern French (AVOIR). I think I read that it was in the XVI century that latin spelling was reintroduced, to make it closer to Latin (it is spelled HABERE in latin).

And this happened with many other words. In a few cases there are two words in modern Spanish that come from the same Latin word: one from its natural evolution and the spelling and pronunciation variations that the language experienced through the Middle Ages, and another directly from Latin, reintroduced after the Reinassance. I will try to remember examples.
 
What you get in Latino america is a drive to get differentiate of the Spanish drom Spain, and that you get is a language that strives to a simplification of the orthography so you get a more distinctive and different language from Latin, as the revolutionary Ethos in Latin America was to differentiate from Spain and Spain was in love with Latin so yo get this monstrosity https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bello_orthography
 
What you get in Latino america is a drive to get differentiate of the Spanish drom Spain, and that you get is a language that strives to a simplification of the orthography so you get a more distinctive and different language from Latin, as the revolutionary Ethos in Latin America was to differentiate from Spain and Spain was in love with Latin so yo get this monstrosity https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bello_orthography

What's so monstrous about it? All I see is an attempt to match orthography to phonology (albeit for political reasons, but that's hardly anything onerous). If anything, it seems similar to Noah Webster's spelling reforms in the USA, only for Latin American Spanish. The words aren't THAT different from their previous versions (and thus, the etymology isn't totally obscured).
 
Grand spelling reform are always far more likely in AH than reality.
simplified.gif
 
One would imagine it being easier to just reintroduce Latin than try to force words to more resemble their Latin equivalent but sound mostly the same as before. Orthography almost always lags behind phonology, with English being a particularly noticeable example, let alone Chinese Hanzi.
 
What's so monstrous about it? All I see is an attempt to match orthography to phonology (albeit for political reasons, but that's hardly anything onerous). If anything, it seems similar to Noah Webster's spelling reforms in the USA, only for Latin American Spanish. The words aren't THAT different from their previous versions (and thus, the etymology isn't totally obscured).

I don´t know how was your Spanish, but i could supply you with a thesis wrote in this orthography, for a Spanish speaker like me it´s look awful like someone really cult and intelligent that couldn´t write for shit:

http://www.tesis.uchile.cl/tesis/uchile/1876/prat_a/html/index-frames.html
 
I don´t know how was your Spanish, but i could supply you with a thesis wrote in this orthography, for a Spanish speaker like me it´s look awful like someone really cult and intelligent that couldn´t write for shit:

http://www.tesis.uchile.cl/tesis/uchile/1876/prat_a/html/index-frames.html

Granted, it looks like a 12-year old wrote chunks of it due to numerous typos (using the inverted exclamation "¡" for an "i", and even with this new orthography, since when does "junta" have a space in the middle?!), inconsistent application of accent markings, excessive and improper use of accent marks (e.g. dropping a comma after a preposition, despite the following sentence belonging to the same clause).

However, other than "registra -> rejistra" or "y -> í", I'm not seeing a ton of usage of the Bello orthography. "Que" isn't re-written "qe", "siguiente" doesn't become "sigiente", etc. Really, it's a badly written work in many ways and in need of an editor, but considering its inconsistent use I don't see anything of an indictment against the orthography itself.
 
Granted, it looks like a 12-year old wrote chunks of it due to numerous typos (using the inverted exclamation "¡" for an "i", and even with this new orthography, since when does "junta" have a space in the middle?!), inconsistent application of accent markings, excessive and improper use of accent marks (e.g. dropping a comma after a preposition, despite the following sentence belonging to the same clause).

However, other than "registra -> rejistra" or "y -> í", I'm not seeing a ton of usage of the Bello orthography. "Que" isn't re-written "qe", "siguiente" doesn't become "sigiente", etc. Really, it's a badly written work in many ways and in need of an editor, but considering its inconsistent use I don't see anything of an indictment against the orthography itself.
That was because is in the epoch that more of the silly rules of Bello´s was being abandoned and the Chilean Orthography was more in accordance with the RAE rules but still have some of the Bello´s rules
I couldn´t find an older document

If you like you could read the digitalized document: http://www.memoriachilena.cl/archivos2/pdfs/MC0002908.pdf
 
Simplified Chinese characters

Again, this is the work of a revolutionary government towards simplifying and naturalising a vernacular, essentially the opposite of OP's point.

There's never been a large-scale state spelling reform which adds more orthographic depth (less phonemic correspondence) without at least regularising or reducing ambiguity.
 
Grand spelling reform are always far more likely in AH than reality.

Irish language also

Prior to the middle of the 20th century, Irish was usually written using the Gaelic typefaces. This alphabet, together with Roman type equivalents and letter name pronunciations along with the additional lenited letters, is shown below.

Use of Gaelic type is today almost entirely restricted to decorative and/or consciously traditional contexts. The dot above the lenited letter is usually replaced by a following h in the standard Roman alphabet [for example, ċ in gaelic type becomes ch in Roman type]. The only other use of h in Irish is for vowel-initial words after certain proclitics (e.g. go hÉirinn, "to Ireland") and for words of foreign derivation such as hata "hat".

Although the Gaelic script remained common until the mid-20th century, efforts to introduce Roman characters began much earlier. Theobald Stapleton's 1639 catechism was printed in a Roman type alphabet, and also introduced simplified spellings such as suí for suidhe and uafás for uathbhás, though these did not become standard for another 300 years.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irish_orthography

Old Irish script
Gaelic-text-Duibhlinn.png
 
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