NativLang Response - The Hardest Language To Spell

[@LangThoughts]

4:09 On Page 301, Beyer clarifies that he means གྲོགས་ as a particle, not as the word, stating that based on the Lhasa pronunciation as /ɹô:/, he believes the particle evolved from the word, but shifted to be pronounced as གརོགས, , with fossilized spelling, though I think he should have said "See page 301 and footnote ibid." when he begins talking about the གྲོགས་ pronounced as /ɹô:/ in Lhasa Tibetan.

[@埊]

grogs is not ro, བོད་པ should invent new diactrics for existing letters and not use grogs combination for modified ro sound.

[@vampyricon7026]

I think the problem with this video is that you're coming at the video from the wrong direction. It was prefaced with a spelling bee, so the problem is going from the sounds of the language to the spelling. This video seems to be mostly about going from the spelling to the pronunciation, which is relevant, but I don't think that is the main point.

[@notwithouttext]

but even if you're going from pronunciation to spelling, there are many languages where it's very ambiguous. take french, where plural and feminine forms of many words are pronounced the same, and often the 1st person singular, 2nd person singular, 3rd person singular, and sometimes the 3rd person plural are pronounced the same.

[@jivkoyanchev1998]

I think the excuse "but English has that," "but Hangul has that" aren't really valid since technically speaking, every language has some annoying parts about its script. I do think that tibetan still remains one of the hardest languages to spell and read.

[@conlangknow8787]

Yeah imagine if English did what Tibetan does "like English or hangul" imagine "hdjthæstdjs hhdcwidchegekkd jjksjfloxkskn jskskoféuhlypeaafgd jdjofécndný hsjsjthõhsjsk aghahslæcë hfjdrghüdhg" as "the quick fox jumped over the lazy dog"... Where do you even begin? What the hell am I reading???

[@埊]

the most annoying thing in tibetan is these tshegs ' marks in middle of a word so that it looks like it is a dot . like couldnt they use space?

[@conlangknow8787]

@@埊 nah

[@arthurmoran4951]

doign comparison is the best way to expose that the sript is actually NOT THAT HARD, so that is NOT an "excuse"

[@nexusanphans3813]

I use English as an excuse because most languages don't write as retardedly as it is.

[@spectator352]

My god I thought I mispronounced it, thank god I kept my gut feeling on the retroflex, I’m currently learning Lhasa.

[@xwtek3505]

5:13 I'd question more on the claim that Hangul being the "pinnacle of an easy script". Hangul script is only phonemic if you write Middle Korean. However, just like Tibetan, Korean has also changed a lot from Middle Korean, so the spelling system may not reflect pronunciation, especially in coda position. To make things more convoluted, Hangul marks neither length (for Seoul dialect) nor tone (for Busan dialect). You have to memorize the vowel length.

[@kadenvanciel9335]

I wonder how Josh took this if he looked at it.

[@bhuMarab]

in tibetan language, alot of the same sound refers to a lot of different things....thats why spelling became hard to distinct which word your reading about....

[@kori228]

about the retroflexes, going by the Wikipedia page implies it varies between stop and affricate

[@davegraham7550]

People have been making attempts to respell Ladakhi language, related to Tibetan. They have experienced push back from Tibetans within Ladakh.

[@fungmatkhan1998]

Oh shit, I had no idea. Admittedly I don't know a tonne about Ladakhi apart from the fact that it is a lot more conservative in it's pronunciation than other Tibetan dialects/languages. Not knowing enough about the situation in Ladakh, I wouldn't dare make a judgement call; though yeah, people are often very resistent to change of any kind aren't they. I guess to be fair sometimes it is justified, there are some good reasons for not wanting to change your languages spelling. Though there are also often a lot of bad ones too. Like I said though, I don't know enough bout this situation in particular.

[@mahatmaniggandhi2898]

one question: did the silent sounds use to be spelled in old tibetan?

[@fungmatkhan1998]

If you mean did they used to be pronounced, then yes for the most part they did, tho I have heard of some cases where people have changed the spelling over time so in those cases obviously the answer is no.

[@Sky-ms2us]

The hardness on the spelling of Tibetan is basically the same as the ones on French

[@TheoEvian]

Both are famously silly spelling systems. But English is one of the worst ones to be sure.

[@Sky-ms2us]

@@TheoEvian I think French might be getting the prize here

[@TheoEvian]

@@Sky-ms2us Sure, it is a personal prefference in matters like these. But have you considered pre-reform Japanese kana spelling? (歴史的仮名遣い) :D

[@Sky-ms2us]

@@TheoEvian I can recognize some characters in common with Mandarin Chinese

[@TheoEvian]

@@Sky-ms2us Eh, I just put it in there for clarity, basically before 1947 Japanese kana had a system with a bunch of silent letters where there was no unambiguous way to neither spell nor read some combinations of sounds and just generally sucked, but after the reform the spelling is really intuitive and it works very well for teaching the language too (but you still have the kanji which are total mess ofc). The difference the reform made alone is worth an honorable mention. An example: the word "today", pronounced /kyo:/ used to be spelled "ke-fu" :D

[@mahatmaniggandhi2898]

nice video, and josh made a video on kanji next

[@fungmatkhan1998]

Yeah, I have seen it, though to be honest, I don't have too much to add to it 🤣. It's a good vid, everything he says in it is pretty accurate 🤣

[@MrRhombus]

7:21 When this happens I call them “split diphthongs” because they’re basically diphthongs with the ending consonant written in the middle I also forgot if that’s their official name

[@ghostboi71]

Algorithm brought me.

[@nexusanphans3813]

People don't realize that English spelling is just as clusterfucked.

[@Inescapeium]

Well at least Tibetan has strict spelling rules unlike English

[@notwithouttext]

yeah i don't think it would be too hard to parody nativlang's video to be about english. "you might figure out that the g is silent in "sign" and pronounce it /sɪn/. but that "i" is pronounced /aj/, because of the g after it. /sajn/. /ɪ/ to /aj/ isn't the only change g does (like impugn) and g isn't the only letter that does this (indict). even if you do figure out how to pronounce sign, you'll have to throw that all away in "signature", where the g is pronounced."

[@muzukashiinamae]

Someone needs to make a video about English having the worst spelling system

[@poproporpo]

OOOO OO OOO OOO OOOOOO OOOOO

[@kjl3080]

OOO OOOO OOO OOO OOOOOOOO OOOOOOO OOOOO????

[@theerawatk]

ภาษา เอาจริงดิครับ really Thai 🥲

[@埊]

བོད ཡིཁ རུཨོ ༂ བདོས །། i used spaces instead of tshegs caus they just a bad idea and || is divided caus lettters too smal, +the 'i with diacrit and : is here cuz it the closest thing to look like : in tibetan.