[Spellyans] SWF, KK, KS, and Bailey.

Michael Everson everson at evertype.com
Sat May 9 22:42:32 BST 2009


The C24 forum is mostly both a wasteland and a waste of time, but just  
for the record, I made the following posting there:

Keith Bailey said to "PieterCharles" (whoever that is):

=====
> Pieter : What is the point of a 'compromise' where only one side  
> changes its position? That looks rather more like a surrender to me.  
> I don't doubt that some of those involved acted in good faith. But  
> since that good faith has now been abused by the intransigence of  
> the other side, they have nothing to gain by continueing to honour  
> the agreement.
>
> It should be clear by now that the SWF is an expensive failure. That  
> should be impressed on the Council and the Kesva and Kowethas should  
> only support KK which can be justified linguistically, whereas the  
> SWF is a mess which cannot be justified from *any* standpoint,  
> neither ours nor theirs. It's only justification was as a compromise  
> that everyone would accept and use. And since the others will not  
> use it, but continue to press for something more to their liking...
>
> Well I hope you see the point.

It's easy to see your point, Keith.

I've been asked by a colleague to say a word here.

Keith is wrong. This should come as little surprise to readers of this  
forum.

Yes, the SWF has faults. We (who have participated in the open  
discussion on Spellyans) believe that the faults are serious. We have  
examined the SWF, identified its faults, and have both provided a set  
of corrections to those faults, and begin publishing with those  
corrections made.

We are aware, of course, that the CLP may or may not adopt all or some  
or any of the corrections in 2013. That's up to them and whatever  
structures they have in place then.

Of course, this is no secret.

What is interesting is Keith's confession. He has never wanted any  
kind of compromise, and never been interested in the least feature of  
the SWF. (Actually, I believe he likes the use of the hyphen with *- 
ma* and *-na* in KS.)

But we see here just what I predicted we would see. As a diehard KK  
supporter, he likes each and every one of the faults in the SWF. He  
wants the SWF to fail. He won't use it. He doesn't want the Cowethas  
to use it. He doesn't want the Kesva to use it. He doesn't want us to  
help to fix it. He wants it to die, because he is wedded to a non- 
traditional orthography that represents a theoretical phonology that  
nobody uses, *not even the inventor of the theoretical phonology*. He  
lies, quite constantly, on this forum, saying that KK represents  
Cornish as it was actually spoken, when of course there is *no  
evidence of this at all at all at all*. The only evidence we *really  
do have* for how Cornish was spoken was Lhuyd's phonetic respelling.  
And Keith will turn handsprings to show how that cannot be trusted.  
The only thing that can be trusted is the thesis Ken George proposes.  
It's not verifiable. And it's not been put into practice by speakers  
of Revived Cornish.

But that's all Keith wants. Kernowek Kebmyn or nothing. I am sure that  
this has been the aim of the Kesva hardcore all along. I am sure it  
was part of their plan to make sure that the SWF/T (which  
Traditionalists are meant to use) had non-traditional graphs in it,  
precisely so we would have to derogate—so they could claim that the  
SWF was a failure. So they could claim that only Kernowek Kebmyn  
should be used, because it has all the books, and all the grammars,  
and all the dictionaries.

I don't believe that will be true for very long.

Well, that's my word. I believe I might repeat this on Spellyans, so  
it gets recorded in a reputable archive.

I'll get back to working on a forthcoming publication now.
=====
Just for the record.

Michael Everson * http://www.evertype.com/





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