How accurate is your roadmap? Surely the Gregory's from 1983 will get you where you need to go?

[changeling]

So on Non-Fluffy Pagans, there was a discussion on whether or not the spelling "magick" should be used and why.

Ratatosk (squirrel of discord), had this to say:

Words are maps of ideas. If the word conveys the idea, then how important in the spelling?

This made my editorial brain whirring (it's one of those, Why bother doing what you do questions). I'm reposting here, because it's one of those flashes of clarity one rarely gets:

"Correct" spelling is a politeness to your readers, as is "correct" grammar. If words (and sentences) are maps of ideas, using "correct" spelling and grammar is a map using commonly understood symbols for the paths and quagmires within. "Bad" spelling and grammar is the same map, but using uncommon symbols that your reader is unfamiliar with so they have to keep referring to the key. Sometimes there is no key. Sometimes the same symbol means two things, or the symbol for "road" may change several times over the course of the map. Your reader may take a wrong turn once or twice along the way.

Both will (probably) get you to the same place, but one will get your reader there faster and in a better mood.

Comments

[watersusurrus.livejournal.com]

Hail Eris!

[watersusurrus.livejournal.com]

Also I don't spell magic "magick" because it's stupid and twee. I have my own uniqueness to feel speshul, not extra letters in words.

[dorukai.livejournal.com]

Insightful. I wish people would stop butchering the language I rely upon to understand them.

In particular, I wish people would stop assigning emotionally loaded terms to their own ideas. Makes it damned difficult to communicate with them at any sort of depth.

[delirieuse.livejournal.com]

Oh, me too. Sigh.

[dorukai.livejournal.com]

Btw I have both Legends anthologies on my bookshelf, so that one can't be mine :)

[delirieuse.livejournal.com]

I wonder if it's mine??

[dorukai.livejournal.com]

if so, yay!

[delirieuse.livejournal.com]

Perhaps I should get it out again to reread it!

[dorukai.livejournal.com]

Like you don't have enough books on your reading list already? *grin*

[mawaridi.livejournal.com]

I like correct spelling and grammar. I can be quite fussy about it, in fact. But I know that is as much a foible of my educated brain as it is an actual requirement for understanding. In almost all cases, I can understand what someone means if they write "artifishal" instead of "artificial" or type "your" where they mean "you're". It irks me, and tends to jar, but it doesn't jar because I can't understand, or even because I have to think about it to understand - I don't. It jars me because it's not what I'm expecting to see. I still find poor spelling and grammar problematic, but I don't think the roadmap analogy necessarily hold true, because unless you are actually inventing completely new jargon meaning ISN'T usually obscured by poor spelling.

Also, I like the fact that I can lend new meanings, significance or connotations to a word by changing the way I write it!

What is the justification for spelling "magick" with a k, anyway?

[mawaridi.livejournal.com]

Ha, and my point can be demonstrated by my failure to put an "s" on the end of "hold(s)" ;)

[delirieuse.livejournal.com]

unless you are actually inventing completely new jargon meaning ISN'T usually obscured by poor spelling.

While I take your point, that really depends on just how bad the spelling is. What if someone had typed "artifiscal" when they meant "artificial"? Would you have understood what they meant immediately? Sometimes the misspelling could easily be either of two words, and it isn't clear from context which word is meant. This is when I would usually write "AQ" in the margin and circle it, for "author query". :)

The other thing to consider is that those people who have difficulty spelling correctly usually have some problems with grammar, too. The two things go hand in hand.

An (actual) example of poor spelling clouding meaning:

Im not so well with long and safisticated words your going to have to use words i understand sorry???

(Taken from dot_pagan_snark)

Most of the community readers got there in the end, but many people misread "safisticated" as "satisfied" rather than "sophisticated", as it was meant to be.

[delirieuse.livejournal.com]

What is the justification for spelling "magick" with a k, anyway?

Argh, forgot to respond to this bit.

Originally it was changed by Crowley (as the post notes somewhere in the comments) for numerological reasons, but these days people justify using "magick" to differentiate the religious/spiritual practice from stage magic. Or because it looks "cooler", and makes them feel "more special". Depends who you talk to. [/cynicism]

[bekscilla.livejournal.com]

That's a fantastic response, I love it!

[delirieuse.livejournal.com]

Thank you. :)

[jolly-oddness.livejournal.com]

If the word conveys the idea, then how important in the spelling?

*twitch*

I may not be the world's most fantastic speller, but I wish I was. Because you respect a language's meaning and history when you get all the words right. The gap between magic and magick, from what I remember, is huge, so yes - IMPORTANT.

[hespa.livejournal.com]

Oh, that's a very nice analogy. Well done.

[delirieuse.livejournal.com]

Thank you!

(I read that as "anthology" at first, and I thought ... She's got a hold of a copy of Visible Ink?)