Why don't "tough" and "dough" rhyme? - Arika Okrent
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TEDEd Animation
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Spelling reformers have been advocating for changes to make English spelling more intuitive and less irregular. One example of its messiness: take the “g-h” sound from “enough,” the “o” sound from “women” and the “t-i” sound from “action,” and you could argue that “g-h-o-t-i” spells “fish.” So, how did English get like this? Arika Okrent explores the complexity of English spelling conventions.
When people tried to adapt the Latin alphabet to English, they had to figure out ways to represent sounds that Latin didn’t have. What are some solutions languages can use to extend a writing system to cover the sounds they need to represent?
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Meet The Creators
- Educator Arika Okrent
- Director Emily Howells, Aaron Brady
- Narrator Jack Cutmore-Scott
- Music Aaron Brady
- Sound Designer Aaron Brady
- Director of Production Gerta Xhelo
- Produced by Sazia Afrin
- Editorial Director Alex Rosenthal
- Editorial Producer Cella Wright
- Script Editor Molly Bryson
- Fact-Checker Charles Wallace
