And a far more logical spelling system than what we have now.
Wič wœd bé (ænd wuz) muč beter ðæn wut wé hav now.
If we consistently used k for /k/ then there would be no need to accent c for /tʃ/.If we're keeping phonemic 's' to signify plural and ''s' to signify ownership (because drawing a distinction in written language is helpful), then for disambiguation's sake it would help to have an alternative glyph for phonetic /s/ at the end of a word -- c. That was my thought. But in all honesty, there are a million ways to do this that make more sense than what we have now.
Conversely, we still need an orthographic distinction between w and wh since there are still dialects for which there is a distinction between them.
True; this somewhat slipped my mind, as where I live the difference is quite literally zero. In which case, in the above sentence I posted, the words would be rendered
hwič and
hwut, most logically.
Indeed, the multiplicity of dialects is the biggest obstacle to a meaningful reform of English orthography. Save for letter combinations such as 'ph' and 'ps' which we retain to keep the etymological link to words imported from Greek, practically all other simplification would eliminate a spelling distinction still useful in some dialect.
This is true, but I still think a universal reform which takes all dialects into account, and might write sounds which are still expressed in one dialect but not in another; or might preserve old spelling for contentious words (for instance, since 'schedule' is pronounced 'skejúl' in America and 'šejúl' in Britain, the word could be an 'exception' and continue to be written 'schejúl' to preserve language unity; or, alternatively, more differences between American and British spelling could be introduced; or, some dialects geographically removed from it may not adopt the reform) is very possible and would greatly benefit the English language. But who am I kidding; the English language has never developed a central authority, so there's no way at all anything like what I would like could come to pass.
