Episode 184: Spelling Says a Lot (Part 1)

Over the course of the 1500s, English spelling started to become standardized, but the pronunciation of the language continued to change. By the early 1600s, English scholars noticed that spellings no longer reflected the way words were pronounced, and they recommended phonetic reforms. In this episode, we examine how English spelling reformers described the pronunciation of English in the early 1600s, and we also explore how Modern English spellings reflect the phonetic history of words. TRANSCRIPT: EPISODE 184

You can listen to Episode 184: Spelling Says a Lot (Part 1) online on Radio and Podcast. Open the player on this page to stream the available audio.

Episode 184: Spelling Says a Lot (Part 1) is an episode from The History of English Podcast by Kevin Stroud.

This episode is 1:20:43 long.

This episode was published on Jul 15, 2025.

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