The National Spelling Bee was held in the US last week, and in a change that has shaken up the sport, contest hopefuls had to know definitions as well as spellings.

Why is English so difficult that simply spelling its words is a challenge? And can you be an orthographic prodigy?

Linguist Daniel Midgley spells it out on this episode of Talk the Talk.


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122: Spelling Bee

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I’ve never told this to anyone, but at one point in my young life when I fancied myself a bit of a speller, I had this fantasy of competing in the National Spelling Bee in Washington DC. Maybe my imagination was fueled by that Charlie Brown special.

Anyway, the Bee never happened for me — lack of corporate sponsorship — but I was able to parley my interest in language into a podcast and an empire, so it wasn’t a total loss. And anyway, I think my chances would have been miniscule against these kids.

I don’t do much spelling in this episode, but I do get to torment Ben, which is lots of fun. And here’s a test for you: Can you spot the three mispellings I’ve made in this post?


Show notes

About the Bee
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/may/30/scripps-spelling-bee-vocabulary-tests

Arvind Mahankali won it all this year
http://espn.go.com/espn/story/_/id/9327203/arvind-mahankali-wins-scripps-national-spelling-bee

The winning word was ‘knaidel’
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/05/31/nyregion/queens-boy-13-wins-scripps-spelling-bee-with-knaidel.html?_r=0

Watch the win
http://www.usatoday.com/videos/news/nation/2013/05/31/2374867/

Spelling bee champion goes NUTS after winning (GIF)
http://imgur.com/gallery/vIf0lAD

How would you do in the National Spelling Bee? Take the challenge!
http://www.spellingbee.com/sample-test

Why is it a ‘bee’?
http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=bee

Bone up with this word list, complied from previous years
http://www.project-read.com/give-2/spelling-bee/consolidated-word-lists/

Or take it slow by starting with the top 100 misspelled words
http://grammar.yourdictionary.com/spelling-and-word-lists/misspelled.html

Tricky spellings that trip people up
http://newsfeed.time.com/2013/05/29/six-things-you-probably-didnt-know-about-the-scripps-national-spelling-bee/

This year, definitions were a part of the contest.
http://au.news.yahoo.com/thewest/entertainment/a/-/entertainment/17382608/u-s-spelling-bee-starts-with-a-new-challenge-definitions/

Not everyone is happy about this.
http://www.slate.com/articles/life/the_good_word/2013/04/national_spelling_bee_definitions_it_s_indefensible_to_force_top_spellers.html

AMAZING video about the Great English Vowel Shift
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zyhZ8NQOZeo

or just read the Wikipedia page, which is very good too.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Vowel_Shift