The decision to carry out the reform was made by the leaders of German-speaking countries – Germany, Austria, Switzerland and Liechtenstein – as well as by representatives of states with compact German minorities – Italy, Romania and Hungary. The reform was planned to be completed in August 2005. Now, however, meeting these deadlines has been called into question.
According to German journalists, the new spelling rules, introduced into everyday use with the support of Chancellor Gerhard Schröder, worsened the situation with the German language and led to mass confusion. Polls show that only 38% of Germany's residents know these rules. The rest continue to write the old way. Even when drawing up official documents, German officials make numerous spelling errors.
Most writers, among them Nobel Prize winner in literature Günter Grass, declared a boycott of the new grammar from the very beginning. In Lower Saxony, a collection of voter signatures began to force local authorities to abandon further implementation of the reform. All this gave the former rival of Schröder in the 2002 elections, Bavarian Prime Minister Edmund Stoiber, the right to demand that the federal government immediately reconsider its results.
Many in the country call the new spelling rules “the chancellor's most dubious achievement.” As Karl Bluml, head of the international commission that introduced the new norms of the German language in Austria, put it, “in the end, spelling errors made even in official documents do not in any way change their content.” So in most countries where German is used, people have received the right to decide for themselves which spelling rules – new or old – to apply.
But in Germany, the question of whether to write the word “Schifffahrt” (a boat trip) with two or three “f”s, as five years ago, divided society almost equally. Unlike the Swiss or Austrians, who perceived the linguistic reforms with stoic indifference, under Schröder these issues became an integral part of intra-party struggle. And now, as the French “Libération” writes, “most politicians, having postponed discussion of health care and labor market reforms, have engaged in a new discussion that promises public dividends.”
Supporters of a return to the old writing cite the successful experience of the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung newspaper. In 1999, its journalists, like the whole country, switched to the new orthography. But they could not hold out and a year later returned to the previous customary spelling. Since then, every issue of the newspaper, written in the pre-reform language, reminds society: the linguistic changes carried out by the government are a temporary phenomenon, and after a change of power everything will return to normal. And residents of the state of Schleswig-Holstein held a referendum back in 1998, in which they voted for linguistic isolation from the federal center. They have been trying to adhere to their decision ever since.
The president of the Association of School Teachers, Josef Kraus, is convinced that, contrary to popular opinion, a return to the old orthography will not pose a problem for 12-13-year-old children who studied grammar under the new rules. “Of the 700 words that primary school students must learn during their studies, only 20 have been revised,” says Kraus.
In response to Stoiber's demand to return to the old spelling, the government appeals to figures and, just in case, calculates in advance the possible losses to the state treasury from such proposals. According to minimal estimates, only the reissue of school textbooks in the pre-reform edition will require 250 million euros. And this is without taking into account other costs. “Is the game worth the candle?” ask Schröder's supporters. And they immediately answer themselves: it is not.
Incidentally, disputes about language reform are not only taking place in Germany. The famous British philologist Max Müller called English spelling a national disaster. In the last century, major British scientists repeatedly created societies aimed at simplifying the written language and bringing it into line with spoken speech. However, none of the proposed spelling reforms were ever implemented.
In 2002, several English newspapers conducted an experiment. They translated the materials published in their editions into one of the variants of improved English (which uses shorter sentence structures) proposed by linguists. During the experiment, about 25% of newsprint was saved.
In 1990, a spelling reform took place in France. However, it was cosmetic in nature and affected only the hyphenated and solid writing of certain words and some diacritical marks. After World War II, linguistic reforms took place in Japan and China. In the second half of the last century, grammar rules also underwent serious changes in Holland, Sweden, Portugal, Brazil and Romania.