Disemvoweling
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Disemvoweling (also spelled "disemvowelling") is the removal of vowels from text.[1] Some implementations include the use of homophones, e.g., "mates" becomes "m8s".[2] Disemvoweling has been used as a method of abbreviation, of self-censorship (for example, either "G*d" or "G-d" for those whose religious beliefs preclude writing "God" in full), and as a technique by forum moderators to suppress Internet trolling and other unwanted posting. When used by a forum moderator, the net effect is to mark the original text as deprecated.[3]
Disemvoweling would leave the first sentence of this article looking like this:
Dsmvwlng (ls splld dsmvwllng) s th rmvl f vwls frm txt.
Disemvoweling text in this fashion reduces its readability. The technique has been facilitated by plug-in filters to automate the process. Because the letter "y" is sometimes a vowel and sometimes a consonant, there are a variety of options on how to treat it. To remove it only where it is used as a vowel is not easily automated. Aside from an "all or nothing" approach, one option is remove a "y" only at the end of words, where it is virtually always a vowel.[4]
The word follows the standard patterns of English orthography; i.e. it may be spelt either disemvoweling or disemvowelling, with the former generally preferred in US English and the latter preferred in British English.
[edit] References
- ^ Used in this sense as early as 1995, e.g. in an online humorous story from October 28, 1995:
"What happened?" the Amigoid asked.
"D'nt knw," she said. "Jst wk p nd hrd y tw tlkng n thn, sddnly nd wtht wrnng, thr ws ths ns."
"What?" Robotech_Master asked.
"I think I know what happened," Lawrence said. "It must be part of the Silliness that's infecting the Author's Altiverse."
"S wht hppnd?"
"You've been disemvoweled," the Amigoid informed her. - ^ Peter Conrad, Tiny Things, Tiny Minds, The Guardian, November 13, 2005
- ^ Used as a forum moderation method as early as November 21, 2002 by Teresa Nielsen Hayden on Making Light. This was termed "disemvoweling" by Arthur D. Hlavaty in that thread, later the same day.
- ^ Scholastic Teaching Resources, Scholastic, Accessed August 09, 2006
[edit] Further reading
- Double-tongued Word Wrester by Grant Barrett
- Jargon File by Eric Raymond
- shrpshr.pl A Movable Type plug-in, written by Bryant Durrell, which removes the vowels from all comments coming from a specific IP address or addresses.
- disemvowel.tar.gz Another Movable Type plug-in, written by Thomas Hassan, which lets the moderator disemvowel specific individual comments.
- The process for disemvowelling comments in WordPress.
- Plugins/Disemvoweler by WordPress
- NP_CommentBuddy a plugin written by Matthew Brown that allows flexible and lossless disemvowelling of posts in Nucleus CMS.
- Making Light - Autodisemvowelling A discussion of Disemvoweling techniques, including the shrpshr.pl plugin, and Thomas Hassan's implementation, both linked above.
- A disemvowelling CGI script
- A 1991 Usenet mention of disemvoweling in a slightly different context (Scrabble set)
- A 1990 Usenet mention of disemvoweling with a slightly different meaning (vowels replaced by asterisks)
- Cited in SFX magazine column, November 2006
