whilst or while?

English usage: ize or ize – a short history

Just how did Britain end up with a system of using both -ise and -ize spellings? How did -ize become the default spelling in American English? Why do some people argue that the only -ize spellings in British English are correct yet -ise is used by the BBC, every national newspaper in Britain like the Times and the Guardian, as well as being the spelling of choice of the board of education?

The bad news for the reader wanting to know whether to use -ise or -ize is that there is no one, "correct" answer that applies everywhere. Instead there are three (see below: UK ise; UK ize; and US ize).

The -ize versus -ise problem is only an issue for writers of British English. American and Canadian writers have the luxury of safely using -ize without hesitation. The US is loyal to –ize spellings because Noah Webster favoured them when he wrote his spelling books and dictionaries. In the UK two camps exist: a minority of writers who favour the –ize spelling, including many academic and scientific writers, on the grounds that it is “correct” and endorsed by the OED; and the remaining majority who use -ise spellings, which are supported among others by the British boards of education, the BBC, British advertisers and the entire national press, including the Times, the Guardian, the Economist and the FT.

So who is right?

Advice on this subject is rarely clear, helpful or consistent. Dictionaries such as the OED usually present -ize as the first alternative – because the house style of the Oxford University Press (OUP) is to use –ize – and -ise spellings are presented as alternative spellings. For many, the inclination is to go with the first recommendation. However, what dictionaries don't reflect is that the -ise spellings are in the majority in the UK.

A brief history of -ize and -ise spellings

The truth is that there are not two but three systems of -ise/-ize spellings. These are determined by whether the writer is writing in British or American English. British attempts to use ize is specifically motivated by the desire to follow Greek and Latin etymology while the American and Canadian ize is based on standardization as a result of spelling reform in the 1800s. The British use of ise is partly a preference to retain original French spellings (French is the source of most English loan words) and partly an attempt at standardisation. Before looking at each of these three spelling approaches individually, here is a brief explanation as to how the situation arose.

English is a Germanic language blended together in the six centuries by the Germanic tribes who filled vacuum left by the departing Romans, and later blended with the Norse languages of the Viking invaders. What little Latin was spoken at the time was done so in matters relating to Christianity and the Bible. Following the Norman invasion in 1066, while the Englanders continued to speak English, French (a Latinate language) was used in the corridors of power and through the centuries thousands of new words entered the English language directly from French and others from Latin.

Among these were a number of –ise/-ize words. These included baptize, first used in English in the 1200s. By Chaucer’s time, the late 1300s, the number of -ise/-ize words had grown and were used interchangeably, as evidenced by Chaucer’s own writing. Countless more -ise/-ize words were created from the 1500s onwards, this time it was new words formed from existing English words but exploiting the handy -ise/-ize suffix – no longer were these French or Latin originals, which by now were in the minority.

When Samuel Johnson wrote his famous English dictionary in 1755, he favoured -ise spellings and these became standard across England and its colonies, though -ize remained. Following American independence in 1776, an American Noah Webster wrote the successful The American Spelling Book in 1786 (a book that has outsold the Bible), in which he took the opportunity to introduce some spelling reforms. He heavily favoured the -ize spelling and later enshrined them in his American Dictionary of the English Language, published in 1828. Webster was primarily concerned with consistency of spelling through reform rather than the etymology of words. Dissatisfied with the Americans having a superior English dictionary, a group of men decided in 1857 that a definitive English dictionary, from England, was needed. A formal proposal was declared in 1858 and over the decades several volumes covering various letters were published in the run-up to the full dictionary of 1928.

This dictionary favoured -ize spellings following attempts to once and for all sort out the original “classic” words from Latin (-izare) or Greek (-izein). The original desire was to keep -ize in classical words and allowed the remaining French (-iser) words to stay ise. This was a futile task because the number of classical words that have come into English directly from French made it impossible to tell French from “true classical” words. The second, major problem with the etymological approach for ize was that today the overwhelming majority of -ise/-ize words in use did not come from French, Latin or Greek anyway. Third, across the country (and indeed the Commonwealth) a majority of writers use the original –ise spellings cemented by Johnson.

The result, in the UK, is a half-baked confusion over which is “correct” and which is standard. It is wrong to label “–ize as correct” and therefore “-ise as incorrect” – surely the likes of the boards of education, the national institution the BBC and the British media would not use only –ise if this were the case? It is equally wrong to label automatically –ize as “Americanisation” when used in British English, although it is argued that much of the appeal of –ise comes from being “not American”.

Three systems

Now for the advice part. First, choose your “camp”. Second, always remember to follow the standards of your chosen spelling category. Third, be consistent – don’t mix and match. For instance, if you decide to use -ize spellings and write say, generalize, make sure that your other words follow suit. Remember your list of exceptions and don't later write: economise, recognisable, organisation, compromized, polariser or analyzing. These would all be wrong. Equally, if you decide to use -ise spellings and begin by writing say, generalise, and later write economize and organization. For US English, use -ize and -yze as standard but be aware of a few exceptions.