This is called “orthographic depth,” or how much a language’s spoken words deviate from their spelling. This occurs as accents change, new words are introduced, etc. Languages change over time, splitting off into dialects or new languages entirely (despite what French lawmakers think). This causes the orthographic depth to turn more “opaque” if no efforts are made to reform spelling.
Some languages with pictographic alphabets don’t run into this problem because the letter representing a thing never changes. It’s one of the strengths of having such a large alphabet. Pictographic alphabets also let people who speak different languages understand each other if their languages share an alphabet with similar enough grammar.
This is called “orthographic depth,” or how much a language’s spoken words deviate from their spelling. This occurs as accents change, new words are introduced, etc. Languages change over time, splitting off into dialects or new languages entirely (despite what French lawmakers think). This causes the orthographic depth to turn more “opaque” if no efforts are made to reform spelling.
Some languages with pictographic alphabets don’t run into this problem because the letter representing a thing never changes. It’s one of the strengths of having such a large alphabet. Pictographic alphabets also let people who speak different languages understand each other if their languages share an alphabet with similar enough grammar.