To bee or not to bee

Without balls, bats, nets, cleats or a bevy of bucolic beauties parading in body floss, the Scripps-Howard National Spelling Bee has become one of the highest-rated specials on ESPN and, according to some, one of the most suspenseful competitions on television. In fact, this perennial parade of lexical one-upmanship has made its way to the silver screen in the award-winning film "Spellbound" -- a real nail biter in which hundreds of anxious teens face-off for bragging rights, fame and fortune. Well, maybe the fortune part is a little overstated, but who wouldn't mind taking home $12,000 for a perfect score on the spelling test from hell? Just ask Sai R. Gunturi, a 13-year-old from Dallas, Texas. On May 29, he became the 2003 national champion by correctly spelling "pococurante," which means nonchalant. \nIn addition to prize money, Sai will also walk away with an engraved loving cup, one set of the Encyclopedia Britannica, one set of the Great Books of the Western World and a commemorative watch from the Bee, among other prizes. Congratulations are due to all of the this year's participants, but the die-hard pragmatist in me just has to ask, "What's all the hubbub about?"\nBecause we've so liberally appropriated words and expressions from practically every language on the planet, we're left with a system of orthography that's more akin to a moving target than an immutable set of rules on which to rely. In fact, most of our international 'acquisitions' have been forced onto a Procustean bed called English spelling, and now we're stuck with words like comb, dumb, numb and doubt. I mean, what up with that silent 'b' thing? If it wants to remain so silent, why not make it invisible, too? But I guess that would just about squeeze all the fun right out of a spelling bee, huh? \nI don't mean to imply that good spelling skills aren't necessary, and I don't believe a little friendly competition ever hurt anyone. I would like to know what we prove by holding such competitions, though. In an article written for the June 5 Beacon Journal, Roger Ebert questioned the utility of the words used in the Bee.\n"Some of these kids study up to eight hours a day, memorizing words they may never hear, write or use," Ebert said. "You don't win because of your overall score, but because you have been perfect longer than anyone else; the entire bee is a sudden-death overtime."\nApart from tremendous pressure, I believe spelling bees can also be unfair at times. Imagine, if you will, that you're in the finals and the kid before you has to spell "knack" or "luge," words that won the 1932 and 1984 championships, respectively. But when you approach the microphone, your heart hits your toes because you've got to deal with such sesquipedalian goodies as insalubrious, marmoraceous, halogeton or rhathymia. I don't know about you, but I'd be really ticked off at the inequity of it all. \nSo, apart from mastering lexical parlor tricks and taking home prize money, what else do participants get out of the ordeal? Does their spelling prowess necessarily portend great things for any of them? And how must the sole-survivor format make other equally competent spellers feel?\nI can't begrudge these kids their accolades, and I am especially glad to know that there is a fair amount of scholarship money involved, too. But if this were my contest, I'd change the name and format to the How Much Vocabulary Can You Actually Use Bee. In my version, judges would spell the words, then participants would define them, identify the part of speech and use them in a sentence. Now that would be a contest worth studying for, wouldn't you say?