For me common spelling mistakes include confusing some of these word pairs.
- loose vs. lose
- then vs. than
- were vs. where
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english instructors, were so anal with the words “act and acts” in writing a paper. or cellular and celluar.
In english a lot. Not just because i am dislexic, but also french stemming words are a nightmare
“Litterly” is one i have still no idea how to spell. Or wether, not meaning the weather as in sun and run but the one for implying choice
Australian English is based off British English but is not identical. Both are different to US English and have a lot of words that are spelled with a bit more historical contingency. That said, knowing which words have which version of suffix can be difficult.
For example, authorise or authorize. Practice or practise. Gaol or jail. English is a pain but it does make a good common language.
At this point I just accept the various spellings as common. I feel like I stick to one particular style but I honestly couldn’t tell you if certain words are UK English, US English, or specific to somewhere else.
As long as meaning is clear, I don’t think it matters which is used. Alternate vocabulary is probably more significant points of confusion (e.g. what is a biscuit to you?)
Yeah, and also the Oxford comma is in my mind much clearer. I think if you are understood you are using the language correctly. If you are not understood at first but become understood after a bit of back and forth then you are using the language and also pushing the limits a little, making changes along the way. It is an evolutionary process, not design, so it is messy.
Somehow I am constantly mistyping “because” as “becsause.” I know damn well I am hitting the a before the s but I type really fast (average 120wpm) and on a touchscreen it might be laggy 🤷♂️
For some reason unfortunately gave me trouble until I broke it down and remembered to have tuna in there lol
So I just think: unfor tuna tely
unfor🐟tely
I will cry if this becomes the evolution of emoji usage lol
We have kids saying U R . Emoji taking the place of words is just natural devolution.
Think of all of the interesting things you can do with regional dialects!
Viscous vs vicious.
It’s a viscous cycle.
Sounds like a sticky situation.
A vicious liquid!
I used to do this with nauseous versus noxious.
I always ALWAYS have to check separate / separation / separator. I want to put a third e in there so much.
uhm … separate is an adjective and separation is a noun I guess?
I think they were referring more to a tendency of writing seperat(e, ion, or).
Unfortunately the classification of single words is not so cut and dry:
- The separator machine uses separation algorithms to separate separate appropriately.
- separator is an adjective
- separation is an adjective
- 1st separate is a verb
- 2nd separate is a noun
- The separator machine uses separation algorithms to separate separate appropriately.
So few comments… Yet mine is already taken. I get this wrong constantly too.
Illegitimate/legitimate. Always struggled with that one until I got a phone that could tell me how to spell it.
I fuck up “insure/ensure” and “effect/affect” a lot.
Misspellings effect a terrible affect from pedants.
“effect/affect”
There are three meanings to each. Good luck.
Their vs there vs they’re.
I know the difference but my fingers clearly do not.
One thing I’m realizing more and more as I type in a game in PC is that I’m only good at spelling the first half of words. I’ve gotten used to auto correct on phones and spell check in other programs. My errors are typically on the end.
Necessary and apparently are two common words I get wrong fairly often.
I can never figure out where that pesky u goes in restaurant. (Thank goodness for autocorrect, or I couldn’t have spelled it for this post!)
Pronounce and pronunciation seem like they should have the same root, but one of them has an extra ‘o’ for some perfectly logical reason. I know the difference and don’t consistently misspell it, but if I edit a sentence to switch from one to the other without noticing that it’s a danger inflection …
Also maintain vs. maintenance for the same reason.
- Guarantee
- it(')s
For the pairs you mentioned this might help:
- “loose” is a loose word, it’s extra “o” makes it lanky, but “lose” lost an “o”
- “then” is a reply to “when” and is spelt similarly rather “than” the comparison word
- “where” is a question answered by “here;” “was” has no “h” and neither does “were”
It’s and its annoy me because they both make sense for possessive. The only thing that really made me feel better is thinking of it’s like his and hers. His and hers doesn’t have an apostrophe.
thank you for the tips!
ageing vs aging
The former is the way I learned it in school way back in the 70’s… Apparently that is the way the British spell it and it sends US citizens into an aneurysm.
One that bothers me the most when people do it is brake vs break. Your car will break if you do not apply the brake in a timely fashion.
I’m an American and the former looks much more natural.
