10 Sets of Doublet Nouns
The store of nouns in English, just like that of English verbs, is enhanced by the language’s generosity in permitting adaptation of words from other tongues more than once. In the case of most of the...
View ArticleDifferent Suffixes for Different Contexts
Many words derived from Latin have two (and occasionally three or more) possible plural forms. The distinction is usually between popular usage based on English plural endings grafted onto Latin terms...
View Article8 Eroding Inflectional Endings
English — once, like many other languages, laden with inflectional endings — experienced an erosion of inflection hundreds of years ago, but sometimes it seems as if shaving influences are at work...
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7 Vehicular Violations of Proper English
Advertising in the form of signage printed on vehicles is a road hazard when exasperating errors and extraneous elements in the mobile messaging distract motorists. Here are photographs of seven moving...
View Article7 Types of Misspellings
Most misspellings can be categorized in one of seven groups. Here are some examples for each of those types. 1. Incorrectly Repeated Consonants In some words, consonants are awarded extraneous twins,...
View ArticleThe Basics of Back-Formation
A back-formation is a new word produced by excising an affix, such as producing the verb secrete from the noun secretion. Many back-formations, like that one, acquire respectability, but others,...
View ArticleIs That Even a Word?
No authoritarian authority exists that determines whether a given word is valid or bogus. In any language, there’s a complex and imperfect vetting procedure; at least in English, most serious writers...
View ArticleCan We Cooperate About “Co-”?
I’m not holding my breath about world peace, and I’m not any more sanguine about consensus on the prefix co-, but here’s an appeal about coming to terms about this term. Generally, no hyphen is...
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10 Shelf-Sign Errors
Errors on store signs are less egregious and more common than those on the products sold themselves, but one wonders, based on these photographs (and on the mistakes we see all the time while we’re...
View ArticleThe Logic Behind “-logic” and “-logical”
Why does the English language allow one to select between, say, biologic and biological, neurologic and neurological, and technologic and technological? Why complicate our language lives with the...
View ArticleSuffixes That Denote Relation or Resemblance
When we refer to something suggestive of William Shakespeare’s works, why do we write Shakespearean (or, seldom, Shakespearian) rather than Shakespearesque? Why is an epic tale labeled Homeric rather...
View ArticleWhy One Suffix Is More Common Than Another
What is the rationale, if any, for the predominance of one suffix over one that performs the same function? Last week, I discussed the question of choosing between the suffixes -logic and -logical....
View ArticleHow Verbs Become Adjectives
What determines whether a verb-to-adjective transformation ends with the suffix -able (as in assessable) or with -ible (as in accessible)? Why do some root words accept both options? What happens if...
View Article5 Words That End in the Excrescent “-st”
Somewhere along the way, a very small group of English words, through dialectical divergence, acquired spelling and punctuation variants in the form of an odd appendage: the letters -st. Three of these...
View Article“Size” Matters
How do you treat the word size (or is it sized?) when it’s used in combination with other words as an adjective? Here’s a rundown of the options, with judgments about the best bets. The combination of...
View ArticleCapitonyms Are Separate Cases
Some words, in a class called capitonyms, have distinct meanings or senses when they are capitalized as opposed to generic senses. Writers should take care to render these words as appropriate to the...
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7 Poor Parking Signs
I’m inured to ineptly expressed messages on parking signs, but the signage reproduced here prompts a ticketing spree by the spelling police. What, exactly, is a low-emmiting, fuel-efficent vehicle —...
View ArticleThe Surfeit of Weird Exceptions to the I-Before-E Rule
In the chaos of spelling of the English language, some rules provide comfort — until you realize that the number of exceptions renders a rule nearly useless as a memory aid. Such is the case with the...
View ArticleThe Volatile Nature of It’s
Blasphemy: A law to protect an All-Powerful, supernatural Deity from getting it’s feelings hurt. As you might expect, this quip by Ricky Gervais stirred strong responses when it was posted on Facebook....
View ArticleAnswers to Questions About Suffixes
Here are several questions from DailyWritingTips.com readers about suffixes, followed by my responses. 1. Why is cheese-like written as two words, when doglike and catlike are written as single words?...
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