I used to hear from my history teacher in high school that the word “illegal” isn’t actually a word. I never followed up on that notion, but I suppose from popular usage, “illegal” has become legitimized. Do you have any etymological info on that?

The word illegal with the sense of “not legal or lawful” has been in English since 1626. Similar words existed in Middle English and French as early as the fourteenth century.

The expression illegal immigrant dates from 1939 during the British mandate in Palestine. The term was applied to Jews who entered Palestine without authorization.

The word illegal derives ultimately from Latin: legalis “legal” with the negative prefix in-. The n of the prefix assimilates to l in words that begin with l:

illegal: not legal or lawful

illegible: not legible; incapable of being read

illegitimate: not recognized by law as lawful offspring; not rightly deduced; departing from the expected

illiberal: not liberal; not generous; not broad-minded

illicit: not permitted; not allowed

illimitable: not capable of being limited or bounded

illiterate: unable to read or write

illogical: not logical; contrary to logic

I suppose being a Brit., I should to use -ise instead of -ize? For example, realise/realize. I prefer to use -ize in most cases. Any rules say I can’t?

I am pleased to report that British usage and American usage agree on the spelling of the verb realize.

Look up “realise” in the OED and you will be taken to the entry for realize.

The spelling “realise” is, however, a recognized alternate spelling of realize.

H. W. Fowler makes it clear that most English verbs that end in -ize or -ise and are pronounced [iz] go back to a Greek ending that contains a z. He points out that although British printers of his time follow the French practice of converting the z to an s in such verbs, the OED and other respected authorities prefer to keep the z.

Both Yanks and Brits are allowed to use the -ize ending in most instances, for example:
baptize
authorize
canonize
recognize
agonize
characterize
stigmatize
methodize
patronize
womanize
popularize
philosophize
civilize

Nevertheless, English being what it is, there remains a small group of verbs that call for the -ise ending on both sides of the Atlantic. These are verbs that, according to Fowler,

do not get their -se even remotely from the Greek -izo, & must be spelt with -s-”

Here are the most common -ise verbs:
advertise
apprise
chastise
circumcise
comprise
compromise
demise
despise
devise
disfranchise
disguise
enfranchise
enterprise
excise
exercise
improvise
incise
premise
supervise
surmise
surprise

Many of the most frequently-misspelled words in English are misspelled by leaving out a letter.

Others are misspelled because we think a letter should be doubled, so we put in an extra one.

I thought it might be useful to organize these frequently-misspelled words into three categories.

Words we try to spell with too few letters
balloon
dumbbell
embarrass
millennium
misspell
occurrence
possession
broccoli
occasionally
questionnaire
coolly
dissipate
difference
generally
incidentally
magically
success

Words that have double letters, but not as many as we think
deterrence
harass
personnel
recommend
referred
disappear
disappoint
finally
fulfill
necessary
occasion
occurred
parallel
sheriff
tomorrow

Words that don’t have double letters, but we want to add them
preferable
procedure
coliseum
labeled

NOTE:
i. There’s also the spelling colosseum with a double s.
ii. British usage doubles the l in labelled.

Caveat to writers of British English: Most word-processing software comes with spell-checkers programmed for American spelling usage.

Another NOTE: Merriam-Webster gives programmed as the first spelling and programed as an alternate. Go figure.

It will end up simply as book, but before that happens it will be ebook—just as email ended up as email. eBook looks entirely too corporate to me, and I doubt if the general writing public will ever adopt camel case for anyThing, ever.

Camel case, also appropriately spelled CamelCase, is the practice of writing a word with a capital inside it. For example:

iPhone
CinemaScope
VistaVision
AstroTurf

The name comes from the fact that the uppercase letter makes a “hump” in the word.

The Wiki article gives a long list of other terms for this practice. Here are a few: BumpyCaps, CamelBack, CamelCaps, CapWords, mixedCase, and RollerCoasterCaps.

I have to agree that words written that way are a bit too cutesy to survive as real words.

That’s not to say there is no practical use for the mingling of upper- and lowercase letters. For example, in chemistry: NaCl, AgF, BaSe, etc.

As for the e-book poll, 326 DWT readers voted. The form e-book received 50% of the votes. The CamelCase version eBook came in second at 26%.

I was listening to classical music on my local NPR station the other morning when the DJ launched into some public service announcements.

The first time she said [av] for avenue I wasn’t sure I’d heard correctly, but then she mentioned another address that included the word avenue. Again she said [av]. And then, leaving no doubt whatever, she pronounced a third address as “Central [av].”

Say it isn’t so!

I need the help of you readers on this one. Googling won’t help me figure out if this is a trend or merely a local aberration. Please let me know if you have heard anyone pronounce the abbreviated form of Avenue as anything other than [ăv'ə-nū'] or [ăv'ə-nyū']

For the record, avenue, abbreviated Ave. or Av., came into the language as a military term meaning “a way of approach.” Now it refers to a wide street lined with trees or, in some cases, a street having a planted median.

In British usage an avenue is the roadway leading from the gate to the front of a country house, like the lovely tree-shaded approach to Manderly in the movie Rebecca.

I suppose I shouldn’t be too astonished. The word versus, abbreviated vs. or v. is now universally pronounced [vee].