Although the two spellings are often seen used interchangeably, recommended modern usage is to distinguish between them: stanch: verb. to stop the flow of something, usually blood. staunch: adjective. (of persons) strong, standing firm and true to one’s principles. Pronunciation differs among English speakers, but /aw/ is the most commonly heard vowel sound in staunch. … Read more
Yes, I know that just about everyone uses the word “bust” as a noun to mean “arrest” and as a verb to mean “arrested.” Phoenix police discuss soured drug bust that killed Chandler officer …a Merrill Lynch banker… was busted along with seven others yesterday for participating in an illegal game… I know too that … Read more
I wanted to call this post “Cows and College Graduates,” but blog titles must be plain and to the point. Warning: This is something of a shaggy dog story, so if you’re the impatient type, you may want to skip this post. Vaccination The Latin word for cow is vacca. When Edward Jenner was looking … Read more
Isn’t it ironic that I’m having a hard time focusing on this list of tips to help people focus? As I struggle to keep deadlines, I realize that my work environment is filled with distractions – whether it’s other people’s conversations filling my head or the flashing of my instant-messaging window telling me a co-worker … Read more
Both dictionaries and lexicons are collections of words. Both words derive from Latin and Greek words meaning “to speak” or “to say.” dictionary: A book dealing with the individual words of a language (or certain specified classes of them), so as to set forth their orthography, pronunciation, signification, and use, their synonyms, derivation, and history, … Read more
One of my favorite terms used in the study of literature is hapax legomenon [hā’păks’ lĭ-gŏm’ə-nŏn’]: A word or form of which only one instance is recorded in a literature or an author. A famous example from the works of Shakespeare (1564)-1616) is honorificabilitudinitatibus. It occurs in Love’s Labour’s Lost (V, i) in a passage … Read more
I’ve begun to notice the misuse of “just” for gist in the expression “gist of the matter.” Admittedly, many of the occurrences appear in informal comments at the end of blogs and articles, but I’ve also found examples in formal pieces written by writers who should know better. I think I got the just of … Read more
Is “foment” the same as “ferment”? People stirring up discord are often described as “fomenting trouble”. If you search for the phrase on the Internet you’ll find, for instance, Indian agents fomenting trouble in Canada and the Russian Kremlin fomenting trouble in Belarus, to pick just two recent examples. But quite often, the phrase used … Read more
Suzanne Baal notes: [an] error that I’ve been hearing lately is “flesh it out” vs “flush it out”. I couldn’t find any examples on the web of “flesh it out” being confused with “flush it out,” but I did find numerous comments made by people who say they’ve heard the error: My last two bosses … Read more
Cora wants to know the difference between safety and security. Safety and security and their adjectives safe and secure are often used in tandem, as in the hymn: Leaning, leaning, safe and secure from all alarm Leaning, leaning, leaning on the everlasting arms These definitions from the OED treat them as synonyms: safety: a. The … Read more
Previous poetry writing tips have looked at rhyme and alliteration. Another fundamental aspect of poetic language is its rhythm. This post is the first of two that will look at this topic and the related notion of metre (or, if you prefer, meter). In the English language, rhythm is created by a series of stressed … Read more
A reader asks if one feels empathy for a person, or with a person. Plenty of examples can be found of both for and with used to follow empathy and its verb empathize: …there were things in it I could empathize with… Browns coach Eric Mangini has empathy for Mike Brown How can I empathize … Read more