site and sight; to, too, and two

Arrghh......

Definition "site": the piece of land on which something is located (or is to be located);
"a good site for the school".
"This web site is finally available again."

Definition "sight": an instance of visual perception;
"the sight of his wife brought him back to reality";
"the train was an unexpected sight"
"The return of this web site was a welcome sight."




Definition "to": approaching, or a relation with;
"He's going to the store."
"The book belongs to him."

Definition "too": also, additionally, excessive, very;
"She's going to the store too."
"The item is too expensive for me."

Definition "two": the number after one and before three;
"The two of them are both dead."
"It was too difficult for the two of them to deduce why the object was too expensive."

If you didn't know this before, now you do.

[CelticMuscle]

It's the same with several of my American online friends.

Pants (UK): undergarment worn below the vest
Pants (US): overgarments

My personal favourite comes from my background in astronomy

"I say Your Ran Us, you say Your Anus"

[Mdlftr]

Its real anoaying too sea peeple whose dun't now cirrect spellung and punct! Itz two much too stand sumetimes, but keep on trucken, LG!

yur onz the rite tract!

Mdlftr (who donnt knead no frakin spelchek!)

Thanks, I feel so informed now....

An while you're (not your) in grammar nazi mode don't forget "Their" and "There"


There: refering to location

Their: belonging to

[jcwise]

Mr. Lemur:
I believe there are other meanings!

And that is why English is such a poorly engineered language.

When one word (based on context) can be a noun, a pronoun, an adjective or an interjection you start to realize how schizophrenic it is.

BTW, The location/beloging rule is the quick self test when writing to assist in choosing which one is proper but perhaps "state of" would be broader than location?

Being a touch-typer often my hands think quicker than my head.

An excellent non-grammar-Nazi discussion of English grammar. It points out typical errors but in a friendly way. Also identifies things that the grammar-Nazi's would shoot you for but are actually quite acceptable.

Very useful for non-native English speakers as well as native speakers wanting to tighten up their habits a bit.

http://www.wsu.edu/~brians/errors/index.html

[Notbigenuff]

Originally Posted by Mr.Lemur

...BTW, The location/beloging rule is the quick self test...

"Beloging?" My dictionary doesn't seem to have that word in it.


Aww, I'm just kidding - we all make typos and after all, what are friends four? Er, I mean "for."

Now I'll just sit back and wait for someone to point out the difference between the United States' use of quotation marks and punctuation as opposed to the United Kingdom's usage (and any other number of grammatical differences or errors in this message).

[Flexus Lee]

My understanding is that the US are a lot stricter on grammar and punctuation than the UK. New York Times style is only double quotation marks, viz. " , ever. I have a policy on quotation marks so that "what I say and 'what I say' within what I say" are differentiated like so. This is kinda standard, but others reverse the double and single quotation marks.

Speaking of quotes - what?s the rationale on the internet use of * instead of " ?

* is used way too (not to or two) much.

I guess this is a throw-back to the early days when you couldn't use quotes on a BB (or ampersand or other numerous "reserved" characters)?

Those days are gone people give * up - there is no good reason to surround a word(s) in * to imply emphasis.

If you enjoy grammar humor you need to see the Liminey Snicket (sp?) movie - A Series of Unfortunate Events. Meryl Streep is wonderful/wacky grammar afficionado.

Originally Posted by Mr.Lemur

...Those days are gone people give * up - there is no good reason to surround a word(s) in * to imply emphasis.

Unfortunately, I receive many letters with some special characters and especially quote marks replaced by weird symbols (squares, thin circles, etc.). I've seen discussions on the web describing an arrogant ideosyncracy of Microsoft in dealing with special characters. The problem makes MS incompatable with some standardized internationalized uses of text for people who do not use MS (yes, there are a few). If I find that discussion again I'll post it.

Originally Posted by LeatherGryphon

Unfortunately, I receive many letters with some special characters and especially quote marks replaced by weird symbols (squares, thin circles, etc.). I've seen discussions on the web describing an arrogant ideosyncracy of Microsoft in dealing with special characters. The problem makes MS incompatable with some standardized internationalized uses of text for people who do not use MS (yes, there are a few). If I find that discussion again I'll post it.

That a charset issue, Outlook uses MS Word charachter code when it sends HTML mime type messages, and yes they are not supported by anything other than MS products. It's also why Front Page is the worst tool ever for developing web sites - it uses the same charset as MS Word for dealing with special characters like quotes, bullets and all the other memembers of the extended character family.

If you use Mozilla, Firefox, Opera or the like, sites built with Front Page turn to crap for you.

That's why I use text only format in my email, even though I use Outlook. I can't use "pretty" stationay when I send messages, but frankly I hate receiving that stuff anyway.

Who enjoys from trying to read text on an Ivy or teddy bear background?

[Phlex]

Lose: To cease possession of. The 's' is pronounced like a 'z'.
Loose: Not tight; as a verb, to release. The 's' is pronounced like an 's'.

Got it?

[glammaman2000]

i prefer proper spelling&usage,too.can anyone tell me if there's a difference between"historic"&"historical"?or are they interchangeable?(or is"historical"not a real word?)

Originally Posted by glammaman2000

i prefer proper spelling&usage,too.can anyone tell me if there's a difference between"historic"&"historical"?or are they interchangeable?(or is"historical"not a real word?)

Regarding the usage of "historic" and "historical":
Google is a wonderful resource. Simply asking:
historic historical usage
retrieved the following link http://www.bartleby.com/64/C003/0158.html

Your preference for proper spelling & usage is admirable. It's a shame your machine has trouble with capital letters and spaces.

[glammaman2000]

thank you!being a total tech-ignoramus,i got the impression that avoiding caps saved somebody's bandwidth,somewhere;&that it was acceptable to not leave a space around"&".the inability to form paragraphs IS the fault of my machine.sorry.

[brent]

Originally Posted by glammaman2000

thank you!being a total tech-ignoramus,i got the impression that avoiding caps saved somebody's bandwidth,somewhere;
...

This is one reason I think people need to cut a little extra slack on the Internet. People are told things like the above comment, and they believe it, and odd things happen. For the record, their is no difference in the amount of bandwidth used for caps, or non-caps.

[brent]

My only real problem on the Internet, is stylised text. Sites like this one use theames, then if yours is different from mine, I can't read you text easily. My grammar ain't no good anyway.

Originally Posted by glammaman2000

thank you!...the inability to form paragraphs IS the fault of my machine.sorry.

You're welcome, but I was serious. I assumed it was a problem with your interface. I'm assuming you're coming in through WEB-TV or a web capable cell phone all the time.

Yes, 30 years ago bandwidth used up by excess spaces might have been measurable but now, it is of no consequence at all. Each image uses the bandwidth of about 10,000 to 100,000 blanks. Use all you like.

Sorry if I stuck my foot in my mouth again. I have an extra joint that makes that too easy.

[glammaman2000]

I AM on a webTV hook-up & it does automatically compress text to make paragraphs impossible.& many thanks for clearing up the techno-old-wives' tales.(Please note the re-introduction of caps.)

[flexicon1]

How about when two words sound the same but mean the opposite?

Raise - to lift or to build: "Are you coming to the barn-raising today?"

Raze - to tear down, demolish: "Are you coming to the barn-razing today?"

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

... and razed the bungalow to the ground.

Originally Posted by flexicon1

Title:
Finally, the teen behemoth raised his mighty arms...

"After the sucessfull summit disarmament negotiations, the leaders of both countries returned home and razed their mighty arms..."

These examples occur when people don't read enough. The meaning is obvious when you see it in print but when spoken, the context must be sufficient to identify the true meaning. Sometimes it's not.

Listening to TV is not sufficient education in the language, reading is still important.

[Yachirobi]

After the sucessfull summit disarmament negotiations, the leaders of both countries returned home and raised their mighty arms then burst their sleeves with the rush of blood to their heavy biceps, each declaring that they had dominated the other with their strength. With such a great display of true human strength they saw no need for the weak mechanical weapons developed by even weaker men.

Now that's an arms summit I'd like to see.

Definition: separate

This is one of those very commonly mispelled and mispronounced words.

Just to keep this thread alive I did not start a separate thread. When things or people are not together, they are separate.

Think of the word as sep'-A-RATe.

There are two e's and two a's and no i's in the word separate.

Remember, there is "a rat" in the middle of the word separate.

The first "a" is ALWAYS pronounced with a soft sound, like "ah".

The accent is on the first syllable.

When used as an adjective, the second "a" is usually pronounced with a soft sound.
example: The trains came into the station on separate tracks. (sep'-a-rat)

When used as a verb, the second "a" is often pronounced with a hard sound.
example: A good cook knows how to separate egg yokes from the egg white. (sep'-a-rate)

[Yachirobi]

Mispelling is one thing but mispronunciation is different. If you're in the midwest then it is "sep'rut."

Originally Posted by Yachirobi

Mispelling is one thing but mispronunciation is different. If you're in the midwest then it is "sep'rut."

You'd think that all those healthy corn fed farmer boys out there would have enough energy to deal with three syllables and not have to shorten it to two.

"Bend over and sep rut your cheeks. I'm gonna plow your back forty."

An interesting point about writing dialog. Accents from various areas or other habits of speech can be represented in quoted dialog. In which case you could write "separate" as "seprut" to give the appropriate geographic or cultural meaning to the word in that circumstance.

One of the more interesting examples of this type of thing can be found in Tolstoy's "War and Peace" . One of the characters is a military officer with a severe lisp probably caused by a hairlip deformity. In the English translation the lisp is represented very well in dialog passages. I really wish I had the language experience to appreciate how that lisp would be represented in the original Russian text or speech.

The rule for using 'a' or 'an' is actually quite easy and most native English speakers use it correctly instinctively when speaking but have some difficulty when writting.

Definition: "a": indefinite article, used to indicate an unspecified or unidentified individual, used before words beginning with a CONSONANT SOUND;

"Do you see a dog?"

"Mr. Jones, there is a man here to see you."

"I bought a new car today."

"A bomb was found in a locker."

"Am I being a pain in the butt?"



Definition "an": indefinite article, used to indicate an unspecified or unidentified individual; used before words beginning with a VOWEL SOUND (a,e,i,o,u, and sometimes y).

"Do you see an elephant?"

"I bought a new elephant today."

"Spelling it out he said, 'I bought an N E W elephant today.'"

"There is an owl hooting in the tree."

"Curry is an Indian dish."

"The story of an apple dropping on Newton's head is a myth."

"I have an injury, is there a doctor in this room?"

"I have an understanding of the subject."

The important point to note is that the use of 'a' or 'an' depends upon the SOUND that follows, not the LETTER that follows. examples:

1) "She was tired of being treated as a sex object." (the sound of the 's' in the word 'sex' is a consonant sound i.e 'ss')

2) "Embarrased, she said she was tired of being treated as an S E X object." (the sound of the 'S' in the spelled out word is a vowel sound i.e. 'es')

3) (Note: The NAPA company makes automobile air filters. NAPA is an acronym for National Automobile Parts Association) Pronouncing the acronym gives the following sentence: "I have a NAPA filter in my car."

4) Spelling out the acronym gives the following sentence: "I have an N A P A filter in my car."

(the 'N' in the second sentence has the vowel sound of 'en' that requires the 'an' form)

5) Note: The letter 'u' can have a soft vowel sound like 'uh' as in 'under' or it can have a hard consonant sound like 'you' in 'used'.

examples: "I have an undersized penis." (vowel sound).

6) "I have a used book." (consonant sound)

This confusion with this usage of 'u' is probably related to the confusion over whether 'y' is a vowel or a consonant. eg: "yoused"

For a native English speaker it is actually quite difficult to say "I have an dog." or "I have an used book." However, it is not quite as difficult to say "I have a elephant." However, 'an' would be correct because it inserts the consonant sound 'n' between the vowel sounds of 'a' and 'elephant' to help keep up the flowing alternation of consonant and vowel sounds in the sentence.

[xXx]

For the love of all that is good and right in the world, will someone *please* do the your/you're/yaw/yore entry?

Originally Posted by xXx

For the love of all that is good and right in the world, will someone *please* do the your/you're/yaw/yore entry?

OK, here it is.


Definition your:
(possessive pronom. adj.) of, belonging to, or done by you. (e.g. your dog, your house, your cat) It also can be used in formal titles. (e.g. ""Your Excellency." the diplomat said as he bowed before Emperor Talpa.")
[color=#008000]stratatenku.tripod.com/dictionary/words.htm[/color]

Definition you're:
contraction of the words "you are" (e.g. "I am glad you're coming with us.")

Definition yore:
noun LITERARY; of yore, of a long time ago: (e.g. "This was once a Roman road in days of yore.")

Also, a dialect pronunciation of the contraction "you're". Should not be used unless you are writing quoted dialect. (i.e. "Paw, said to git yore gun 'n go down t' the creek, there's a big buck just a wait'n to be shot.")


Definition yaw:
A side-to-side direction of movement around a central pivot point. (e.g. "The strong cross wind caused the airplane to yaw to the left as it came down the runway.")

A gross mispronunciation of the word "your". Consider it dialect but I don't know from where.

I don't know why this word was included in this request but I can make a guess. The word "yaw" sounds like the southern US dialect word "y'all': (see below)

Definition y'all:
Contraction used to indicate the 2nd person plural pronoun. English has no formal 2nd person plural pronoun. Consequently, many different words have evolved in various English dialects to serve as one. Being dialect, the word "y'all" should only be used when writing quoted dialect. This contraction is generally used in southern US dialects. (i.e. "Y'all come back now, y'hear!")










http://www.business-words.com/dictionary/Y.html

[xXx]

Note that there are British and Australian readers of this forum. Those four variations are all indistinguishable in our accent.

Originally Posted by xXx

Note that there are British and Australian readers of this forum. Those four variations are all indistinguishable in our accent.

Bloody hell! How do make yourselves understood?

When the wind came up, the ship began to your to the left. The captain said: "get yawselves ready for the next wave boys." That's how it was done in the sailing days of you're.

[sibuna]

[color=black]. [color=white]. . and then you have principal and princ[/color][color=white]iple. [/color][/color]

[glammaman2000]

(frequently misused in news articles!)