-ice or -ise?

Some of the problems faced by the learner of English arise from differences between British and American usage – and there are of course other varieties of English such as Australian and South African.  I am British, and so therefore my advice and what I practise are based on British usage.

The last sentence above shows what I mean.  In American usage, “practise” is commonly used in cases where British usage would be “practice”, but in British English both forms are used.

So what is the difference?  Basically, the “-ice” ending indicates a noun, whereas “-ise” is used for a verb.  I can advise you (verb) to take my advice (noun), which is to practise (verb) your English practice (noun).   Think of “ice” as being a thing (i.e. a noun), so a word ending in “ice” will also be a noun.

But beware!  This rule only applies in the very few cases where both word forms exist – I cannot actually think of any apart from the two mentioned above, can you?  It is not the case that a word ending in “-ice” is always a noun (“entice” is a verb), and the “-ise” ending is also used in British English for some nouns, such as “exercise”, which can be either a noun or a verb – “keep exercising at those exercises!” 

Feel free to offer a comment, perhaps to suggest a point that I could include in a future post.  This post is the result of just such a comment.

If you would like my help in more general terms, such as to proofread/edit your longer pieces of English text, please visit my website at www.welfordwrites.co.uk

Less or Fewer?

Supermarkets are fond of displaying a sign over their express queue that reads “6 items or less”, although some have now realised that it should be “6 items or fewer”.  So what’s the difference?

When deciding which to use, ask yourself whether the thing or things under discussion are counted or measured.  

If you are asking the assistant at the deli counter to give you a piece of cheese that is smaller than the piece she has just offered you, you should ask for less cheese, because this is something that is measured – by weight in this instance.  It would make no sense to say “please give me fewer cheese”.

However, if she has given you too many olives, you would say “please give me fewer olives”, because olives are things you can count.

Be careful when you are dealing with collective nouns, such as “people”.  You can count people, so it is correct to say “there are fewer people in France than in India” and wrong to say “there are less people”.

The golden rule here is – Measure Less, Count Fewer.  If you can remember the line from Coleridge’s “Kubla Khan” that goes “Through caverns measureless to man”, you won’t go far wrong! 

 Do you need more help with your written English?  Pay a visit to www.welfordwrites.co.uk and find out about the services that are available to you.

Insure, Ensure, Assure

These words cause confusion, partly because there are differences between British and American usage.

In British usage their meanings are quite distinct, namely:

insure – to protect something (your house, car, etc) against loss or damage, usually by taking out an insurance policy.

ensure – to make sure that something will happen, as in “we need to ensure that she keeps her promise”.

assure – to make somebody confident about something or to convince them, as in “I can assure you that the money will be paid” or “She assured us that she had done what she promised”.

In American usage,  insure and ensure are simply variant spellings of each other and the distinction in meaning has been lost.

Remember that we use “ensure” to refer to future possibilties and “assure” when something is already in place or has happened.

There is also confusion over “insurance” and “assurance”, in that we typically have “car insurance” but “life assurance”.  The thing to remember here is that we insure against possibilities but assure against the consequences of certainties – your car MAY be damaged or stolen, but your life will DEFINITELY come to an end one day – sorry!

Please feel free to offer a comment on this or any other posting on this blog – perhaps you want to tell me about a problem that I might be able to help you with.  You can also visit my website at www.welfordwrites.co.uk and find out how I can help you in other ways.

Compliment or complement?

These two words are often confused with each other, but they have quite different meanings.

If I compliment someone, I say something nice about them – “I like your new hairstyle”, for example.   A complimentary remark or statement is therefore one that shows approval.

However, a complement is something that accompanies something else, maybe offered as a gift.  For example, if my restaurant meal comes with a complementary glass of wine I would assume that it is free of charge because it was not on the original bill of fare, but something extra that the restaurant supplies to its customers.

Confusion sometimes arises when a situation can involve both meanings.  For example, in the case given above the glass of wine could arrive with a note that reads “with the compliments of the manager”.   In other words, the “complementary” (i.e. extra) glass is offered because the manager wishes to “compliment” his customers for having the good sense to eat in his restaurant!

Stationery or Stationary?

Two words that are often confused are “stationery” and “stationary”.  Their meanings are very different – the former refers to materials used for writing, such as paper and envelopes, the latter means standing still, or not moving.  The two meanings are clear in the sentence:

The car was stationary at the roadside while its owner was buying stationery in the shop.

How do you remember which one is which?  A simple way is to remember that somebody who does something is a “doer”, not a “doar”.  Somebody who sells notepaper and envelopes is a “stationer” not a “stationar”.  What he sells is therefore “stationery”, not “stationary”.

If you have a question about word usage, or any other aspect of English grammar,  why not contact me by adding a comment or visiting the website at www.welfordwrites.co.uk ?

Unique

The word “unique” has a very clear dictionary definition, namely “the only one of its kind”.  It comes from the Latin “unus”, meaning “one”.  It is therefore not possible to qualify “unique” by saying that something is “very unique”, or that something is more unique than something else.

Unfortunately, American usage has tended to debase this very useful word by pretending that it means “unusual”, so that “a unique selling opportunity” means nothing more than that this is an unusual opprotinity that you would be a fool to miss.  What I want to know is, how do you express uniqueness when you have hijacked the word to mean something else?

(You can join the debate on words, grammar and the use of English by commenting on this post, or you can learn more about what Welford Writes has to offer by visiting our website at http://www.welfordwrites.co.uk)

Very interesting!

A comment on the previous post read:

“This looks very interested”

What this should have been was:

“This looks very interesting”

This sort of mistake is very common – confusing “-ed” with “-ing”, but it also reminds me of another common mistake that brings out what I said before about shades of meaning.

For one thing, the word “interest” has several meanings in English.  “Interesting” can mean “worth having a closer look at”, which is the meaning intended here.  However, interest can also mean the value that an investment gains over time, as in “this account pays five percent interest”. A third meaning is “having a connection with something in such a way that one cannot be objective about it,” as in “I have a personal interest in this matter so I cannot talk about it further”.

This also causes confusion between the words “uninterested” and “disinterested”.  They are both negative terms, and might appear to mean the same thing, but “uninterested” refers to the first meaning given above, as in “this is something that does not bother me”, whereas “disinterested” refers to the third meaning, as in “I have no personal connection with it”.   Don’t worry too much about this – even native English speakers make this mistake!

Feel free to ask any questions you have, either as a comment here, or via my website at http://www.welfordwrites.co.uk