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Vocabulary

You are increasing your store of words passively all the time that you use a language. Active learning will speed the process and make the words you learn more useful.

It is not just the number of words you know that constitutes your vocabulary, but also the uses you know for the words. One way we increase our stock of words is by learning new uses for old words. Never think "I know that word", always think "Can I get to know that word better?"

Choosing the right word is as important as knowing many words to choose from.

Many mistakes in vocabulary are due to words being confused. On this page I will list some of these together.

The index on the right will take you to spelling tips as well as notes on the uses of words.


affect and effect are sometimes a problem:

to affect something means to have an influence on it
to effect something means to bring it about

When a doctor says "This will affect her recovery", the doctor may means that it will delay recovery. As in "The death of her favourite puppy will affect her recovery badly".

When a doctor says "This will effect her recovery", the doctor means it will make her recover. As in "The death of her husband, who has been slowly poisoning her, will effect her recovery quickly".


argue and dispute

An argument and a dispute may appear to be the same thing. However, an argument can be for or against, whereas a dispute is always against.

The following two sentences are in agreement with one another:

  • Aristotle argued that men and women have different kinds of reasons.

  • Aristotle disputed that men and women have the same reason.


    Before and after are old English words. Sometimes they are replaced by Latin words:

    Prior - previous and pre- all mean before. So pre-natal means before birth.

    Post means after. So post-natal is after birth.

    See also a priori and a posteriori.

    Clear English tends do use before and after.



    A
    bibliography is a list of books. Biblio means book (as in Bible).
    A biography is a person's life story. Bio meaning life (as in Biology, the science of life).



    If something is comprehensible, it can be understood. If something is comprehensive, it includes everything.


    concatenate means link together. It is the kind of word I would want to know the meaning of, but never use. Click here for a passage in Freud's Interpretation of Dreams where one translator uses concatenation and another does not. Concatenation is a union, as in a chain. To say that the concatenation of images in your head matches the concatenation of objects before you means your mental images are linked in the same order as the objects you are looking at.


    concur - run together with - agree

    I concur with your argument

    concede - yielding - agreeing despite previously disagreeing

    I concede your argument


    The old man was decently dressed as he descended the stairs, and his descendants swelled with pride as he decanted the wine and descanted for many minutes on their individual virtues. Without dissent, they agreed it was good that their descent was from such a decent fellow.


    To differ is to be different or to disagree. Differential relates to differences. (In Mathematics, differential calculus is a clever way of measuring movement by calculating tiny differences in position from one moment to the next.)

    To defer something is to put off doing it until later. To defer to someone is to accept their opinion or do what they want. (One word - two completely different meanings).

    A society built on deference would be one in which the lower orders defer to the higher orders, not through fear, but due to the respect they have for them.

    However, you could say "I defer to your opinion because you are pointing a gun at me". This would be defensive rather than deferential



    To deny something is to argue that it is not true. To disprove something is to prove it wrong (show it to be wrong by proof). To refute something means to do the same even more conclusively.

    People who use refute as a strong form of deny should be (gently) rebuked.

    To rebuke someone is to tell them off. To rebuff someone is to refuse their offer of help, friendship, advice etc.

    Refute has meant to prove a statement or argument false or incorrect since the late 16th century. You would only have "refuted allegations" if you had decisively proved them incorrect. The recent practice of saying that someone refuted an assertion meaning he or she denied it vigorously or repudiated it, has the unintended consequence of suggesting the person using the word in this sense is taking sides.


    elaborate

    An elaborate pattern is a complex and detailed one

    To elaborate on something is to bring out its detail or to explain something in detail


    Feel starts as a word for touching, especially with the fingers. From there it develops a rich, sensuous and emotional (my feelings) range. In the 1970s the term touchy feely was coined to describe a sensitive and caring approach. -- I think this is great. -- The phrase I feel that is increasingly used as a way of saying "I think that" without being assertive and running the risk of upsetting the other person (who may think differently). -- Such a concern for other people's feelings is also great --. BUT: In student essays, the reader looks for thinking. So do not be so concerned about his or her feelings!

    Sometimes "I feel" can hide a valuable argument - At other time it may just be used because the writer does not want to use another word twice: "I believe that Freud feels..." instead of "I believe that Freud believes...". The writer might better express her thoughts with "I interpret this as meaning Freud believes..." or "I would argue that Freud believes...", or some other alternative to feel - depending on the context.


    Innovating is introducing something new. The opposite virtue is conservation, preserving something old. Weber argues that traditional authority is a conserving force, resisting social change, and that the political innitiative necessary to change society comes from charismatic authority. The table groups some words linked to innovation and some linked to conservation:

    innovation
    initiative
    change
    invention
    creation
    modernisation
    moving
    conservation
    preservation
    tradition
    stability
    conservative
    fixed



    Intellectual means of the mind, so an intellectual is someone who is concerned with things of the mind. Intelligent means clever, and (sometimes) sensible; but intelligible means clear and understandable.

    If intellectuals were sufficiently intelligent to be intelligible, we would all be able to understand more.


    Excruciating is very painful. Exhaustive is very thorough - So thorough that it exhausts the subject.

    Exhaust usually means tire out, but in the above sentence it means leaving no part (of the subject) unexamined. The reason for such different meanings is that the origin of the word "exhaust" is from the Latin "ex" (out) "haurire" (draw) - used when you draw water out of a well, for example. The exhaust pipe of a car draws fumes out of the engine; when we are exhausted, we have the energy drained out of us; when we exhaust a subject we draw out of it everything that can be drawn.


    fact

    "The facts" can mean the data on which an argument is based. However, the word "fact" has the basic meaning of something that is true or real. If, therefore, you say

    "This principle is based on the fact that individuals are self interested"

    you are asserting that individuals are self interested. If you wish to remain neutral about this, or disagree, you could put it in one of these ways:

    "This principle is based on the argument that individuals are self interested"

    "This principle is based on the axiom that individuals are self interested"

    "This principle is based on the premise that individuals are self interested"


    Do you know what Durkheim meant by "consider social facts as things"?


    I knew that I had a new nib in my old pen, but I did not know that knew is spelt with a k and new is not. There is no way to know this from the sound of the words. Words that sound alike, but are spelled differently and have different meanings are called homonyms.



    If a person inspires another to do something they motivate them. The inspiration is not usually deliberate and not necessarily what the first person would desire. For example:
      By denying women the full use of reason, Rousseau inspired Wollstonecraft to create a feminist classic.
    If a person incites another to do something they do so deliberately.
      The disciplinary committee was told that the deranged tutor had incited his students to misuse words like inspire and instigate in their essays.
    If a person instigates something, they are responsible for starting it.
      The University instigated proceedings against the deranged tutor who had incited his students to misuse words like inspire and instigate in their essays.


    In a state of nature people may be in their "birthday suits" (which means they are naked), but they are not necessarily naturists.

    Naturist, nowadays, is another word for nudist. To be a nudist you have to believe in going naked. So twentieth century Europeans who choose to take all their clothes off on a beach might be called naturists. It would not be a suitable word for people who just happened to be in a state of nature: like Adam and Eve in the creation story, or our hypothetical ancestors before they formed society.


    You pass me by
    You passed me by
    The time has passed
    In past times
    Those times have passed away
    Those times are past

    Confused? I am - But the clue (according to Fowler's English) is that "past" is an adjective (it adds something to a noun). So "past times" is the same as "times that are past".


    "My brother is just passing though a phase" is a sentence, not a phrase.

    Phase (no r) comes from phases of the moon: the different shapes that the appearance of the moon takes on in the month.

    Phrase comes from a Greek word for speech. It is part of a sentence, as the new moon is part of the moon and the phase that your brother is passing through is just part of him.


    A simple thing is free of unnecessary complication. Students are advised to write their essays in a plain and simple style. But one can over simplify. A simplistic view or interpretation is one that makes something seem less complicated than it really is.


    sufficient: enough

    super: above, beyond, on top, over the top. Sometimes good, but not if it is:

    superfluous: flowing over the top. Too much.

    My essay was too long because I used superfluous words. I reduced it to just sufficent, and I got a superior mark.


    A suit of clothes would suit you. It rhymes with fruit and hoot.
    A suite of furniture would not. It rhymes with heat and sweet.
    A lady in a three piece suit would surely have sufficient loot
    To buy, to rest her aching feet, a gorgeous three piece suite.


    wether, a castrated ram, is probably not the word you wanted, but, if it was, well done! If not, try

    Feel superior if you know whether whether is spelt weather, wether or whether. I have to continually check (Not cheque - that is what we write to pay our debts)



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  • Writing Home Page - Spelling

    Word Index

    Blue words go to
    entries on this
    page, red words
    to another page

    advice
    advise
    after
    a-posteriori
    a-priori
    argue
    affect
    always
    axiom
    before
    bibliography
    biography
    borough
    bourgeois
    bourgeoisie
    check
    cheque
    choose
    chose
    comprehensive
    comprehensible
    concatenate
    concede
    concur
    conservation
    decant
    decently
    defensive
    defer
    deference
    deferential
    deny
    descant
    descend
    descent
    differ
    differential
    disprove
    dispute
    dissent
    elaborate
    effect
    excruciating
    exhaust
    exhausting
    exhaustive
    ego
    fact
    file
    filing
    fill
    filling
    homonyms
    id
    incite
    innovation
    inspire
    instigate
    intellectual
    intelligent
    intelligible
    knew
    know
    loose
    loosen
    lose
    lost
    nature
    naturist
    new
    no
    nudist
    pass
    passed
    past
    phase
    phrase
    planed
    planned
    post
    pre-
    premise
    previous
    prior
    rebuff
    rebuke
    refute
    repudiate
    shall
    should
    simple
    simplistic
    sufficient
    suit
    suite
    super
    superfluous
    superior
    superego
    there
    their
    to
    too
    weather
    weaver
    were
    wether
    where
    whether
    will
    would


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