… and says Ow!
It was an iron bar!
HA!
Sorry, I do love a good bad joke. But seriously, isn’t it interesting that this joke only works because we use the same word for two very different things? And if you think about it, the word bar has a lot of uses.
There are two quite contrasting, yet equally fascinating aspects of the English language. One, is the sheer variety of words and phrases one can use to refer to the same thing, each adding a slight difference in meaning or tone. And the other is the sheer utility of some words, which can be used with a variety of meanings. Some of these words are so common that we don’t even think of how many ways in which we use them.
Take the word way, for example. Continue reading
What’s the difference between the following words in bold:
I’d like to protest about my treatment!
I’m going to a protest about the treatment of refugees tomorrow.
If you’re linguistically minded, or simply very smart, you may have answered that even though they look identical, the first one is a verb, and the second a noun. You can tell from the context of the sentences. But if you were listening to someone recite those sentences, there’d be another clue to help you know the difference. Think about how you’d say both, or say them both out loud, if it’s not too embarrassing, and see if you can figure out the clue.
If you’re still not sure of the difference, here’s a visual aid: Continue reading
We all have a store of words that we come across again and again as we read, but we never actually hear spoken. So we then either:
a) have a moment of surprise when we hear it for the first time…
b) hear it spoken aloud, but never associate that sound with its spelling, thinking of them as two separate words (this was the case for me with the word epitome for a long time), or…
c) we go our whole lives never hearing them.
Here are some of the most common words people have this struggle with: Continue reading
Before finding out what they are, please have a guess at what you think the ten most common words in the English language are (note that by word I mean the main word form, which includes other forms of that word. For example, only dog would appear in the list, not dogs; or have might appear but not has, had or having). So you can’t see the list by mistake, here’s a picture of some puppies. Scroll past them (if you can) for the list. Continue reading
English-Language Thoughts 