I just read that the most misspelled word in the U.S. (and 47 other countries) is "coolly."
It is very often incorrectly spelled with one "l" (cooly).
The adjective "cool" when used as an adverb requires the "ly" to be added.
I just read that the most misspelled word in the U.S. (and 47 other countries) is "coolly."
It is very often incorrectly spelled with one "l" (cooly).
The adjective "cool" when used as an adverb requires the "ly" to be added.
I wonder how they determined that is the most misspelled word. I would have expected a word that is used more often like tail/tale, brake/break, loose/lose, marry/merry, plane/plain, pray/prey, or site/sight. More usage means more (possible) misspellings.
More usage means more (possible) misspellings.
Keet, that's one way to look at it, the total number of misspellings.
I think they meant the ratio of correct spelling to misspelling. When its nearly every time misspelled when used, it is the most misspelled word.
HM.
I think they meant the ratio of correct spelling to misspelling. When its nearly every time misspelled when used, it is the most misspelled word.
Or, as languages always change/evolve, it's the received (and thus accepted) spelling, even if it's not the traditional spelling.
Which is correct? Coöperate, co-operate, cooperate?
The one that stands out to me is "lead" instead of "led," but "lead" is a real word too, and it seems that the program only counted non-words.
Of course, a large part of the problem with incorrect spelling is that English orthography is stupidly arbitrary, making it far too easy to misspell words, even using auto-carrot.
Of course, a large part of the problem with incorrect spelling is that English orthography is stupidly arbitrary, making it far too easy to misspell words, even using auto-carrot.
Was this an intentional Malaprop?
Yes.
(My friend's auto-correct corrected his typo of "auto corret" to "auto carrot" and I have decided to keep using that. After all, that is what it wanted to be called.)
I wonder how they determined that is the most misspelled word. I would have expected a word that is used more often like tail/tale, brake/break, loose/lose, marry/merry, plane/plain, pray/prey, or site/sight. More usage means more (possible) misspellings.
That is not really misspelling, but transposition. Simply using an incorrect word instead of misspelling it.
Like to-too and their-they're-there.
Do those count as misspellings or misusages? Each of those is spelled properly - the wrong word is being used.
On the other hand, 'cooly' is spelled incorrectly (unless one intends an ethnic slur, in which case some sources indicate it's a proper spelling).
The other commonly miss-used pair is 'then' and 'than'.
One being time based and the other being an alternative.
I went back to read the article. When I created this thread all I saw was the litttle Google thing that I noticed when googling something else. Now that I read the article I doubt I would have brought it up. It seems the stats are gathered from tweets.
The online word-finding tool started with a list of the 350 most misspelled words in the English language, writing down the correct spellings of words and the most common misspellings.
WordTips collected a sample of over two billion tweets from around the world and listed the word from each country with the highest percentage of misspellings, the website noted.
Don't beat yourself up over this. I think this is part of the problem with disputes over grammar. We all use the "expert" sources we find on the internet. Unfortunately, we seem to overlook who the source is and their qualifications.
I have found numerous bloggers who present themselves to their readers as experts. A few of them seem to be knowledgeable about grammar, but when a blogger starts quoting other bloggers as their source of proper grammar, I question their guidance.
In several stories I've read recently there have been significant occasions where 'that' was used instead of 'then'. Not sure autofill would cause that error.
there have been significant occasions where 'that' was used instead of 'then'.
The program that scanned billions of tweets wouldn't catch that. Both those words are spelled correctly, just not used correctly. They were looking for spelling errors.
In several stories I've read recently there have been significant occasions where 'that' was used instead of 'then'. Not sure autofill would cause that error.
I've seen the same with 'that' where 'than' should be. Seems to happen more frequently the last few years.
Judging by what I've read on SOL recently and seen and heard in US films and TV, 'lying' misspelt as 'laying' must push it close.
AJ
'lying' mispelt as 'laying' must push it close.
Again, those aren't spelling errors. They're using the wrong word. However, the consistent misuse of lay/lie might make the wrong way okay in the future. I wonder if "I laid down on the bed" is used more frequently than "I lay down on the bed" even though the first one is wrong (unless you were placing that feathery down stuff on the bed).
In my last carton of eggs, one had a fluffy white feather indelibly stuck to an eggshell. An instance of a hen apparently laying down ;-)
AJ
Before she is married a woman named "Spelled" is Miss Spelled. My sister had a state named after her, Miss Shagrin. It's principle city is Detroit.
A biggie here on this site is using "discrete" (which means separate) where they mean "discreet", of course it does not help that "discreet" is related to "discretion".
So we should be highly suspicious of whether a principle can be sufficiently discrete.
Which, thanks to English's flexibility, isn't an entirely unworkable sentence :)
Principles can be discrete, and principals can be discreet. Can principles be discreet? Probably. Principals can surely be discrete!
Discrete principals can be discreet about their principles. However, principles can be neither discreet about principals nor principled about discrete principals.
principle
principal?
Another one I'm seeing more frequently is silicon/silicone. I don't think women really augment their breasts by having them 'pumped full of silicon'.
AJ
I don't think women really augment their breasts by having them 'pumped full of silicon'.
Kind of they do.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silicone
In organosilicon and polymer chemistry, a silicone or polysiloxane is a polymer composed of repeating units of siloxane (−O−R2Si−O−SiR2−, where R = organic group). They are typically colorless oils or rubber-like substances. Silicones are used in sealants, adhesives, lubricants, medicine, cooking utensils, thermal insulation, and electrical insulation. Some common forms include silicone oil, grease, rubber, resin, and caulk.[1][2]
Silicon is component of silicone.
That probably explains why so many authors use 'silicon' in conjunction with breast implants.
However, SOL has only two stories containing "silicone chips" ;-)
AJ
Coincidentally, yesterday I christened my silicone microwave egg poacher. It's got two cups and, upside down, looks as though someone could wear it under a small medium cup-size bra :-)
ETA the instructions said to put tablespoons of water into each cup before adding an egg. I'm jealous of the protagonists in SOL stories who ejaculate two tablespoons of cum each time because they regularly get reminders of what two tablespoons of liquid look like ;-)
AJ
Given how often breast implants look unrealistic, perhaps they are a silly con, too.
I don't know whether you're familiar with any of the 'Love Island' TV show variants, but allegedly all the females are 'enhanced'. Considering how many have become millionaires on the back of it, they probably consider the investment worthwhile.
AJ
There's a court case (REGINALD R. HESS AND CYNTHIA S. HESS v. COMMISSIONER OF INTERNAL REVENUE) which held that a particular exotic dancer (Cynthia Hess) could deduct her implants as a business expense, arguing that she derived no personal benefit from them. Hers were 'abnormally large' (56FF) and she demonstrably had significant medical issues related to them.
It seems to have been worthwhile financially, even with the medical issues.
Surprised more people don't put "could of" as opposed to the correct "could have" in their top 10. As in "I could have slapped him!"
Maybe that's an Anglo thing?
Repeating another comment, to me that's not a misspelling, it's failed grammar/usage. The words are spelled properly.
'Could of' is a colloquialism in the United States. It's basically how one pronounces "could've" literally - drop the H sound and 've' is 'of'. I don't think many people would claim it's correct, but it's correct for dialogue for people in many places in the US.
As a descriptive grammarian, I could make the case that, since it's commonly used, it's 'correct'. But I'm not quite there yet :)
On SOL, 1000+ stories use 'coolly', 140 use 'cooly', giving a maximum incorrect spelling rate of 12.28%.
505 stories use 'german shepherd', at least 78 stories use 'german" followed by an incorrect spelling of 'shepherd' (I could only think of three variants to check but there may me more) giving a minimum incorrect spelling rate of at least 13.38%.
AJ
Unless something has changed in the past few years I would question that article. According to the most recent data (2019) on Google's nGram viewer, use of "cooly" appears to be dropping.
Coolly vs cooly
As a test I ran "accidentally, accidently" and the incorrect second one appears more than 8 times as often overall compared to "cooly".
on Google's nGram viewer, use of "cooly" appears to be dropping.
Yeah, I did an ngram check too. But the source of ngram is published books. You shouldn't get many spelling errors there. The study was done with tweets.
I ran "accidentally, accidently" and the incorrect second one
Here the additional "al" is necessary, but I just skimmed over the Wikipedia article about Nikola Tesla and my brain inserted "al" into one word I read, changing his birth country into "Australian empire" instead of "Austrian empire".
HM.
As a test I ran "accidentally, accidently" and the incorrect second one appears more than 8 times as often overall compared to "cooly".
Both accidentally and accidently rack up at least 1000 stories on SOL. Both occur in 229 stories.
I wouldn't race to condemn 'accidently': English is pliable enough to allow adverbs derived from nouns as well as adjectives.
AJ
accidently
Interestingly enough, Merrian-Webster states that 'accidently' dates back to the 18th usage, and has become less common over time.
They also state that 'it is sometimes cited as an error,' which sounds like they're not willing to state that it's an error.
Sometimes I use Speech to Text on my phone while texting and some of the stuff that comes out is mind-boggling.
Donaudampfschiffsgesellschaftsunteroffiziersmütze, capitalising to make it marginally less confusing, DonauDampfSchiffsGesellschaftsUnterOffiziersMütze.
Apparently that word was created by the person who translated Donald Duck into German, a rare case where the translated work was considerably better than the original.
the person who translated Donald Duck into German, a rare case where the translated work was considerably better than the original.
This person was Dr. Erika Fuchs. In 1951, she became chief editor of Disney's newly founded German Micky Maus magazine and retired in 1988.
The mentioned Donaudampfschiffsgesellschaftsunteroffiziersmütze is not created by her. It's an example of the virtually unlimited compounding of nouns, cited in this Wikipedia article.
BTW, the "Erste Donaudampfschiffahrtsgesellschaft" was founded in 1829 and in 1880 was the world's largest river shipping company with more than 200 steamboat ships. In 1991 it was split into a passenger and a cargo transporting company The name was usually shortened to its acronym D.D.S.G.
HM.
"SUPERCALAFRAGILEISTICEXPIALADOCIOUS"
Or the famous newspaper sports headline after a unexpected victory of Inverness Caledonian Thistle over Glasgow Celtic ...
SUPER CALEY GO BALLISTIC, CELTIC ARE ATROCIOUS
There are 170+ uses of "thier" on SOL.
It is not an English word. Perhaps their spell-checker was programmed to recognize Middle High German?
There are 170+ uses of "thier" on SOL.
The adjectival form, thierry, is often used to describe Henry. It's also used to describe someone who is more of a mugle ;-)
AJ
The adjectival form, thierry,
Never heard of "thierry" so I googled it. Thierry is a French male first name. I couldn't find it as an adjective.
Phew, I DID remember to put a smiley.
Consider my post an attempt to pre-empt Shaggers, although the 'humour' might have been a little too obtuse for an international audience.
AJ
A couple of years later, an explanation, and those from the eastern side of the Atlantic will have picked up the reference immediately.
Interestingly I live just down the road from the most misspelled suburb in the state if not country. no not telling, that would be far too easy to track down. Even the 'locals' are frequently known to misspell it as the pronunciation and spelling don't match at all. isn't English wonderful?
My vote would be 'definitely'.
I hardly ever see it being spelled correctly. They almost always write definately or defiantly...
I'm guilty of this one if I'm not paying attention to the spell checker and running through a block of text. my brain just rearranges it to the word I expect. one of the most important reasons to get a second set of eyeballs run over your work. text to speech is also good at catching these things.
My vote would be 'definitely'.
Agreed. It can't be that 99% of the population has been taught the wrong spelling.
I suspect that for some reason, spell-chuckers have been trained with a word - 'defiantly' - which is, AFAIK, far less commonly used than 'definitely'.
the one word I mostly use wrong is "then" instead of "than"
That's not a misspelling, but very common.
In her recent blog, Paige Hawthorne claims 'the most misspelled word in the English language' is 'impostor'.
I have no dog in this fight - I'm confident I spell coolly and impostor correctly. Just don't ask me to spell 'neice' :-)
AJ
I just read that the most misspelled word in the U.S. (and 47 other countries) is "coolly."
People in certain countries might get the impression it's 'aluminium' :-)
AJ
Around 12h ago I was going to reply to Justin's post saying I found that spelling quite atrocious and that it was SHOUTED by people trying to be precocious, but I couldn't find a form of words that I was satisfied with and had the correct metre and I didn't want to imply an insult to Justin, so I gave up. I did think 'I bet TGD's going to post the lyrics' and would have put money on it, but who's going to bet on Donald Duck not being a duck?
(Fat finger and time clarity edit)
ETA: I was also going to throw in my own constructed long word, Quasipseudopsychophysiopathologically, 'In the manner or having the qualities of seeming to refer to the mind, body and effects of disease on them', but ironically, I made three spelling mistakes in it even though it's my own word. In my defence, I must point out it's forty plus years since I constructed it, and it's not exactly an everyday word (not even everydecade).
Probably one of the former president's girlfriends can explain it, why Donald wears a shirt but no pants.
I like how all the Charmen bears are naked in the ads except for that one ad that no one would pick up the boys underwear that he never wears.
I like how all the Charmen bears are naked in the ads except for that one ad that no one would pick up the boys underwear that he never wears.
They're not really bears. They're just a family of very dedicated furries. They've got underwear under their fursuits. I mean, really, have you ever seen an actual bear that was bright red?
(Incidentally, that ad series is one those brilliant pieces of marketing that's so annoying that it's made me resolve never to buy a product that I was previously indifferent about.)
(Incidentally, that ad series is one those brilliant pieces of marketing that's so annoying that it's made me resolve never to buy a product that I was previously indifferent about.)
I have a long list of those, recently populated by products for which I see the same commercial a dozen (or more) times when streaming sports (e.g. ODI Cricket). Instantly on my 'never do busniess with' list.