Common Usage Errors

1. Common Usage Errors 61-80

2. 61. THEY’RE/THEIR/THERE • Many people are so spooked by apostrophes that a word like “they’re” seems to them as if it might mean almost anything. In fact, it’s always a contraction of “they are.” If you’ve written “they’re,” ask yourself whether you can substitute “they are.” If not, you’ve made a mistake. “Their” is a possessive pronoun like “her” or “our” “They eat their hotdogs with sauerkraut.” Everything else is “there.” “There goes the ball, out of the park! See it? Right there!There aren’t very many home runs like that.” “Thier” is a common misspelling, but you can avoid it by remembering that “they” and “their” begin with the same three letters. Another hint: “there” has “here” buried inside it to remind you it refers to place, while “their” has “heir” buried in it to remind you that it has to do with possession.

3. 62. THRONE/THROWN • A throne is that chair a king sits on, at least until he gets thrown out of office.

4. 63. TO/TOO/TWO • People seldom mix “two” up with the other two; it obviously belongs with words that also begin with TW, like “twice” and “twenty” that involve the number 2. But the other two are confused all the time. Just remember that the only meanings of “too” are “also” ("I want some ice cream too.") and “in excess” ("Your walkman is playing too loudly.") Note that extra O. It should remind you that this word has to do with adding more on to something. “To” is the proper spelling for all the other uses.

5. 64. SPECIALLY/ESPECIALLY • In most contexts “specially” is more common than “especially,” but when you mean “particularly” “especially” works better: “I am not especially excited about inheriting my grandmother’s neurotic Siamese cat.” “Especial” in the place of “special” is very formal and rather old-fashioned.

6. 65. SAW/SEEN • In standard English, it’s “I” ve seen” not “I” ve saw.” The helping verb "have” (abbreviated here to “” ve” ) requires “seen.” In the simple past (no helping verb), the expression is “I saw,” not “I seen.” “I” ve seen a lot of ugly cars, but when I saw that old beat-up Rambler I couldn’t believe my eyes."

7. 66. VAIN/VANE/VEIN • When you have vanity you are conceited: you are vain. “You’re so vain you probably think this song is about you.” This spelling can also mean “futile,” as in “All my love’s in vain” (fruitless). Note that when Ecclesiastes says that “all is vanity” it doesn’t mean that everything is conceited, but that everything is pointless. • A vane is a blade designed to move or be moved by gases or liquid, like a weathervane. • A vein is a slender thread of something, like blood in a body or gold in a mine. It can also be a line of thought, as in “After describing his dog’s habit of chewing on the sofa, Carlos went on in the same vein for several minutes.”

8. 67. VARY/VERY • “Vary” means “to change.” Don’t substitute it for “very” in phrases like "very nice” or “very happy."

9. 68. VERSES/VERSUS • The “vs.” in a law case like “Brown vs. The Board of Education” stands for Latin versus (meaning “against” ). Don’t confuse it with the word for lines of poetry—“verses”—when describing other conflicts, like the upcoming football game featuring Oakesdale versus Pinewood. • Note that in formal legal contexts the usual abbreviation is usually just “v.”, as in “Brown v. The Board of Education.”

10. 69. VIOLA/VOILA • A viola is a flower or a musical instrument. The expression which means “behold!” is voila. It comes from a French expression literally meaning “look there!” In French it is spelled with a grave accent over the A, as voilà, but when it was adopted into English, it lost its accent. Such barbarous misspellings as “vwala” are even worse, caused by the reluctance of English speakers to believe that OI can represent the sound “wah,” as it usually does in French.

11. 70. WANDER/WONDER • If you idly travel around, you wander. If you realize you’re lost, you wonder where you are.

12. 71. WARRANTEE/WARRANTY • Confused by the spelling of “guarantee,” people often misspell the related word “warrantee” rather than the correct “warranty.” “Warrantee” is a rare legal term that means “the person to whom a warrant is made.” Although “guarantee” can be a verb (“we guarantee your satisfaction”), “warranty” is not. The rarely used verb form is “to warrant.”

13. 72. WAS/WERE • In phrases beginning with “there” many people overlook the need to choose a plural or singular form of the verb “to be” depending on what follows. ”There were several good-looking guys at the party” [plural]. “There was one of them who asked for my phone number” [singular].

14. 73. WEATHER/WETHER/WHETHER • The climate is made up of “weather”; whether it is nice out depends on whether it is raining or not. A wether is just a castrated sheep.

15. 74. WHILST/WHILE • Although “whilst” is a perfectly good traditional synonym of “while,” in American usage it is considered pretentious and old-fashioned.

16. 75. WHO’S/WHOSE • This is one of those cases where it is important to remember that possessive pronouns never take apostrophes, even though possessive nouns do (see it’s/its). “Who’s” always and forever means only “who is,” as in “Who’s that guy with the droopy mustache?” or “who has,” as in “Who’s been eating my porridge?” “Whose” is the possessive form of “who” and is used as follows: “Whose dirty socks are these on the breakfast table?”

17. 76. WOMAN/WOMEN • The singular “woman” probably gets mixed up with the plural “women” because although both are spelled with an O in the first syllable; only the pronunciation of the O really differentiates them. Just remember that this word is treated no differently than “man” (one person) and “men” (more than one person). A woman is a woman—never a women.

18. 77. YOKE/YOLK • The yellow center of an egg is its yolk. The link that holds two oxen together is a yoke; they are yoked.

19. 78. YEA/YEAH/YAY • “Yea” is a very old-fashioned formal way of saying “yes,” used mainly in voting. It’s the opposite of—and rhymes with—“nay.” When you want to write the common casual version of “yes,” the correct spelling is “yeah” (sounds like “yeh” ). When the third grade teacher announced a class trip to the zoo, we all yelled “yay!” (the opposite of “boo”!). That was back when I was only yay big.

20. 79. YOUR/YOU • “I appreciate your cleaning the toilet” is more formal than “I appreciate you cleaning the toilet.”

21. 80. YOUR/YOU’RE • “You’re” is always a contraction of “you are.” If you’ve written “you’re,” try substituting “you are.” If it doesn’t work, the word you want is “your.” Your writing will improve if you’re careful about this. • If someone thanks you, write back “you’re welcome” for “you are welcome.”