Tag Archives: language

As well as being asked to post about this by a number of people, I’ve also seen these two used incorrectly a number of times.  I think negative versions of words do get people confused – and why not, when you have odd things like “flammable” and “inflammable” knocking around …

These two don’t mean the opposite of one another, but they do have distinct, separate and different meanings.

Uninterested means not interested.  “I was uninterested in his plans for world domination”; “the cat remained uninterested in my new party dress”

Disinterested means impartial.  I think this must be connected with the idea of “declaring an interest”; the disinterested person has no interest or investment in either side of an argument. “Amid all the disucssions, the chair remained a disinterested party, keeping order between the warring sides.”

If you aren’t keen on sitting on the fence and want to get involved, you could quite easily be uninterested in being disinterested …

You can find more troublesome pairs here.

I’ve had so many suggestions of troublesome pairs from people – but please keep them coming!  With some of the pairs, I know the distinction immediately (but I still look it up, just to make sure); with a few, I really don’t know the difference (and sometimes there isn’t one!); and with others, like this one, I know the difference and will happily write one or the other, or exchange one for the other in someone else’s text, but I need the might of the dictionary to help me define them.  So I’m never setting myself up as the expert here; I’m just trying to guide us all to simple distinctions to help with our writing and/or comprehension.  I’ve even changed a few posts as a result of readers’ comments!

Anyway, here we go with comparative vs. comparable.

Comparable – able to be likened to another, similar, of equivalent quality i.e. the same.  “Smith’s skills on the cricket pitch are comparable to those of the previous captain, Robinson.”

Comparative – measured or judged by comparison, relative i.e. different. “Joe’s performance is poor comparative to Bill’s, and Bill is likely to beat Joe in the next race if he doesn’t improve his time.”  You can replace “comparative to” with “in comparison with” and still get the same sense out of the sentence.

Comparative to other posts, this one has been fairly easy.  It’s comparable to, say, “disinterested or uninterested”, rather than one of the trickier ones.

You can find more troublesome pairs here.

This is a slightly tricky one – before I looked it up, I wasn’t sure what the difference was, and I would probably have used either of them in a sentence without thinking about it too much.  And it turns out that one is preferable to the other, not that they mean different things. It’s nice that we all get to learn something from these posts!

Due to, used for “because of” (as opposed to “timed to” – “the train is due to arrive at eight”), is usually seen as being incorrect, according to my OUP reference books, which prefer “on account of”.  I’m going to quote the New Oxford Dictionary for Writers and Editors here: “Due to: traditionally condemned as incorrect in the sense ‘because of’; on account of is a better alternative.”  I don’t feel that we use on account of very much in common written or spoken English. So, maybe it’s best to stick to …

Owing to, which is defined as meaning “because of” or “on account of”.

So: use “because of” or “owing to” if you don’t want the good people of the OUP to think you’re incorrect!

“Owing to leaves on the line, and because of other issues with the track, this train, which is due to leave at eight, will not be departing on time.”

For more troublesome pairs, have a look on the category cloud or click here.

We don’t often have a Troublesome triplet, but these three do go together and I’ve been asked about them a few times now.  This is another one where the American English is a bit different  (enquire is more common in British English, inquire in American English, which matches use of ensure and insure), so we’re sticking to British English here.  The Dictionary doesn’t distinguish between them that clearly, but my “special” dictionary for Editors and Writers does, so that’s what I’m sticking with!

Enquiry – a request for information.  To enquire – to ask for information.  “I would like to enquire as to the price of this article”; “Please enquire within for information on our rates and services”; “Directory Enquiries”

Inquiry – a formal investigation (e.g. by the police, the courts, etc.).  To inquire – to make a formal investigation.  “An official inquiry has been launched into the murder of the policeman”; “The Select Committee are inquiring into the expenses scandal.”

Query – a question. To query – means to question, to ask a question about.  “She queried the amount she was asked to pay”; “I have a query about the expenses you’ve claimed.”

“I have an enquiry about the outcome of the police inquiry; can you answer my query about paragraph 4?”

You can find more troublesome pairs here.

The stationery / stationary pair mix-up is one I see a lot.  It’s an easy one to get wrong, but hopefully an easy one to get right (or else just bookmark all these troublesome pair posts, I suppose!).   If it comes to it, learn “stationery” as I’m fairly sure I see that more often than “stationary”, on the grounds that if you know one of them, you can work out the other one.  Or something.  Anyway, here we go:

Stationary – not moving, still.  “The traffic was stationary”

Stationery – writing materials.  “My wedding stationery has a pink theme”; “Have you done the office stationery order yet?”

“The stationery truck is caught in stationary traffic and we have no more notepads until it gets here!”

You can find more troublesome pairs here.

This explanation of this particular troublesome pair is very definitely confined to British English.  I will write something about the differences between British and American English on this blog at some stage.  But this one is strictly English.

Again, this can be explained quite simply, although people seem to get in rather a state about it all.  Maybe everyone’s bookmarking these posts so they don’t have to get in a state any more!

Practice is the noun – football practice, Best Practice, these dodgy practices have to stop.

Practise is the verb – Ben is practising his football techniques.  I need to practise making up good examples.  The GP practised handstands in the practice waiting room.

To sum it up in one go: Ben went to football practice to practise his goal-keeping skills.

You can find more troublesome pairs here.

And here we are with another troublesome pair that’s been requested by one of the Libro blog readers.  This one relates somewhat to good old fewer vs. less, in that you have fewer of a number but less of an amount.  Basically, an amount is uncountable, while a number is countable.

An “amount” is a total of something, whether it’s a number, a value, an extent or a size.  An amount can be of several countable things all added up together, or, more usually, of one of those uncountable, collective nouns we talked about in the “fewer or less” post.

A “number” is an arithmetic value, represented by a symbol, word or figure.  And it refers to the countables – hairs, rabbits, coins, sheep …

“He owed me three sheep, £2 and an acre of land, and paid the full amount.”

To hark back to the fewer and less post: A large amount of hair; a large number of hairs.  A small amount of coinage, a small number of coins.  A small number of sheep eating a large amount of grass.

Here’s an interesting side note:

“The number of” + a plural noun is used with a singular verb: “The number of children who can read is lower at age 5.”

“A number of” + a plural noun is used with a plural verb: “A number of children remain unable to read later on.”

For more troublesome pairs, click on the category cloud over to your right, or go here.

One of the biggies, here: fewer or less? Many people, including a good friend of mine, get absolutely incensed when these are used incorrectly (leading to the spectacle of several well-educated, intelligent ladies self-correcting nervously when they make a slip in front of her: she probably doesn’t warrant this fear any more than I warrant the fear people apparently have of making a typo in a response to this blog!)

Anyway, it’s quite simple …

Fewer is used for countables.  Less is used for mass nouns denoting things that can’t be counted – uncountables.

So – it should be “5 items or fewer” on that supermarket checkout sign.  Less coinage has been produced this year, but there are fewer coins.  Less hair has been cut off this time, but I have fewer grey hairs than he does.

The Concise Oxford English Dictionary is reassuringly stern on this one: “The use of less with a count noun (“less people”) is incorrect in standard English.”  That’s told you!

You can find more troublesome pairs here.

As with most of these pairs, this idea came from one of my readers: how to distinguish between relative and relation.  Well, basically, it’s a subtle one!

I looked these ones up in the Oxford Concise English dictionary. Relative is defined as “considered in relation or in proportion to something else”.

Relation is defined as the way in which two or more people or things are connected or related.

I see this as relative being about a comparison, and relation about a similarity.

So, you can say, “the relation between rain and snow is that they are both wet and cold; relative to snow, rain is wetter but less cold”.

As regards the other main meaning, a relative is a person connected to another by marriage or blood (I’d add or adoption or arrangement there to cover adoptions, step-families, etc.) and a relation is defined simply as “a relative”. Your sister is your relation, and also your relative.

Always nice to have some subtlety on a Monday …

You can find more troublesome pairs here.