I'm not a copy editor, nor do I play one on TV, but I find myself irritated by the misuse of similar-sounding words. I'm going to post some examples to start. Others are invited to add more.
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Calvary refers to the hillside on which Jesus was crucified.
Cavalry is a group of highly mobile army troops.
Eminent means “prominent, famous"
Imminent means "about to happen"
The pair that bugs me the most (right now) is titled vs. entitled.
If something is “titled” it means that it received such a title, either by the author or by someone else. Entitled, on the other hand, means that a person has rights to something.
It is never all right to spell "alright" as one word.
INFER / IMPLY:
The set-up (panel five):
Jabberwock - a monster appearing in a poem by Lewis Carroll.
Jabberwocky - the name of that poem.
I'm in the middle of reading a modern novel based on Carroll's "Alice in Wonderland", in which Alice is being hunted by a monster that has yet to make an appearance. So far, it's an interesting read, but every time that the monster is referred to as "The Jabberwocky", I wince.
This isn't the first time that I've encountered the same confusion between name of poem and name of monster.
Adhering strictly to the category of English usage error that Mr. Willis specified: the misapplication of similar sounding words, I believe the most common one sees is the confusion over affect and effect.
If this thread migrates into common misapplications of English grammar of any stripe, there's not enough time in life for me to list even just the ones I hear and read regularly.
A few more that have been recently driving me crazy (a short drive). These are misused and/or misunderstood by many newspeople who talk for a living on TV.
To make a problem worse is to exacerbate it, not exasperate it.
You can't exasperate a problem because a problem can't feel annoyed or irritated.
If a place can not be found on a map, it is uncharted, not unchartered.
Unchartered would be something that does not have a charter or written constitution.
To wreak havoc is to cause chaos and/or destruction.
You can wreck something, but you can't wreck havoc.
Saying that the Presidency or another high office is a "bully pulpit" means that it is an excellent place to disseminate views on various subjects. It was coined by Theodore Roosevelt in the early 20th Century when the slang term "bully" meant that something was really great. It doesn't mean a place from which to bully people.
If you wreck havoc, are you establishing order?
Language changes, and I know the ship has sailed on a lot of these, but I can still stand on the dock fuming with annoyance:
-Decimate does not mean the same as the similar word, devastate. At least, it didn't used to mean the same. I grant that words from one language often shift meaning, but this shift appears to have occurred because decimate sounds cooler.
-While not quite "similar sounding words," I was literally... when the person means, I was metaphorically... has come into widespread usage, so that the word literally now means what it originally meant AND its exact opposite. I literally climb the walls over this one. Because I'm Spider-man.
-But can we at last draw the line at: for all intensive purposes??? The phrase is, for all intents and purposes. WTF* is an intensive purpose?
Finally, I apparently missed the memo that forbids anyone to post anything online anywhere unless they do not understand the respective meanings of its and it's.
*As the kids these days say.
While not quite "similar sounding words," I was literally... when the person means, I was metaphorically... has come into widespread usage, so that the word literally now means what it originally meant AND its exact opposite. I literally climb the walls over this one. Because I'm Spider-man.
I used to use the word "literally" incorrectly on purpose just to annoy people. Now so many people use the word wrong, without realizing it, that they took the fun out of it.
About 4-5 years ago I stopped down a meeting a work, because my boss' boss and a couple of other people were misusing the word "leverage". I don't recall exactly how they were doing it, but I sat there probably for about 5 minutes arguing with them about it. My boss at the time was also at that meeting, and she just sat there with a big ol' smile on her face.
Affect vs. Effect
Compliment vs. Complement
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