Do you have difficulty remembering when to use the word effect and when you should use affect? Confused about its and it’s or lay and lie?
Using the wrong word makes you look dumb. It’s distracting to the reader and knocks your writing off course. Many thanks to reader FredinChina for bringing us this nifty little tool. The free searchable database at Confusing Words is fast and easy to use.
Each set of confusables (eg: there, their, they’re) are displayed together as follows:
Confusing words and their definitions
Examples: the confusing words used in sentences
Notes: more information and links to other groups that contain the same words
This tool was developed by a teacher for her students to use way back in Apple Hypercard days. The database has grown over 20 years and contains over 3,000 entries now. Keep a short-cut to this link handy and you’ll never embarrass yourself by using the wrong word again.
{ 2 comments… read them below or add one }
Thank you for sharing with your readers & for the credits Yelwrose
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I am an English speaker as a 2nd language; I cringe each time I read a horde of gold when the appropriate word is a hoard… A horde is when the barbarians are coming for your hoard.
Keep this nifty tool handy.
Next is someone to take care of USUK journalists using “decimated” when “destroyed” was appropriate.
I’ve often shuddered when reading egregiously miss-used words in even professional documents but I’m having a hard time convincing anyone there’s a difference between “artifacts” and “artefacts”. Hypercard FTW, however one would expect that given 20 years’ worth of input, this database would have eventually become self-aware
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