 A pet peeve of mine is parents who give their kids normal names with extremely strange spellings. For example, I've seen: It's almost as if they didn't know how to spell the name they wanted, so they spelled it incorrectly. But of course the real reason is that they wanted to be 'creative' and seem clever. Unfortunately the kid will be saddled with that strange spelling for their entire life, and will have to spell it out every single time they tell someone their name! For the rest of their lives. This page is about ordinary words and how they are spelled or pronounced differently or the same; one of the many reasons that the English language is apparently the hardest language to become fluent in. Same Spelling, Different Pronunciation Pronounce each of these words: bought bough could doubt hour rough slough ('slew') How is a beginner supposed to know how to pronounce each of these, when they're spelled the same but pronounced differently?! The answer is, of course, lots of practice and memorization. There are no rules. These are examples of homographs. Different Spelling, Same Pronunciation Each set of words is pronounced the same, but spelled differently, with different meanings: byte, bite, bight sense, cents, scents their, there, they're wheel, weal, we'll and of course: gnu, new, knew These are examples of homophones. If you haven't already, visit our Synonyms, Antonyms, Homonyms and More page for lots more weird English word forms. My favourite: explain why pony and bologna rhyme!! |