Woomera,
Thank you for this thread. I have always been amazed at the poor skills of pilots in their use of the written word. ‘Written Expression’ was an important part of the English syllabus when I was at school (many years ago).
Boomerang
I was pleased to read your last post, especially in the correct use of the pronoun, ‘my’, preceding the gerund, ‘being’, in ‘stranger things have occurred in life than my being mistaken’. The Australian vernacular almost invariably substitutes ‘me’ for ‘my’.
Regarding ‘licence’ and ‘license’, I agree. ‘Licence’ is a noun, and ‘license’ is a transitive verb – unless you are an American. ‘Affect’ and ‘effect’ are not as clearly labelled as verb and noun because of the variety of meanings each word has. ‘Affect’ is always a transitive verb. ‘Effect’ is usually a noun (as in
cause and effect,
to take effect, etc) but can be a transitive verb meaning bring about or accomplish (as in
to effect a change). The Oxford Dictionary is a good reference.
The Oxford Dictionary also recognises both ‘inquire’ and ‘enquire’ as valid spellings. I am not aware of the Macquarie Dictionary’s position on this. I must buy one someday, if only as a reference for crosswords!
Australian practice is to use ‘-ise’ instead of ‘-ize’ in verbs with that ending. Similarly, ‘program’ has replaced the French ‘programme’ in Australian English.
A good, easily accessible reference to the use and abuse of the English language is
www.dictionary.com. This is an American site, and so be aware that US English is not Australian English.
By the way, for those who use Microsoft Word, the language it uses for its spell-checker can be changed to whichever form of English you use, e.g., Australian, Canadian, US, etc. Just look under the
Tools menu. I’m not familiar with WordPerfect and other programs, but I expect they have a variety of dictionaries as well.
A word of advice for those who rely on spell-checkers: they will usually not detect and correct instances where the chosen word is phonetically the same as another, e.g., 'read' and 'reed'.
Pseudonym
The reason 'phonetic' is not 'fonetic' is because its root is the Ancient Greek 'phonos'. Many of our words have their roots in Ancient Greek and Latin.
So endeth the lesson.
