I Used to Know That_ Stuff You Forgot From School - Caroline Taggart [3]
English abounds in homonyms and homophones, which are often completely unrelated in the etymological sense.
• Eerie (spooky) is a homophone of eyrie (an eagle’s nest).
• Pale (light in color) is a homonym of pale (a fence, as in beyond the pale) and a homophone of pail (a bucket).
• Mean (miserly) is a homonym of mean (intend) and a homophone of mien (appearance).
All those silly mistakes that spell-checkers fail to detect, such as there and their, are homophones.
Diphthongs
Diphthongs are complicated things. What most people think of as a diphthong is actually a digraph or ligature, and true diphthongs are often written as a single letter, which makes them less obvious to readers.
Huh?
OK. Merriam-Webster defines a diphthong as “a gliding monosyllabic speech sound that starts at or near the articulatory position of one vowel and moves to or toward the position of another.”
Try it for yourself and feel the difference when you say late and bat or loud and catch. Listen for the glides (y or w) at the end of the vowel sound.
Diphthongs may be written as a single letter (the i in white and the o in no, for example) or as two (ui in fruit, ea in heat). Any combination of two letters, whether vowels or consonants that produces a single sound is known as a digraph, so that includes not only the ui in fruit and the ea in heat but also the ph in photograph and the dg in bridge.
Many North American words that are spelled with a single letter are represented by two letters in their British counterparts. The ae written together in the British spelling of encyclopaedia or mediaeval is, strictly speaking, a ligature, which means that the two letters are joined together as one. This has its origins with medieval scribes who were simply trying to save time and space by combining the two letters on the same block when it was transferred to hot metal type. Modern typesetting doesn’t recognize ligatures, so the tendency since the 1950s has been to write the two letters separately or, increasingly, to drop one of them altogether—with the result that, in British English, encyclopaedia and mediaeval look rather old-fashioned, while in American English encyclopedia and medieval have become the standard.
Figures of Speech (and other devices for spicing up your writing)
A figure of speech is technically an expression used in a nonliteral (that is, a figurative) way, such as when you say My lips are sealed. Obviously, this is not possible unless you have put glue over them. When most people learn ways to expand their writing style, they are often directed to utilize such techniques as alliteration and onomatopoeia, which poets also use for effect. Here is a basic list that you may (or may not) remember:
alliteration: when a number of words in quick succession begin with the same letter or the same letter is repeated. For example, Full fathom five thy father lies, as Ariel sings in The Tempest.
assonance: similar to alliteration, but now with the repetition of vowel sounds. For example, And so, all the night-tide, I lie down by the side/ Of my darling—my darling—my life and my bride,/ In the sepulchre there by the sea,/ In her tomb by the sounding sea. (Edgar Allan Poe, Annabel Lee)
euphemism: replacing an unpleasant word or concept with something less offensive, as in substituting the term Grim Reaper for death. Some are also intended to be funny, as when morticians refer to corpses as clients.
hyperbole: Pronounced hy-PER-bo-lee. Not HY-per-bowl. Exaggeration for effect, as in I’ve told you a hundred times. This is the opposite of…
litotes: understatement for effect, as when not bad means completely wonderful. Litotes can be interpreted differently, depending on culture and verbal emphasis.
metaphor: an expression in which a word is used in a nonliteral sense, saying that x is y rather than x is like y, which would be a simile. For