Definitions
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.
- noun The forming of words with letters in an accepted order; orthography.
- noun The art or study of orthography.
- noun The way in which a word is spelled.
- noun A person's ability to spell words.
from The Century Dictionary.
- noun A story; a relation; a tale.
- noun The act of one who spells; the manner of forming words with letters; or thography.
- noun A collocation of letters representing a word; a written word as spelled in a particular way.
from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.
- noun The act of one who spells; formation of words by letters; orthography.
- adjective Of or pertaining to spelling.
- adjective [U.S.] a spelling match.
- adjective a book with exercises for teaching children to spell; a speller.
- adjective a contest of skill in spelling words, between two or more persons.
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- verb Present participle of
spell . - noun uncountable The act, practice, ability, or subject of forming
words withletters , or of reading the letters of words;orthography . - noun uncountable The
manner of spelling of words;correct spelling. - noun countable A
specific spelling of a word. - noun US, rare, dated, countable or uncountable A spelling
test orspelling bee .
from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.
- noun forming words with letters according to the principles underlying accepted usage
Etymologies
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License
Examples
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“Henry the Fift” [_this spelling is used consistently_] except the “Faery Queen,” [_spelling unchanged_] next to the Miter and Phænix [_error for “Phœnix” in original_] [Stz. 3 sidenote] ...
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[_anomalous spelling unchanged in both] -- To my own hindrence did I try. [_spelling unchanged_]
The Fables of Phædrus Literally translated into English prose with notes
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CM: Of course, my name spelling is even different from my grandfather's name spelling.
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CM: Of course, my name spelling is even different from my grandfather's name spelling.
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Hey Butch, if Dutch goes back to school, make sure he enrolls in English 101; his spelling is a little rusty ...
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If your spelling is any indication of you education, you should go back to school while you still have time in life.
Think Progress » Carl Cameron Gets Chummy With Brown Supporters, Ducks Question Of Fox News’ Ethics
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And by the way, the themes of the posters are selected by the crews, and name spelling is verified by each crew member before it is printed.
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Another large chunk appear fine until I start to read them: the spelling is abysmal, the punctuation non-existent, and the syntax is convoluted.
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Of course, in a sense, we all start from scratch in childhood, and children who start with a language like Spanish, where the spelling is almost perfectly phonetic, pick up reading much, much sooner than children who have to learn all the crazy rules and exceptions of English spelling.
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There's a john smendrovac in the US, and on his blog, his spelling is almost as bad as above.
Plasma and LCD, step aside? Take a peek at Laser TV | Sync Blog
skipvia commented on the word spelling
Suport You're Local's!
I saw this handwritten sign in a window a few days ago. The "local's" referred to are local craft makers. I like it because every word is either misspelled or grammatically incorrect.
October 22, 2007
chained_bear commented on the word spelling
OUCH! That hurts my head!
October 22, 2007
skipvia commented on the word spelling
It's also surprisingly difficult to read, isn't it?
October 22, 2007
reesetee commented on the word spelling
Wait. What if we rearranged the punctuation?
"Support! You're Locals."
October 22, 2007
chained_bear commented on the word spelling
That reminds me of a story (possibly apocryphal) about the wife of Peter the Great (or was it Ivan the Terrible...?) who had a merciful streak as well as being more literate than her husband. She intercepted a note from the emperor to one of his officers about the fate of a man who was imprisoned. The note supposedly said: "Pardon impossible. To be sent to Siberia."
Allegedly the woman changed the punctuation to read: "Pardon, impossible to be sent to Siberia." And the man's life was saved.
I don't really know or care how true it is. I just thought the use of punctuation to change the meaning was interesting.
October 22, 2007
reesetee commented on the word spelling
And the famous "Woman, without her man, is nothing." Changed to "Woman: Without her, man is nothing." :-)
October 22, 2007
uselessness commented on the word spelling
I have to wonder about people who go out of their way to insert unnecessary punctuation. It's easier to type your than you're! It's easier to type locals than local's! It's a two-for-one deal: save yourself the trouble of typing extra characters, AND get the added bonus of being correct. Who wouldn't want that?
A frightened part of me suspects that these people assume using more letters and punctuation marks equals being more grammatically intelligent. Like refusing to acknowledge that its really is the possessive form of it, because it's not as "complete" as it could be.
October 23, 2007
skipvia commented on the word spelling
On the nosey, U. It's the same phenomenon that we experience when people say "Bruce was really mean to she and I," but that's another story...
October 23, 2007
reesetee commented on the word spelling
Or "Myself and Bob decided not to go." *shudder*
October 23, 2007
chained_bear commented on the word spelling
Or, like the sign I saw the other day:
Lost "Keys"
Please return to... (etc.)
Perhaps the author really did mean that the misplaced object masquerades as keys. AGH!
Skipv, one of my (least) favorites is similar to your example, but mixes up the cases entirely: "I can't believe he did that to her and I." STABBY!! STABBY STABBY!!
October 23, 2007