Effective Writing. Elizabeth Manning Murphy

because it looks at the word in isolation, not in context (although a grammar checker may pick up the problem).

      Activity 3d

      Write sentences to show that you know the difference in meaning between these pairs of words:

      1 accept, except

      2 infer, imply

      3 addition, edition

      4 dessert, desert

      5 Joneses, Jones’s

      6 accede, exceed

      7 singeing, singing

      8 eminent, imminent

      9 immigrate, emigrate

      10 it’s, its

      11 discreet, discrete

      12 stationery, stationary

      Solutions 3d

      One sentence per pair has been used here sometimes – you can use one or two.

      1 I think everyone will accept my invitation except my brother who will be overseas.

      2 Did you imply that my work was below standard? I inferred that from the way you spoke.

      3 In addition to the morning papers, he bought the latest edition of The Bulletin.

      4 Ice cream is my favourite dessert. If you desert me, I will be miserable.

      5 The Joneses own a swimming pool, and it is Mr Jones’s job to keep it clean.

      6 I will accede to your request provided your expenses do not exceed $50.

      7 Giving him access to the freezer meant that he consumed an excess of ice cream.

      8 We are very excited because the eminent professor’s visit to Canberra is imminent.

      9 Many people immigrate to Australia from Asia, but few emigrate from Australia to Asia.

      10 It’s a shame that the baby kangaroo has lost its mother.

      11 She was discreet when discussing business, not wishing to divulge the company’s expansion plans. The proposal for a new building and the share offer just announced are, however, quite discrete issues.

      12 As I entered the stationery shop to buy copy paper, I noticed a large van stationary in the street outside, blocking access to the lane alongside the shop.

      Activity 3e

      Here are some more confusing pairs and groups of words. Make sure you can use all of them correctly in sentences.

      1 negligible, negligent

      2 adopt, adapt

      3 implicit, explicit

      4 allude, elude

      5 officious, official, efficient

      6 continual, continuous

      7 amount, number

      8 fewer, less

      9 personal, personnel

      10 principle, principal

      11 credible, credulous

      12 migrate, immigrate, emigrate

      13 all ready, already

      14 affected, effected

      15 accept, except

      16 lend, loan

      Solutions 3e

      1 I am glad the amount of work left is negligible. The crash resulted from his negligent driving.

      2 We intend to adopt a baby. I can adapt to new conditions very quickly.

      3 Implicit in his remarks was a slur on my captaincy. An explicit diagram made the mechanism clear.

      4 In my speech I will allude to your very fine work. The burglar was able to elude the police for hours.

      5 Nobody likes her overbearing, officious manner. He is now the official scorer for the cricket club. She is very efficient in her prompt and accurate handling of orders.

      6 The teacher commented on the continual chatter of the students. The torrential rain had been continuous for about eight hours, and the streets were now flooded.

      7 Please give me a small amount of dessert. A number of sweets were given to the children.

      8 There are fewer people here now than were here earlier. Give me less dessert than you gave him.

      9 I resigned for personal reasons. The personnel files hold details of all the people we employ here.

      10 Her work is based on a sound design principle. The college principal will retire next year.

      11 Your story is quite credible – I believe it. He is a credulous person – he’ll believe anything.

      12 People migrate from one country to another in search of better living conditions. Many people immigrate to Australia from Europe. My home is Australia and I do not intend to emigrate overseas.

      13 We are all ready to go to the beach. I have already completed the task you set me.

      14 Her breathing was affected by the smog. The doctor effected a cure in the boy who had been sick.

      15 I accept your invitation to dinner. Everyone is coming to the party except Joe.

      16 Please lend me $10. She made me a loan of $10.

      3.11 Proofreading

      Poor proofreading is included in the list of faults that make documents difficult to read. One of the causes of poor proofreading is the inability to spot the difference between the right and wrong spel­lings of some quite common words. This applies particularly when we are proofreading our own work.

      Precisely because these words are common, we tend to skip over them quickly, imagining that they must be correctly spelt, whereas we tend to take more care with the spelling of unusual words.

      Activity 3f

      1 Here are some commonly misspelt words. Tick the correct spel­ling (A or B) from each pair. Give yourself a time limit of, say, one and a half minutes to complete this part of the activity.

	A	B
1	accede	acsede
2	accomodation	accommodation
3	benefited	benefitted
4	preceeding	preceding
5	changable	changeable
6	aplication	application
7	disapoint	disappoint
8	skilful	skillful
9	moveable	movable
10	drownded	drowned
11	differrence	difference
12	maintainance	maintenance
13	liaison	liason
14	comitted	committed
15	consensus	concensus
16	equiped	equipped
17	humorous	humourous
18	superintendent	superintendant
19	supersede	supercede
20	seperate	separate
21	posesses	possesses
22	occurence	occurrence
23	transferral	transferal
24	definate	definite
25	heros	heroes
26	dulness	dullness
27	February	Febuary
28	laid	layed
29	recomend	recommend
30	beleive	believe
31	discribe	describe
32	misspell	mispell
33	umberella	umbrella
34	grammar	grammer
35	referred	refered
36	mishapen	misshapen
37	conscientous	conscientious
38	revelant	relevant
39	eminent	emminent
40	proceedure	procedure
41	occasionally	occassionally
42	advisor	adviser
43	purefy	purify
44	mischievous	mischievious
45	unparallelled	unparalleled
46	noticeable	noticable
47	coronary	coronory
48	mimicking	mimicing
49	intermarrage	intermarriage
50	sieze	seize