The most commonly misspelled word in the English language

[peacetraveler22]

Do you know what it is? I notice it frequently in comments, and communications with foreign friends. Even the most intelligent and proficient speakers of English as a second language often spell the term wrong. The word is "DEFINITELY", and the most common error is to spell it "definAtely", where an "a" is used instead of an "i". Phonetically, this makes sense, and even native English speakers periodically spell the word wrong.

I was reminded of this today when I began to read a post about studying English via Skype lessons. The blogger mentioned all kinds of tenses - present perfect progressive, past perfect, past perfect simple. I must have learned these tenses in school over 20 years ago, but what the hell do they mean? :) I don't even think about them now as a native English speaker, although the tenses are self-explanatory if you contemplate the basic essence of the words. When I studied Russian for a short time, I wasn't concerned about proper grammar or spelling, because the goal was simply to be able to speak basic phrases during travels and communicate with locals in their native tongue. Some things that still confuse me about Russian:

(1) In Russian, many words are not capitalized. For instance, book titles or titles of blog posts. In English, we use a lot of capital letters.
(2) I notice that in business communications with Russian companies, they put a period after their name at the end of a salutation, which we do not do in English. For example:

Kind regards,
Shannon.

The period looks totally out of place to me.

(3) The biggest - gender for words! I don't understand how you ascertain the sex of an object? :) I know it is determined by the spelling and ending of the noun in most cases. But logically, why are passports and bread masculine rather than feminine?

Just another quick English lesson from Shannon. :) You will recall we previously discussed improper use of "YAmmy" rather than "YUmmy" here, and overall complications with English words in this post. Good luck to those who continue to study my native language! If you have any questions, never hesitate to write me. I'm always happy to help, and I greatly admire the dedication and knowledge of the multi-lingual folks around the globe!

In informal communications in my blog and with foreign friends, I never point out wrongly spelled words or improper grammar, but it grates on my nerves when native speakers misspell words and use bad grammar! I think this is a global epidemic, now that newer generations speak in weird text lingo, and shortened phrases or acronyms. Humanity is doomed! :))

Comments

[iklin.livejournal.com]

Yes, you're right. My English is far from perfect, I know. I'm only learning.

[peacetraveler22.livejournal.com]

Do not worry about small mistakes when writing comments in this blog! :)

[iklin.livejournal.com]

Ok, I will. :) But how do I know if my mistakes small or big?

[peacetraveler22.livejournal.com]

I almost always understand the message readers are trying to convey in comments, even if they are written in very broken English. If I don't understand, this is an indication the mistake is BIG, and I'll ask for clarification. :))

[iklin.livejournal.com]

Thanks for explanation! I get it.

[peacetraveler22.livejournal.com]

You're welcome! :)

[verniy-leninetz.livejournal.com]

Don't worry, not to see a difference between w and th is a common mistake.

[iklin.livejournal.com]

I think I understand the difference (when/then = когда/тогда) but make this mistake again and again because of my inattention.