Difference between ‘particular’ and ‘concrete’

The words “concrete” and “particular” get commonly confused by English learners. Of course, we are not talking about “concrete” in the sense of “made of concrete” (the building material), as in “a concrete wall”. We are talking about “concrete” as in “a concrete example”. Statistically speaking, if you are reading this, the word you are probably...

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English words in which ‘ss’ is pronounced as ‘z’

In French, Italian, German and some other languages that use the Latin alphabet, the spelling difference between “s” and “ss” is used to indicate a difference in pronunciation, namely between /s/ and /z/. More precisely, in certain positions (between two vowels, for example), “s” is pronounced as /z/ in many languages. If the given word is indeed to...

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‘Graphics is’ vs. ‘graphics are’ – singular or plural?

There are many singular English nouns that end with an “s”, such as mathematics, physics, or politics. Those are typically names of certain fields of science or human activity. The word “graphics” fits the above pattern. It can be used in the singular to refer to the field of graphic art or the process of making graphics: Computer graphics is...

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‘Effect’ vs. ‘affect’ in English

Both “effect” and “affect” can be used as a noun or as a verb. If you have found this page using a search engine, the odds are that if you want to use a noun, you want to say “effect”, as in “it has a negligible effect on me”, and if you want to use a verb, you want to say “affect”, as in “it affected me negatively”. “To effect something” means “to...

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‘Clothes is’ vs. ‘clothes are’ in English

The word for “clothes” is singular in many languages, e.g. la ropa in Spanish or die Kleidung in German, and its plural in most contexts does not even make sense (you would virtually never hear someone say las ropas or die Kleidungen). In English, however, the situation is completely reversed. The word “clothes”, pronounced /kləʊðz/ or /kləʊz/...

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Pronunciation of ‘archangel’ and ‘archenemy’ in English

In contrast to “arch” /ɑːtʃ/ (aatch) (UK), /ɑːrtʃ/ (artch) (US), “archangel” is pronounced with a hard “ch”, i.e. /ˈɑːkeɪndʒəl/ (aak-eyn-dzhəl) (UK), /ˈɑːrkeɪndʒəl/ (ark-eyn-dzhəl) (US).  You can remember that the Mormon Church teaches that Noah (the builder of Noah’s Ark) is actually the same person as Archangel Gabriel, if it helps you to...

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‘I am agree’ vs. ‘I am of agreement’ vs. ‘I agree’ in English

Saying “I am agree with you” is a common error among native speakers of Romance languages. For example, when you want to say that you agree with someone in Spanish, you would use the phrase Estoy de acuerdo. = (literally) I am of agreement. and there is no single Spanish verb having exactly the same meaning as the English verb “agree”. It is important...

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