Jan 20, 2015 search for the issue, or get the book and keep it close. Heres what they each mean and when to use them by yolande clarkjackson. There are many words that sound the same or even look the same, but these words are used in entirely different contexts as they have entirely different mean. Woman versus female grammar girl quick and dirty tips. Grammar girls quick and dirty tips for better writing by mignon fogarty. The paperback of the grammar girls quick and dirty tips for better writing. For instance, an average english speaker should have an active vocabulary of about 20,000 words. There are many words that sound the same or even look the same, but these words are used in entirely different contexts as they have entirely different meanings. The difference between beside and besides english grammar lesson duration. Sometimes, the word vocabulary refers to the words that a person knows.
To insure something or someone is to cover it with an insurance policy. Check out this list of common grammatical errors to make sure youre not slipping up. If you insure him, then youre taking out a policy on his life. Confusing words and homonyms misused words in english. Iea style guide international association for the evaluation of.
Learn vocabulary, terms, and more with flashcards, games, and other study tools. Search for the issue, or get the book and keep it close. Get grammar girls take on assure versus ensure versus insure. These blankets ensure that youll be warm enough to insure is to cover with an insurance policy what you insure you entrust to a business. What you ensure results from your personal efforts. Only people can feel anxious or doubtful only they can be assured. The farlex grammar book welcome to the online home of the farlex grammar book, your complete guide to the english language. So, lets explore many thesauri list these as synonyms for each other, so that helps to confuse us further in general, to assure is to lend confidence, to ensure is to confirm, and to insure is to indemnify as with an insurance policy and insure. Written with the wit, warmth, and accessibility that the podcasts are known for, grammar girl s quick and dirty tips for better writing covers the grammar rules and wordchoice guidelines that can confound even the best writers. Lots of folks use insure, ensure, and assure interchangeably.
I find it interesting that, during an argument for grammar, your very first sentence contains a rather nasty little comma splice. In this video linda explains the differences between assure, insure and ensure. Is there a technical explanation, or is it just my ears. Compare it versus grammar difference between assure vs ensure. The chicago manual of style, for instance, recommends dos and donts. Therefore, ensure the tradition of excellence is a better choice.
Assure, ensure, and insure are three words people sometimes confuse. Similarly, does one think that it is important to eat brussels sprouts or think it is important to eat brussels sprouts. Mignon fogarty is the host of grammar girl and founder of quick and dirty tips. Copy editing, grammar, i vs me, object pronoun thank you for spending the holiday with john and i. Its amazing the mistakes people make, especially news and sports announcers. Grammar girl has a great podcast on these tricky words. Not only do these three words sound similar, they also make an outcome sure but they are in no way. Aug 26, 2008 get grammar girl s take on assure versus ensure versus insure. Nov 26, 2007 seriously, were glad that you and many of our weekly enewsletter readers and blog writers join us in finding grammar fun. Inspire a love of reading with prime book box for kids. This makes the connection between the two words very clear. English usage varies from region to region in multiple ways including word choice, syntax, spelling and the use of idioms.
But in this case, not thinking is actually better than thinking. Ensure to make sure something will or wont happen example. The more grammatical form, in this case, would be john and me. There werent a whole lot of actual writing tips, with the exception of a short chapter near the end with advice like avoid cliches like the plague. The assignment included an established author explaining her creation process, how she chose the barn image and how she formed this idea of a girl whos afraid to ride because she broke her leg getting bucked off her horse, but then theres a fire and someone has to ride for help, but her horse is skittish and wont let her friend get on.
To ensure is to do or have what is necessary for success. We have nearly lost the 2nd person singular pronoun. American and british english spelling differences wikipedia. Three oftenconfused verbsassure, ensure, and insure all mean roughly to make secure or safe or certain. James assures, ensures, insure his dog gets enough exercise by running with her each morning.
Learn the definitions of insure, assure, and ensure, and when to use them. There has been no empirical investigation of the bill henderson protocols safety and efficacy to date, limiting the information edition of his book cancer free, mr henderson stated medicine in cancer. Many of the differences between american and british english date back to a time when spelling standards had not yet developed. In this book, you will learn that the pursuit of proper grammar. Check the phone book to find a company that can assure, ensure, insure your storage building. Assurance is the guarantee that something will happen however insurance is the policy that covers up any losses. Its used to show the reader that something is being done, or is happening. Usage describes the way a language is used by native speakers, it is the application of grammar rules at a local level. If they were, then cars can be ensured and confusion can be insured. The three verbs are very much related to each other as all three of them deal with guaranteeing on thing or another. Table of grammar, style, and usage writing explained. After reading this post, i can assure you will never misuse ensure vs.
Covering the grammar rules and word choice guidelines that can confound even the best writers, grammar girl makes complex grammar questions simple with memory tricks to help you recall and apply those troublesome grammar rules. Its so annoying when publications use the word insure when ensure is intended. Lastly, insure is a verb which means to secure or protect someone against a possible contingency or arrange for compensation in the event of damage to or loss of property, or injury to or the death of someone, in exchange for regular advance payments to a company or government agency. The three words, assure, ensure, and insure, are often confused. Learn english with lets talk free english lessons 148,934 views 7. Order a copy of grammar girls quick and dirty tips for better writing. Possessives of nouns ending in s grammar underground. Is there a grammatical reason why ensure to sounds wrong to me, or am i just not used to hearing it. In my book woe is i, i used this sentence to illustrate the traditional differences among them. Some sources note that people use assure, ensure, and insure interchangeably. These words do not have the same meanings, sounds or spellings but their very close spellings and pronunciation is the root cause of all the confusion we have to face. I assure you, said the grieving widow, i ensured he was insured to the hilt. Jul 15, as is the case with so many cancer cure testimonials, wark. Aug 14, 2012 my high school english class taught ensure vs.
For instance, an average english speaker should have an active vocabulary of about 20,000 word. Grammarly can save you from misspellings, grammatical and punctuation mistakes, and other. As long as you remember their different uses, i assure you that you can always ensure that you are using these words properly and in turn, insure yourself from possible moments of. See more ideas about grammar, grammar and punctuation and teaching grammar. Insure makes the distinction that the definition of ensure is to make sure something will or wont happen, whereas insure means to issue an insurance policy. Briefly speaking, vocabulary is a selection of words within a certain language. This was 30 years ago, in the united states, so its not a matter of being trendy or trying to sound british. There are literally hundreds of different rules for grammar, style, and usage, and no one can possibly keep track of them all. This handy reference guide is a great starting point for ensuring you know the. You may be thinking, how did he ever make it through the last few months of election coverage and financial meltdowns without any pet peeve updates. Irregardless some words in the english language are so overused that we dont notice that they are incorrect or dont even exist.
Today, i want to clear up that confusion and outline the unique characteristics of each of these words. If a that clause follows the verb, you must use ensure. While these words sound similar theres no situation where they could mean exactly the. In many areas of life, such cavalier carelessness is a bad idea. Dont make these dumb grammar mistakes presented by shortstack even in this era of quick communication, good writing matters. The words are not interchangeable as some grammar sites profess. Grammar girls qdt for better writing quick and dirty tips.
Aug 26, 2019 english has a long history of confusion of singular and plural. Also derived from securus are the english words sure, assure, secure, and security. Grammar underground podcast grammar underground with june. Ensure, on the other hand, is used in a much more general sense. Download it once and read it on your kindle device, pc, phones or tablets. All three verbs have something to do with making sure and are therefore similar. He didnt think to insure his home until there was a leak in his roof. So, lets explore many thesauri list these as synonyms for each other, so that helps to confuse us further in general, to assure is to lend confidence, to ensure is to confirm, and to insure is to indemnify as with an insurance policy and insure may have legal implications.
Grammar can be confusing in any language and this is especially true of the english language. Insure is the easiest to remember, because it has the same initial letters as insurance. To ensure something is to make sure it happensto guarantee it. Though emily had only met her fiances mother once, it was enough to assure, ensure, insure her that emily would be a good partner. Your guide to gentle, nontoxic healing by bill henderson. Ensure april 17, 2018 no comments theres a large overlap between insure and ensure when it comes to their definitions, and many people find it hard to differentiate the two. Ensure to add the ingredients one at a time sounds off, but replacing it with make sure sounds fine. Apr 17, 2018 im going to insure my new car with this company, as their prices are good. Aug 14, 2019 after youve revised your book, story, blog post or article until you can revise no more, you just hand it off to your editor to clean up, right. Mignon fogarty, grammar girl, wrote a nyt bestseller, grammar girl s quick and dirty tips for better writing. Jan 01, 2008 grammar girl s quick and dirty tips for better writing book. Assure vs ensure the english language can be very confusing if one is learning it as a foreign language. I assure you that our new social media marketing manager did ensure that she will insure the milliondollar diamond necklace were o. Grammar girls quick and dirty tips for better writing.
To ensure my familys safety, i have installed an alarm. A more accurate title would probably be grammar girl s quick and dirty tips for better grammar. Jan 16, 2017 in this video linda explains the differences between assure, insure and ensure. Mignon fogarty is the founder of quick and dirty tips and the author of seven books on language, including the new york times bestseller grammar girl s quick and dirty tips for better writing.
Assure, ensure and insure are word triplets that are most commonly confused in english language by many writers. Most people regularly write stuff like we went to jamess house without stopping to think whether it should be james house. Grammar girls quick and dirty tips for better writing book. She is an inductee in the podcasting hall of fame, and the show is a fivetime winner of best education podcast in the podcast awards. Other authorities, however, consider ensure and insure interchangeable. Assure is something you do to a person, a group of people, or an animal to remove doubt or anxiety, as in squiggly. She hastened to assure me that the report contained no critical comment on my departments performance. On its path from latin through french and into english, securus became simplified and took on a variety of prefixes, thus leading to the confusingly similar english verbs assure, ensure, and insure. On facebook and twitter, and especially on blogs, misspelled words and mis placed punctuation can make you look unprofessional or worse. Whenever someone starts talking or i start reading about adjectives, adverbs. For instance, some spellings seen as american today were once commonly used in britain and some spellings seen as british were once commonly used in.
However by taking the time to look over common grammatical errors, you will be able to avoid making them in your written and spoken language. You hear this a lot from people who are trying to use proper english. I wrote this book for writers who want to write effectively and compellingly but dont want to spend a lot of time sifting through grammar textbooks or. It always grates on me when i see insure used where ensure would be a better fit. It is possible to use the spelling of insure, ensure, and assure to distinguish the three words from one another. American spelling tends to use insure for both ensure and insure.
Grammar girl provides short, friendly tips to improve your writing. Homonyms are sometimes confusing words that are pronounced the same but have different meanings. Also, insure is typically reserved for financial meanings. Grammar at a glance i bet you thought grammar couldnt get any more quick and dirty than it did in the previous pages, but heres the quickest grammar of all, culled from lengthier explanations found elsewhere in this book.
Grammar underground podcast grammar underground with. What role does the that play what part of speech is it in this context. With the trademark wit, warmth, and approachability that the podcasts are known for, grammar girl s quick and dirty tips for better writing covers the grammar rules and word choice guidelines that can confound even the best writers. Let me assure you i can assure you that the children will be totally safe on this.
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