On Tue, Nov 22, 2011 at 05:59:46PM +0000, Geoff Shapiro wrote:
John Bytheway <jbytheway+boost <at> gmail.com> writes:
On 19/11/11 20:39, Brent Spillner wrote:
On Fri, 18 Nov 2011 20:59:26 lorcaminiti wrote:
* Acknowledgments
The title is spelt wrong (should be Acknowledgements)
OK.
Actually, "Acknowledgments" is the traditionally correct spelling. There are some dictionaries that accept "Acknowledgement," but this reads as faddish and less literate. A similar word is "judgment"--- both are frequently misspelled even by native speakers.
Thanks for clarifying. I see now that it was my hyper-British dictionary choices in Thunderbird which caused me to suggest this change :). It also doesn't like "judgment".
FWIW, Wiktionary suggests that this is a US/UK distinction rather than a traditional/rare distinction, though no doubt both languages bleed into each other a lot.
Also all my sources say that "Acknowledgment" is AE, while "Acknowledgement" is BE. And since BE is "traditional", I think the above statement about "traditionally correct spelling" and "faddish and less literate" is false (except when taking the US-point-of-view as the only possible). Also "judgement" is the traditional, i.e.,, British spelling (likely derived from "judge"); as far as I know, dropping some letters is a typical US-thing. There are more examples ... we had them in some joint papers with US-authors ... can't remember them anymore. Oliver
This was refreshing. As an avid reader, but rare contributor, and taking note of how technical the discussions here can get and how often some of these discussions get a little heated, a diversion such as this is most welcome!
BTW, I grew up spelling both as "acknowledgement" and "judgement". Online sources seem to indicate that in Britain those spellings are the norm while in the US the 'e' after 'g' is usually dropped. But I was born and raised here in the US so what gives? Given that my first name is "Geoff" (English spelling) and not "Jeff" (American spelling) the confusion is readily apparent?
:-)
Geoff