Ask questions or just talk about different languages. Since BrainKing is an international game site supporting many languages, this board can be kind of useful.
I am by no means a scholar or the best at grammar in the English language but I can't get over how many people make these common mistakes!
It is You're welcome, not your welcome!
It is congrats or congratulations, not congrads!
I can hear you, not here you!
It is their car, not there car!
they're going away, not there going away!
رضا: Yes, I realize that part. I think a lot of it is lack of written use in every day life. Most folks don't normally write or type very much except at sites like this. Maybe showing them the difference will help them to learn the difference. Just a thought.
Lamby: They're all pronounced the same, so I'd go with the accent theory. :)
rain, rein, reign
to, too, two, 2
for, four, fore, 4
lead and lead are pronounced differently!
lead, led
feat, feet, fete
read and read are pronounced differently!
read, red
read, reed
I'm surprised you guys didn't have the peeve with "our" and "are" as I see them mixed up all the time.
And why is it in English some words have acceptable alternate spellings and others only have one accepted spelling?
Honour or honor are OK, but don't you dare spell congratulations with a "D"
at the university we were allowed to write our work either in american english or in british english ... but not in a mixture of both .. so if we started with 'analyze' we had to continue with 'color' as well ... the professors were quite strict on that
Hrqls: It made it a little difficult for me when I was learning basic html. I would make a page with the colour tag and it never worked. Once I realized it was all 'set' in American English then I had no problem
Rose: And about Congratulations, my assumption is:
The word Congratulations, according to dictionaries is pronounced /kengratsuleisnz/, with a CH sound, but people read it with a J (as in jam) sound which can occure just if a D sound and a Y sound come together, like in soldier which has originally been soldYer. So people think there must hav ebeen a D in congratulations too!