r/mildlyinfuriating 2d ago

English for Beginners

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u/Swervin69 2d ago

Don’t feel bad beginners, fluent speakers still don’t know how to tell their, there, and they’re apart.

24

u/allnaturalfigjam 2d ago

Is it just me or do a lot of fluent English speakers use "weary" and "wary" interchangeably? I keep hearing people saying "be weary of that" and I'm starting to think I'm the crazy one.

I had a boyfriend in uni who pronounced "wander" the same as "wonder". Drove me up the wall.

3

u/sleepytoday 2d ago

I have noticed that people who pronounce wander and wonder as homophones tend to confuse the spelling, too.

3

u/blewawei 1d ago

That's why most spelling mistakes happen, generally. Historical linguists use those kinds of errors to figure out past pronunciations from before we could record voices.