On Mon, 3 Mar 2003, Nicholas Bodley wrote:

> 2003-03-03 09:58:17, Marco Cimarosti <marco.cimarosti@...>
> wrote:
> >Nicholas Bodley wrote:
> >> Of course, this then means that I need to define "homophone" as a
> courtesy whenever I use it...
>
> >Sorry, why do *you* need to define "homophone"? That's on every good
> English dictionary:
>
> <gentle (?) flame>
> Because I often write for people, some of whom have a typical US
> education.
>
> I suspect that people in other parts of the world don't know how badly
> our educational system has deteriorated. Item: Many of us in the USA

I agree it's useful to clarify sometimes with definitions--linguistic
terminology is sometimes mundane-sounding and may be mistaken for ordinary
words or usage, and not recognized as technical terms, by general
audiences.

You must be describing a situation similar to what I experienced circa the
early 80's--I was taught that the likes of "bear" and "bare" were
"homonyms" (rather than "homophones"), and the ridiculous notion of five
(or six) vowels in English, occuring in two varieties.


Thomas Chan
tc31@...