Bare/bear, allowed/aloud, advice/advise, break/brake | Frequently confused words | Usage | Grammar

Hello Grim Marians, hello a man, hello uh! Today, we're going to be talking about four sets of frequently confused words, and the one that I want to begin with is "advice" and "advise."

How do we keep these two words straight? Well, first of all, "advice" with a "c" is a noun, and "advise" with an "s" is a verb. These are really easy to screw up because they look very similar, and you'd think that they have approximately the same sound. However, the "c" in "advice" actually ends up having an "s" sound, and the "s" in "advise" ends up having a "z" sound.

So let's use these both in a sentence: "Bertram gives terrible advice; Mopa advised us not to surf on a full stomach."

The word "advice," the noun, contains another noun: the word "vice," which is kind of like a type of clamp, usually tightened by means of a metal screw that you turn with a handle. In my context and experience, I've used it in woodworking projects to keep pieces of wood still. So you want to clamp something while it's being glued together.

You've got two pieces of wood; let's say this little piece of redwood and this little piece of blue wood—you want to glue them together. Hold them still with a vice. If you remember that a vice is a noun, you can remember that advice is also a noun. When you advise someone, yes, you are giving them advice, but this is the verb form.

Now we have two other words that sound the same but are very different: we have "allow" and "allowed." They are both adjectives, but they have different spellings and different meanings.

Let's start with the first: "allowed," which is spelled "a-l-o-u-d." Note that it has the word "loud" in it, which can help us remember that this word talks about something being spoken loudly. So let's use that in a sentence: "Jinny muttered aloud."

When we say "aloud" (a-l-o-u-d), we mean it's audible; it can be heard. It contains that word "aloud." Cool!

What's this next one? "Allowed" with two "l's." A good way to remember this is to think about the word "legal," which has two "l's." If something is legal, it is also allowed or permissible. So let's think of an example: "Oliver allowed no peppers in his soup; he's very allergic." Yes, similarly, you might be allowed to drive at 60 MPH because it is legal to drive at that speed.

Sweet! Let's move on to our next set. Over here, we have "break" and "break." These are both nouns and verbs, right? To break something is to crack it in half or to split or just to ruin or destroy something. But it also refers to the results of a crack or a split, like you could say "the break in a vase."

The word "break," also a noun and a verb, refers to slowing stuff down. So to slow down or the mechanism that does the slowing. We have here both a verb form, and we have here the noun form.

So how do you remember the difference between them? Let's take it from the decision point. I'm writing a sentence and I'm trying to figure out which one I want to use.

Let's just kind of imagine we've got this unword "Brock" here. Now, if I want to use the "break" and destroy sense, in order to do that, I just have to break the word in half and put that "e" right in the middle. I broke the word in half; I put the "e" right in the center. That means that I've cracked the word.

But let's say I've got "bra" over here; I want to slow down its forward momentum. I'm going to put that "e" right at the end. It looks sort of like a spring. We want to halt its momentum by putting that "e" at the end.

So let's put these into a sentence. Okay, so "Jesse breaks a vase." How do we remember to say "breaks" with an "e"? Well, we put the "e" in the middle; we break the word in half and put the "e" in the middle.

Let's do the other one: "Paulo slammed on the brakes." And how do we remember? We want to have the "e" at the end; while the "e" is trying to slow Paulo down, we're trying to halt that momentum by putting that spring-looking "e" at the end of the word.

This one's one of my favorites. It's the difference between "bear" (b-e-a-r) and "bare" (b-a-r-e). Now the word "bear" (b-e-a-r) can be either a verb or a noun. When it's a noun, it's this critter, but when it's a verb, it means to carry.

And "bare" (b-a-r-e) is an adjective meaning naked or empty. When I say "bear" as a verb, I mean that in the sense of bearing a burden. If you've heard that expression or if you've ever heard somebody say, "I can't bear it," that literally means I can't carry it, but metaphorically, it means I can't withstand it.

"Bear" is something more like "the cupboards were bare," meaning empty. You know, open up the cupboard, a fly comes out, something like that.

So how do we keep these two words separate? Well, all you have to remember is this simple mnemonic: "E before A, take it away. A before E, everyone can see that you are naked or that your cupboard is empty."

So those are just a couple of mnemonic devices—just memory aids—that will ideally assist you in keeping these sets of words straight. You can learn anything. David out, em man out.