April 2008

March TOP TWENTY

Correct usage seems to have been on the minds of many users of the Online Dictionary this month, since affect took the number one spot and its companion word effect made it up to fourth. Now that dictionary editors can see what words are being looked up online on a daily basis, we are gratified that our efforts to discriminate usage and defining information for these entries are relied upon by many. These words aren't looked up for spelling purposes.

As always, we see the words with classical origins and slightly abstract senses such as integrity, pragmatic, pugnacious, and ambiguous in the Top Twenty list. And the pseudo-classical conundrum is still there for good measure. Here's the full list for March.

  1. affect
  2. cantankerous
  3. pretentious
  4. effect
  5. apathetic
  6. appreciate
  7. love
  8. pugnacious
  9. integrity
  10. whether
 
  1. awkward
  2. albeit
  3. eclectic
  4. pragmatic
  5. conundrum
  6. ambiguous
  7. thorough
  8. appropriate
  9. hypocrite
  10. politic

This month's list shows few new words. The news of New York governor Elliot Spitzer's tawdry tryst and Senator Barack Obama's speech on race in America caused spikes of lexical interest that lasted only a few days each, and those words didn't make the overall top twenty. Politic topped the list last month and still had a good showing this time around. Thorough hasn't made the list since May. Thorough and whether show that some very hard-working English words without classical roots are often the subject of inquiry: we all double-check spelling sometimes.


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