Nouns

“They brought back little momentos …”

Common English Blunders, Devolution toward Simpler, Nouns

I heard this yesterday during an HGTV “Design on a Dime” program.

Problem:
The noun is misspelled.

Explanation:
The noun “momento” is a Spanish word and means moment.

The noun “memento” is an English word and means keepsake or souvenir.

The host of the TV program was talking about how the interior designer was influenced by the souvenirs that the home owners brought home from their vacations, so “mementos” would have been the correct noun.

I believe that the use of “mementos” in place of “momentos” is consistent with my “Devolution toward Simpler” linguistic hypothesis. It is simpler to say the initial “o” in “momentos” than to say the initial “e” in “mementos” (try it).

Solution:
“They brought back little mementos …”

“Alternate” vs. “Alternative”

Common English Blunders, Nouns, Versus

I was wondering the other day about these two nouns.

Problem:
The basic definitions differ between these two nouns.

Explanation:
The primary meaning of the noun “alternate” is someone who is allowed to substitute for someone else.

The primary meaning of the noun “alternative” is a selection of one of two or more possibilities.

Solution:
Use “alternate” specifically when referring to a substitute person; use “alternative” otherwise.

“I liked the visual affects.”

Common English Blunders, Nouns

I saw this on TV this morning.

Problem:
The noun “affects” is the wrong word for this sentence.

Explanation:
The sentence was displayed on a TV program containing audience members’ reactions to a new movie.

The noun “affect” means emotion or feeling, and “I liked the visual emotions.” would make no sense.

The noun “effect” — as in “special effects” — means in this context an illusory phenomenon.

For fun, I searched Google for each of the following phrases (with the quotation marks) and got about the indicated numbers of matches:

  • “visual effects” — 9,530,000 matches
  • “visual affects” — 12,100 matches

This tells me that Web authors have written the phrase correctly vs. incorrectly by a ratio of 788:1, which is very good to excellent.

I also searched Google for “special affects” (with the quotation marks) and got about 59,900 matches. Although some of those seemed to be a play on “special effects” (with the ‘e’) — e.g., for a horse named “Special Affects” — many others (such as this one) seemed to reflect an ignorance of the “affect”-vs.-“effect” distinction.

Solution:
“I liked the visual effects.”