Words Beginning with the Letter "O" Commonly Misused, Confused or Misspelled
I'm back with yet another list of commonly confused, misused, or misspelled words. This time I focused on words beginning with the letter "O".
Object vs. Subject (use, meaning): The object of a sentence is the noun or pronoun that receives the action that is named by the main verb in the sentence. Object pronouns include me, you, them, or us. The noun that is doing the action in a sentence is the subject. Subject nouns include I, you, we, or they. For instance, "I" is the subject of the sentence: I ate lunch. Here "I" does the eating. "Me: is the object of the sentence: She thanked me. Here "me" is the thing that is thanked.
Obscure (spelling, meaning): As an adverb means unclear, imperfectly understood or expressed. As a verb it means to conceal or hide something.
o'clock (spelling): Is an adverb used to describe or indicate the position of the shorter hand on a watch or clock. Six o'clock means the shorter hand is pointed at six.
Onomatopoeia (spelling, meaning): The use of words that imitate or sound like what they are, mean, or are describing. For example rustle, bang, buzz, or hiss.
Opaque (spelling, meaning): Means not transmitting or reflecting light or radiant energy.
Organize vs. Organise (use, spelling): Both spellings are correct but "organize" is typically the North American spelling, whereas "organise" is more popular in Britain and outside or North America.
Oscillate (spelling, meaning): Means to move or swing from side to side regularly.
Ossify (meaning): Means to make rigid or settle into a conventional pattern.
Ought vs. Aught (use, meaning): Ought is a special kind of auxiliary verb, meaning that it is added to the main verb. This special kind of auxiliary verb is called a modal verb. Modal verbs (may, must, can, ought, shall) express states of possibility, permission, obligation, or advisability. They do not change their form. They are always added to an infinitive verb. Take the sentence: You ought to eat your vegetables. The main verb is the infinitive "to eat", to which the modal verb "ought" is added to convey a sense that eating is an advisable course of action. Aught used as a noun means nothing or zero. Used as a pronoun it can also mean anything or all.
Outrageous vs. Outragous (spelling): Outrageous is always spelled with an "e". It is the adjectival cognate of the verb "to outrage", meaning to provoke anger or indignation, and is used to qualify persons (or their behaviour) as scandalous or contrary to conventional norms of social conduct.
Overdo vs. Overdue (use, meaning): Overdo is the verb meaning to do something to excess, such as exercise or eat. Overdue is an adjective meaning unpaid, late, or delinquent, such as a bill or a library book.
Oxymoron (spelling, meaning): A rhetorical trope or figure in which contradictory terms are paradoxically conjoined, as in the phrase: "an honest thief". (Tee hee, yes trope will be on the Letter "T" Grow Your Vocab list)
If you haven't already (like that could ever happen), be sure to check out Grow Your Vocab posts brought to you by other letters. Definitions referenced via The Free Dictionary
Yep, just me Cathy thinking out loud about the Letter "O".
Special thanks to my brother/in-house language expert for his insights and help with my Grow Your Vocab posts. If you find parts in the posts that include lots of grammar and academic-like words, yet still manage to be clear and easy to understand they're probably written by, or at the very least improved by his editing skills. He takes my incomprehensible and transforms it into something useful.
Disclosure: I receive no compensation for my Grow Your Vocab posts. The purpose of these posts is merely to share information I think might be of interest to my readers.
