Mistakenly used words

Maybe or May Be?

Maybe, the compound word, is an adverb meaning "perhaps" or "possibly."

May be is a verb phrase meaning "might be" or "could be."

Examples: Maybe I will go out tonight.

I may be going out tonight.





Moral or Morale?

Morale, accent on second syllable, is a noun meaning "a person's mental or emotional state."

Moral, accent on first syllable, is either a noun meaning "the lesson from a story" or an adjective meaning "virtuous, behaving according to high standards."

Examples: Team morale rose after the no-hitter.

The moral of the story is "Never tell a lie."

She made a point with her moral and ethical actions.





Using Of

Do not use of to replace the verb have.

See Could Of or Could Have? for examples.

The word of following the prepositions outside, inside, off, or atop is nonstandard. Simply drop the word of.

Incorrect: He looked inside of the box.

Correct: He looked inside the box.





Official or Officious?

Official is far more common. It usually is an adjective meaning "authorized." As a noun, it means a person with authority, usually one who has authority to make decisions or decide matters between two parties.

Officious means "meddling in matters not one's concern."





Orient or Orientate?

The word orient as a noun means "east." It may be capitalized when referring to the geographical location of the Far East .

Example: Hong Kong is located in the Orient.

Orient as a verb means to "find direction" or "give direction." The noun form of this kind of orienting is orientation.

Sometimes people in their speech will form an imagined verb from orientation and say orientate. At best, orientate is a back-formation used humorously to make the speaker sound pompous. The correct word is the verb orient.

Incorrect: Melanie is helping me get orientated to the new job.

Correct: Melanie is helping me get oriented to the new job.

Orientate is more widely accepted in the U.K. than in the U.S.A. , but it should be avoided in any formal or standard writing.





Perimeter or Parameter?

These two words are often confused, especially parameter for perimeter.

Perimeter, pronounced with a short i in the second syllable, means "the border or line around an object, especially a two-dimensional geometric figure." By extension, it can refer to the border of any area or any kind of limit.

Parameter, pronounced with a short a in the second syllable, is a specific mathematical or physical term which means "a variable which has the same value in more than one equation." Unfortunately, people will often use the word parameter when they mean "boundary" or "limitation," because it sounds more scientific or technical.

Sociologist Thomas Sowell writes: "One of the incidental examples of 'scientific' puffery is the widespread use of the term 'parameters' to mean boundaries, rather than its actual meaning in mathematical equations. What are usually called 'parameters' in discussions of social policies could more accurately be called perimeters. But of course that would not foster the illusion of 'science.'"