A quandary
It is very clear to me that spelling mistakes are a sign of unprofessionalism, but what is not clear to me is what one should do in the situation of being British, but living in America. Whilst I was teaching I steadfastly stuck to British spellings, asking the students to compute the centre of mass of a glass of water modelled as follows... But now I wonder if perhaps that was the wrong thing to do. If I was working in any non-English speaking country, I would of course write exams/papers in their language, if it was required, and use their spellings. But somehow switching to American spellings just seems so wrong.
I am now writing something jointly with my boss, an American, and I am wondering if perhaps I should be considering the stabilization of traveling waves. But it looks so ugly! What should I do?
posted by Claire @ 9:16 am
2 comments
2 Comments:
If you want reassurance on the 'stabilization point' then follow Fowler, who writes that 'ize' is the proper and natural form. He justifies this on the basis that the Greek origin is 'izo' and that phonetically it should be a 'z'. There are exceptions to the rule, though, including advertise, compromise etc, but stabilise does not appear on his list. Hope that helps.
Of course, 'traveling' is simply wrong. But when in Rome...
Post a Comment
<< Home