Discussions about eggcorns and related topics
You are not logged in.
The Eggcorn Forum and the Eggcorn Database are currently in the process of being converted into static sites.
Once the conversion is complete, all existing posts are expected to still be accessible at their original URLs. However, no new posts will be possible.
Feel free to comment on the relevant forum threads.
Chris -- 2025-05-10
I’ve been reading Jennifer Raff’s new book on ancient human DNA, Origins. Last night I came across the line in it “These claims were denigraded by….” Odd, I thought, to see such a bald-faced misspelling in a book from a good publisher. It should have been “denigrated.”
The confusion about the spelling of “denigrate” seems to be a common error. You can see hundreds of examples of this misspelling here. According to Google Ngram, the error happens about 1/10 of one percent of the time (there is an odd peak for this error about 1980, for which I have no explanation).
The more I pondered this, the more I thought this must be an eggcorn, or at least a blidiom. People seem to be blending “degrade” with “denigrate.”
Hatching new language, one eggcorn at a time.
Offline
Downgrade too?
*If the human mind were simple enough for us to understand,
we would be too simple-minded to understand it* .
Offline
fwiw
Prior to its buyout, Beatrice faced sagging profits, downigraded debt, anid rumors of possible takeover.
Still, a loan can be downigraded-say, by one notch-to account for the impairment of related loans.
*If the human mind were simple enough for us to understand,
we would be too simple-minded to understand it* .
Offline