Discussions about eggcorns and related topics
You are not logged in.
Registrations are currently closed because of a technical problem. Please send email to
The forum administrator reserves the right to request users to plausibly demonstrate that they are real people with an interest in the topic of eggcorns. Otherwise they may be removed with no further justification. Likewise, accounts that have not been used for posting may be removed.
Thanks for your understanding.
Chris -- 2018-04-11
Our archetechture makes it easy to add capabilities,
modern home flat roof designer modern archetechture
And 1.7k other hits.
.
This is another one that you wonder what’s going on. If people are perceiving the same root in architecture as in technical and high-tech , that is hardly surprising. It is also the same root, if you go all the way back to Greek, right? (I’m in a meeting and probably’d better not check.) Yet it feels like a restructuring of sorts, to me.
.
The archi/arche difference is probably almost anything but salient to most people, though for me arch(i) is associated with meanings like ‘prime, exceptionally good, specially important, high-level’ and so forth (as in “archi-phonemeâ€, “arch-bishopâ€), but arche with ‘old, primitive’ and things like that (as in “archeologyâ€, “archeopteryxâ€). Again, the same Greek root is presumably responsible for both.
.
Anyhow, it’s an interesting misspelling. And it twice brings up the issue of whether etymology is the ultimate or only definitive criterion for whether two morphemes are the same or different. Fwiw I am of the opinion that it is not: when two etymologically related semantic branches get far enough apart, they are essentially separate words/morphemes for speakers. It is of course very, very complicated.
Last edited by DavidTuggy (2009-05-19 15:12:27)
*If the human mind were simple enough for us to understand,
we would be too simple-minded to understand it* .
Offline
I would consider this the basis of a faulty spelling mnemonic… a little more sophisticated than eye dialect because the spelling rule seems to have some basis in reality. I guess your find would qualify as an eggcorn in many situations, yet in some instances a person may sense that the word has been misspelled—but simply leaves the best attempt at spelling behind. (Perhaps that too could be considered an eggcorn on some level).
By the way, what do people generally do when they know they don’t know how to spell a word, but don’t have quick access to a dictionary or spell-checker? I would think that some logical spelling gets left behind—even though it doesn’t look quite right.
Offline