Which synonyms do you prefer?

[GodLovesCats]

Your teacher was right - sort of. It's rare to find two words with exactly the same meaning. Often the meaning of one word may 'overlap' with another. The meanings will match at the overlap but each word may also have a number of alternate, different meanings.

English added lots of synonyms following the invasion of Britain in 1066. Blame the French.

What do French people have to do with it?

Although I personally say "supper" except for "going out to dinner" at a restaurant, others always say the word dinner regardless of where they are eating supper.

 

[GodLovesCats]

The word 'vacation' is rarely used here. Annual leave is prescribed at a minimum of 4 weeks (20 days) a year for full time workers and pro rata for part timers. Holiday pay also has a 17.5% leave loading (17.5% extra on top of your normal wage)

Neither "holiday" nor "vacation" have anything to do with employment. People take off work to go on a vacation, which is fun travel, or go on a vacation when they are not in school. Whether a person takes off work or not has no effect on whether the day is a holiday either. Easter is on a Sunday,, so by your definition it would not be a holiday because most people do not work on Sundays.

 

[Aussie Pete]

I think everyone naturally tends to say and write certain words all the time, even though other words they know mean exactly the same thing. What are yours?

PEOPLE
mother or mom
father or dad
grandmother or grandma
grandfather or grandpa
anybody or anyone
everybody or everyone
baby or infant
child or kid
lady or women
guy or man

OCCUPATIONAL
waiter or server
police or cop
worker or staffer
task or chore
assist or help
start or begin
done or finished

NATURE
porcine or swine
kitty or cat
dawn or sunrise
dusk or sunset
creek or brook

GENERAL
ideal or perfect
dinner or supper
ill or sick
trip or vacation
exam or test
big or large
small or little
sarcasm or satire

Of course, I know this is far from a complete list.

Maybe I'm a bit odd. OK, for sure I'm a bit odd. I try deliberately not to repeat the same words, especially when writing. I get irritated by over use of words. One I love to hate is "outcome". What happened to "result"? Or, "conclusion"? Or any other synonym? I'm generally against capital punishment. I'm prepared to make an exception for anyone who uses "outcomes (ugly enough in itself) and "deliverables" (aaarghhh!) in the same sentence. And yes, I have read such a sentence. Once too often.

 

[Aussie Pete]

No it's not. Holiday is the British term for vacation. Americans may have started using it that way, but the word always meant a kind of special day to celebrate What do people call holidays everywhere else?

"Holiday" is a contraction of "Holy Day". When you say goodbye as you depart, it's a contraction of "God be with ye". I don't know any Aussies who talk about vacation. Some "go on leave" when they take their paid time off work. Otherwise it's a holiday. Going on leave is military-speak as well.

 

[Mark Quayle]

My questions assumes context usually is not important.

I know. That is why I said what I did. Without bearing certain things in mind, the question approaches meaninglessness.

 

[Occams Barber]

No it's not. Holiday is the British term for vacation. Americans may have started using it that way, but the word always meant a kind of special day to celebrate What do people call holidays everywhere else?

See Posts #14 and #16.

OB

 

[Occams Barber]

What do French people have to do with it?

The Norman French (from Normandy) invaded England in 1066. At the time English people spoke Old English (aka Anglo Saxon) - a Germanic language. The French speaking Normans took over all the top positions in the church, military, aristocracy, the law and as landowners but did not displace the ordinary people. This meant that, for several centuries England had two languages - Norman French at the top and Old English among the ordinary people.

Over time the two languages merged to become the early version of what we know as Middle English. In the process of merging the language often ended up with both French and English words for similar things. For example; 'vacation' is originally French while 'holiday' comes from Old English. As a result we ended up with a lot of synonyms.

Although I personally say "supper" except for "going out to dinner" at a restaurant, others always say the word dinner regardless of where they are eating supper.

No-one in Australia says 'supper'. In Australia the evening meal is always 'dinner' while the midday meal is 'lunch'. My parents came from the north of England where 'dinner' was the midday meal and the evening meal was 'tea'. 'Dinner' was also a generic term for the food sitting on your plate at any mealtime.

Context.

OB

 

[Occams Barber]

Easter is on a Sunday,, so by your definition it would not be a holiday because most people do not work on Sundays.

A Public Holiday is a paid day off here. If you get paid for not going to work, its a holiday. Where the day falls on a Sunday the (paid) Public Holiday is usually on the following Monday. In the case of Easter, Good Friday and Easter Monday are paid holidays.

In general usage a holiday here is paid time off either as part of your 4 weeks annual leave or on a Public Holiday. Christmas, Easter, New Years Day, Australia Day, ANZAC day, Queens Birthday, Labour Day are all paid Public Holidays by law. The British equivalent is a 'Bank Holiday'.

In the US 'holiday' usually refers to a special event day (e.g., Christmas, Easter, Thanksgiving) where businesses might close but does not necessarily include mandatory payment.

OB

 

[GodLovesCats]

Maybe I'm a bit odd. OK, for sure I'm a bit odd. I try deliberately not to repeat the same words, especially when writing. I get irritated by over use of words. One I love to hate is outcome. What happened to result? Or, conclusion? Or any other synonym? I'm generally against capital punishment. I'm prepared to make an exception for anyone who uses "outcomes (ugly enough in itself) and deliverables (aaarghhh!) in the same sentence. And yes, I have read such a sentence. Once too often.

I never understood the word outcome either. It does not mean someone came out of something to get an effect. The word conclusion must be used instead of result in scientific research papers but I would prefer they use the word result to go along with "test results" for hospital patients.

What happened to "cause and effect" sentences? Now I usually see the word "correlation" as if there is no way to prove what happened was the direct effect of a cause (which was the hypothesis). If that is true, a study is useless. I want researchers to stop using the word "correlation" and replace it with "cause/effect."

 

[GodLovesCats]

"Holiday" is a contraction of Holy Day.

That is why I think calling vacations holidays is ridiculous. The phrase "go on holiday" is interpreted in the U.S. as "take a vacation" - meaning they travel, regardless of employment status.

 

[GodLovesCats]

In the US 'holiday' usually refers to a special event day (e.g., Christmas, Easter, Thanksgiving) where businesses might close but does not necessarily include mandatory payment.

There are a few U.S. holidays that government employees take off, but most others do not: Martin Luther King Jr. Day, Presidents Day, Columbus Day, and Veterans Day.

New Year's Day, Memorial Day, Independence Day, Labor Day, Thanksgiving, and Christmas are the public holidays (known as "federal" here) that most people do get a paid day off for. If any of these holidays is a Saturday or Sunday, businesses are allowed (but not required) to give employees Friday or Monday a day off. (Thanksgiving is always on a Thursday. Depending on the industry, many businesses can be closed on the following day.) We do not have Easter Monday.

 

[Occams Barber]

I never understood the word outcome either. It does not mean someone came out of something to get an effect. The word conclusion must be used instead of result in scientific research papers but I would prefer they use the word result to go along with "test results" for hospital patients.

What happened to "cause and effect" sentences? Now I usually see the word "correlation" as if there is no way to prove what happened was the direct effect of a cause (which was the hypothesis). If that is true, a study is useless. I want researchers to stop using the word "correlation" and replace it with "cause/effect."

There's a saying in the statistical business:

"Correlation is not causation"
​

If a report is using the word 'correlation' and not 'causation' there is probably a good reason. Correlation, while it might infer a causal relationship, is not proof of cause. While correlation might infer causation a correlation between two sets of data can be interpreted in a number of ways:

• A co-incidence?
• Did A cause B or did B cause A?
• Were A and B both caused by C?
• Were A and B caused by multiple factors?
• Were A and B in a feedback loop where A caused B, which caused A, which caused B.....

No competent statistician would assume causation without additional data.

OB

 

[Occams Barber]

Yeah, we don't have anything of the sort here. That's all just considered "perks" that the employer can offer if they please. They have to pay time-and-a-half for hours worked past forty hours, or you can have a salary and not get anything for overtime.

Well, we at least have that, sort of. You guys probably get paid, but we just have laws that keep us from getting fired for taking time off for that sort of thing.

From the outside, the US employment system looks like something out of a Charles Dickens novel.

OB