English words are similar to Russian in spelling. The translator's "false friends" mislead us

Today we will analyze 20 pairs of words that are similar in spelling and sound in English. You will learn not to confuse the diary with dairy products, but the fair with fares.

To make it easier for you to feel the difference between the words, we will present data about them in tablets. We will talk about the exact meanings of words, their synonyms, and also give examples of their use in speech.

You can practice complex words in your speech in a lesson with one of.

1. Accept or except

note: accept is a verb, while except is most often used as a preposition or conjunction.

2. Affect or effect

note: the word affect most often appears as a verb, and effect as a noun. As a verb, effect is sometimes used in formal speech in the sense of "lead to execution", "cause action". Here's an example:

This politician has effected many reforms. - This politician brought into action many reforms.

3. Desert or dessert

note: the word desert can also be used as a verb meaning "leave", "leave". Here's an example:

birds deserted this area because of cold weather. - Birds left this area because of the cold weather.

4. Envelop or envelope

note: envelop is a verb and envelope is a noun. You can remember this: you need a noun, so we write envelopE.

5. Loose or lose

note: most often loose is used as an adjective, and lose is used as a verb. Some advise to memorize the spelling like this: if you need the verb "lose", then "lose" one letter "o" in the word loose.

6. Principal or principle

note: the word principle means some kind of rule, standard, principle. And we use principal when we talk about someone important: the boss, the main character of the play, the rector of the university, etc.

7. Stationary or stationary

note: stationery is always a noun, that is, it names some objects. At the same time, stationary is an adjective, that is, with the help of this word, we characterize some object as motionless.

8. Beside and besides

note: besides often acts as an introductory word, in such cases it is separated by a comma.

9. Cook or cooker

note: the word cooker is more commonly used in the UK, in the US a stove is usually called a stove.

10. Current and current

note: current is most often used as an adjective and is translated as “current”, “acting”. The word current is also used to refer to the flow of water or air, but it is less common in general texts or videos. Currant is just a noun, it means berry.

11. Efficient and efficient

note: the difference between these words is quite difficult to catch. Let's try to figure them out. The word effective can be translated as "having the desired effect", it indicates whether the result was achieved. The word efficient demonstrates how efficiently the available resources are used: money, time, etc.

12. Personal and personnel

note: personal is an adjective, that is, with this word we characterize something. Personnel is a noun that refers to a group of people.

13 Quiet or quiet

note: the word quite is an adverb, it characterizes the verb. In our example, it shows how interesting the person is, how confident you are. Quiet is an adjective, it characterizes a noun: the child (what?) is calm, the engine (what?) is quiet.

14. Sensible or sensitive

note: the word sensitivity (sensitivity), sensitive (sensitive) has already entered the Russian language, so it will be easier to remember.

15. Shade or shadow

note: to learn to distinguish between these two words, imagine the following situation. If on a hot summer day you stand in the shade of a tree (shadow), you will find yourself in a cool shade (shade).

16. Conscience or conscious

17. Dairy or diary

You just have to remember the spelling and pronunciation of these words, otherwise you risk buying a diary instead of your favorite dairy product abroad.

18. Device or device

note: It's pretty easy to remember how to use each of these words. We need a noun - we take deviCe, we need a verb - devise.

19. Fair or fare

note: Associations can be used to memorize these words. Fare is somewhat similar to the Russian “headlight”, but we pay the fare just in vehicles with headlights.

20. Career or carrier

note: we all know the word carry (carry, transport), by analogy with it, you can also remember the word carrier - carrier, carrier.

We have analyzed 20 pairs of English words that are most often confused. We hope that now it will be easier for you to use them in your speech. Try to use our tips and carefully understand what is the difference between them. And don't forget to bookmark this article so you can come back and review it as needed.

Municipal educational institution

"Secondary school No. 000"

Homonyms and cognates of English, Russian and Armenian languages

(research work)

completed:

Harutyunyan A.,

3rd grade student

MOU "School № 000"

scientific director:

English teacher language

MOU "School № 000"

Barnaul - 2011

Introduction 3

I. Words of different languages ​​similar in sound 4

1. Homonyms and cognates 4

2. Consonant English and Russian words 5

3. Consonant words in English and Armenian 8

4. Lost in translation 9

Conclusion 11

Literature 12

Introduction

7. "Other"

Thus, out of 70 English words consonant with Russian, 39 words coincide in meaning, which is 55.7%; 31 words do not match in meaning, which is 44.3%.

3. Consonant words in English and Armenian

Comparing the sound of English words with the words of my native language, Armenian, I got the following results:

It follows from the above that among the English words consonant with the Armenian words there are similar and different in meaning. Of the 70 English words consonant with Russian, 25 English words have a similar sound to Armenian words (35.7%), out of these 25 words 16 have the same meaning (64%) and 9 words do not have the same meaning (36%).

4. Difficulties in translation

Some of the interlingual homonyms were formed due to the fact that after borrowing the meaning of the word in one of the languages ​​changed, in other cases there was no borrowing at all, and the words come from a common root in some ancient language, but have different meanings; sometimes the consonance is purely coincidental.

Many people are mistaken in believing that consonant words from different languages ​​are translator's assistants. Interlingual homonyms are false friends of the translator and can lead to misunderstanding and translation of the text. Consider an example where, when translating the sentence “I like lemons and cakes” from Russian into English, the translator can make a mistake and translate as follows: “I like lemons and torts”. In fact, the word "tort" in English means "civil wrong" and the translator's sentence means "I like lemons and wrongdoing." "Ann has got a baton" can be translated by an inexperienced translator as "Anna has got a baton", in fact the English word "baton" means "conductor's baton". Thus, people who study foreign languages ​​should pay great attention to consonant words and do not forget that many of them still have different meanings; in order to be a good translator, you must have a solid knowledge of foreign words and distinguish between cognates and homonyms.

Conclusion

In different languages, there are often words that are similar in spelling or sound to words in other languages. The purpose of this work was to determine whether the meaning of consonant or similar in spelling words from different languages ​​always coincides. Having studied reference books, I found concepts that define groups of words that are similar in sound and meaning, as well as similar in sound but different in meaning. After reviewing the English-Russian dictionary and the dictionary in the English textbook, I found 70 English words consonant with Russian and 25 English words consonant with Armenian. Comparing the meaning of these English words with the meaning of consonant Russian and Armenian words, I came to the conclusion that consonant words from different languages ​​do not always coincide in meaning. Thus, the hypothesis was confirmed. About 55% of consonant English and Russian words and 36% of consonant English and Armenian words do not match in meaning. This can lead to mistranslation and distortion of the meaning of the text. It follows from this that a person studying foreign languages ​​should pay special attention to consonant words. To help students and teachers could serve memos that would contain information about cognates and interlingual homonyms.

Literature

1. English: English with pleasure / Textbook for grade 3. - Obninsk: Title, 2010.-144p.:ill.

2. English-Russian and Russian-English dictionary. 65 thousand words. Revised edition. M .: - "Lad-Kom". - 2009. - 800 pp.

3. The latest dictionary of foreign words and expressions. - Minsk: Modern writer, 2007. - 976s.

5. http://ru. wikipedia. org/wiki/%D0%9E%D0%BC%D0%BE%D0%BD%D0%B8%D0%BC

6. http://*****/Citates/1838/10

7. http://wiki. *****/index. php/%D0%9A%D0%BE%D0%B3%D0%BD%D0%B0%D1%82%D1%8B

I want to start the article with a funny joke that I recently came across:

How do you cure a headache?

Put your head through a window and the pane disappears!

Funny, right? ... How not? Why not? English humor - you say. Of course, there is nothing more unpleasant than explaining an anecdote or a joke that you just told. But I'll try. The fact is that this joke is based on a play on the words PAIN (pain) and PANE (window glass). English humor is so incomprehensible that many anecdotes and jokes are based on the so-called "play on words". English has a huge potential for this, as it has a large number of homophone words: they sound the same, but have different spellings and meanings.

Homophones cause difficulty not only for language learners, but also for native children when they are introduced to the language at school, and even for educated native speakers. Even they sometimes do not understand what the interlocutor means, especially if homophones are the same parts of speech. Therefore, funny situations arise that take the form of anecdotes.

Why do different words sound the same?

English is a mixture of different languages ​​and therefore has many reading rules. If you are familiar with the phonetic structure of a language, then you know that it has dozens of reading rules and hundreds of exceptions to them. In addition, there are silent letters, different vowels and their combinations convey the same sound. You will see this in the examples that I will give in this article.

How many homophones are there in English?

Various sources give about 450 homophones that are used in English. Some of them are rarely used because they have more common synonyms, but there are those that are regularly misleading. Of course, you should not memorize all the homophones at once, but you should take note.

What are homophones?

Homophones come in several forms. Homophones can be individual words(hear - here) , this category is the most numerous. In addition, the same pronunciation can have word forms: different forms of verbs, plural nouns and others (red - read, seen - scene, brows - browse). And besides this, the whole word combinations may be homophones. Most popular: its - it "s, they're - there.

In this article, we will talk about homophones. Two or sometimes three words may have the same transcription. All homophones could not fit into the framework of one article, so I divided them into three articles: A - H, I - S and S - W. In the list below you will find homophones with transcription, pronunciation examples and phrase examples of usage.

AISLE- pass

ISLE- island

An aisle seat - aisle seat
to stand in the aisle - stand in the aisle
the isle of Bali

BARE- naked

BEAR- bear, endure, endure; bear

To walk barefoot - walk barefoot
I can't bear him. - I can't take it.
a brown bear

BEAT- beat, knock; beat, rhythm

BEET- beet

A heartbeat - the rhythm of the heart
sugar beet - sugar beet

BOUGH- bough, big branch

BOW- bow; bow down, bow down

The boughs of a tree - tree branches
to bow before the king - bow to the king

BUY- buy

BY- near/at

BYE- Bye!

To buy a new house - buy a new house
to stand by the door - stand at the door
He said “Bye!” - He said: "Bye!"

CELL- cell, cell, section

SELL- sell

A blood cell - blood cell
to merge cells - merge cells
to sell clothes - sell clothes

CENT- cent

SCENT- pleasant smell, aroma

It costs 50 cents. - It costs 50 cents.
the scent of flowers - the scent of flowers

COARSE- rude

COURSE- well

COMPLEMENT- addition; to complement

COMPLIMENT- compliment

A perfect complement
and direct complement - direct complement
to pay a compliment - give a compliment

CREAK- creak, creak

CREEK- stream

The creak of the stairs - the creak of the stairs
to sit by a creek - sit by the creek

CUE- hint, hint

QUEUE- turn

To have no cues - do not have clues
to stand in a queue - stand in line

DEAR- dear, respected

DEER- deer

Dear Mr Smith - Dear Mr Smith
Dear uncle - Dear uncle
a herd of deer - a herd of deer

DEW- dew

DUE- due, expected

Morning dew - morning dew
It is due to come. - It has to happen.

DISCREET- prudent, cautious; prudent, prudent, prudent

DISCRETE- separate, segregated, segregated

A discreet question - a discreet question
a discrete element - a discrete element

DUAL- double, dual

DUEL- duel

The dual role - double role
to challenge somebody to a duel - challenge someone to a duel

FIR- spruce

FUR- fur

A fir tree
a fur coat

FLEA- flea

FLEE- run away

To be fit as a flea - be healthy, cheerful ("jump like a flea")

FOUL- disgusting, nasty; dirty, polluted, impure, unclean

FOWL- bird, game; Domestic bird

A foul room - dirty room
a foul person - a disgusting person
to order fowl at a restaurant - order game in a restaurant

GRATE- to rub (on a grater), rub

GREAT- beautiful, wonderful, amazing

A fireplace grate
to grate carrot - grate carrots
a great chance - a great chance

HALL- corridor, hall, gallery

HAUL- drag, pull, drag, drag, tow

dance hall - dance hall
to haul a car out of the river - pull the car out of the river

HEAR- hear

HERE- here

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Have you ever noticed how quickly children find a common language even on the condition that they themselves are from different countries, and while one speaks Russian, the other speaks English with might and main? At the same time, they talk very well, and far from gestures. How so? We pore over textbooks, study the phrase book in search of the right phrase, and the child smiles and joins the game with foreign-speaking friends without any problems.

The reason is banal to the point of horror: in English and Russian there are several thousand words similar in sound and meaning. Because both languages ​​are part of one large family of languages ​​- Indo-European. Accordingly, the roots are the same, but then there is a branching: the Russian language belongs to the Balto-Slavic branch, while English belongs to the Germanic branch. Now it is clear why both in the USA and in Russia it is possible to guess the meaning of words without an interpreter nose, sister, mom, final, doctor, lamp. All these words have the same roots.

In addition, language is a living organism. It cannot stand still (that's why Esperanto has remained "dead"), it is constantly acquiring new words, discarding old ones, reworking complex ones. For example, the notorious printer, jumper, jeans - this is understandable even to the Chinese. And there are more such words than you can imagine.

The only question is, who was the first? The argument is as pointless as the chicken and the egg. True, with regard to languages, everything is a little simpler: the first was Greek. The one who gave us medicine, music and other nice things. As an alternative, the first was Latin :) The one that is "instantly at sea."

To be corrosive, then similar English and Russian words can be divided into several groups:

1) Exact copy of Russian.

These are the very words that foreigners really liked or cannot be translated unambiguously. And even simply for the reason that the word loses all its charm with the translation.

Vodka, bortsch(may the Ukrainians forgive me), balalaika, perestroika, beluga, ruble, babushka(with a sweet accent on the second syllable), samovar, dacha(Yes, yes, foreigners cannot call our huts in gardening anthills another word) and many others.

2) Exact copy of English.

Here is just an infinite number: fitness, copier, driver, printer, goalkeeper, football, volleyball, basketball, handball, fast food, deadline, bonus, comeback, copywriter, merchandiser, manager, cleaning, blackout, spoiler, dress code, showroom, fake, shopping etc. etc.

3) General historical borrowings

Mother - mother, sister - sister, nose - nose, number - number, three - three, address - address, wine - wine, television - television, classroom - class, coffee - coffee,be - be, goose - goose, eat - eat, brow - eyebrow, crook - hook, beat - beat, cheek - cheek, widow - widow, talk - interpret, beard - beard, stream - rapids, grab - rob, deal - business, pastor - shepherd, pastor, dale - dol, valley, stall - stall and other words.

Did you notice that the translation in brackets was superfluous? Most of you, even if you don't have an Advanced level certificate, will be able to translate these words without any problems.

Check your erudition:
University, sport, idea, hospital, brother, hotel, student, bank.

It is interesting how, over time, the word "becomes brown" in Russian and "angles" in English. For example, if mother, daughter in Russian still repeat the suffix -er, then television and television have only common roots ("body" and "see"). And, for example, banking and sports are just twin brothers with bank and sports.

That is, roots are roots, but nutrition reaches the branches in different ways. And if it’s easy for an Englishman to pronounce “hospital”, then it’s easier for a Russian to say with his favorite explosive “g” - “hospital”.

In general, if you get into a decent dictionary of the Russian language, then in front of each word in brackets will be (from the Greek. "..." / from the Latin. "..."). What to do, and the main part of the planet uses borrowings from Latin or Greek. The exception is other families of foreign languages. For example, Sino-Tibetan. More specifically, Chinese. Here you can hardly catch any familiar words in speech. If only modern type of computer, jeans, copier. On the other hand, looking at the statistics of speakers of each language, you can seriously think. The world has the most Chinese speakers (1,000 million!), English speakers are in second place (350 million), Spanish (250 million) closes the top three, followed by Hindi (200 million) and Arabic speakers scored the same number of points, Bengali and Russian (150 million each).

From all that has been said, one bold and thick conclusion follows: no matter how hard the guardians for the purity of their native language try, it will still behave as it sees fit. Moreover, no one will say what the original Russian words are. After all, the same “water”, “son”, “earth” are rooted in the parent language - Indo-European.

It's the same with English. It is believed that it has at least 4,000 words similar in sound and meaning to Russian. If you think about it, this is a pretty decent vocabulary. Of course, it will not help to compose a grammatically correct form of a sentence, but at the level of "I understand yours" you can communicate very productively. And for some, more is not required :)

The origin of individual words that completely coincide in different languages ​​is generally an interesting thing. For example, it was a real discovery for me to learn about such:

1. Hooligan- once this surname was in one family in Ireland. And they were famous, as you might guess, for their special behavior. So the surname became a common noun.

2. Galimatias- a gift from students from France. The word appeared in the 16th century and had a literal meaning "rooster science" ("to teach a rooster").

3. Avral- from English over all (military team - “all up”).

4. Dromedery(dromedary) - a one-humped camel. This word owes its origin to the root dromas (lat.) - “to run”. Accordingly, it is easy to guess that the dromedary is a real sprinter compared to other animals. But it is even more interesting that the same root can be found in such words as hippodrome, airfield, autodrome.

5. Palisade and the front garden are rooted in palus (stick, stake).

6. canicular days(vacation) - the period in July-August, when the star Sirius rises in the constellation Canis Major. In Rome, it was called Canicula (canis - dog). Therefore, by and large, what we call holidays are dog days :)

7. Booze- from the Dutch bouse (alcoholic drink, to get drunk). And what is the connection with Russian? "Buzit" - that is, to get drunk.

In addition, there are a lot of words in English with French roots. This happened when the Normans conquered England (XI century). French began to be spoken by the townspeople and rulers, and English by the villagers. It is very significant in this sense that the names of animals remained English, but their meat - in the French manner:

pig - pork (pig - pork)
cow - beef (cow - beef)
sheep - lamb (sheep - lamb)
hen - chicken (chicken - chicken).

specially for