Grammar vs. Spelling

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I'm currently using

Grammar lesson of the day: You have to lose weight to make your pants loose.

as my signature.

Is my sig correct? Is this a grammar lesson or is it a spelling lesson. I admit to not knowing (it has been years since I was in an English class)

 

I've always thought about grammer as relating to sentence structure, whereas spelling is more about things like "to" vs. "too" vs. "two" vs "WTF".

In this case, spelling.

 

Spelling as per everyone else. Although I think an argument could be made for grammar especially if English is your second language.

 

Yeah, that's a spelling lesson. Grammar deals more with capitalization, comma usage, and the like.

 

Isn't that punctuation?

 

Well, I've surprised myself, but I have to take an opposing opinion to the crowd here.

I'd call this a grammar lesson, since it involves similar, often-confused words and their meanings. The fact is, "You have to loose weight to make your pants lose." could still have each word spelled correctly, but merely placed in the wrong....er, place.

"You have to luse weight to make your pants loose." would be a much more obvious a spelling lesson.

...hmmm Okay, upon second thought, even my first 'example sentence' is completely ambiguous on the grammar vs. spelling front; it could be a case of the writer understands the purpose and usage of each word, but doesn't know how to spell the words, or it would also be plausible that the author of the sentence can spell the words, but is uncertain on the proper use of the words in a sentence...

And just to satisfy my nit-picking compulsion, we could say this is a "morphology lesson"

 

JE, good argument. And now that I've already voted maybe you've persuaded me otherwise. I said spelling, but one could certainly argue that it's grammar based on your definitions.
Or you could add a third option, syntax: the ordering of and relationship between the words and other structural elements in phrases and sentences, according the Encarta dictionary installed on this computer.

 

A lesson about lexical confusion caused by near-homophony. It's lexicology. Sorry, guys.

 

Well, I was gonna cover both bases and suggest "English Lesson of the Day:..."

But yours works at least as well.

 

It's a vocabulary lesson. English is full of these kinds of words: There and their, and know and no. These are generally referred to as homonyms, but as Chev points out, words that have different meanings and are spelled differently are referred to as "Homophones." (or words that can't get married, except in MA). Technically, words that have the same spelling but different meanings are homographs:The word "light" would be a good example. It could mean something "not heavy" or the "opposite of dark."

Edit - But in this instance - lose or loose - the spelling is different. But all these are generally referred to as homonyms. Actually, the words illustrated can sound slightly different in use...it is near-homophony.

 

I find it very interesting just how many times "grammar" has been misspelled in this thread.

 

Must be all the

 

I'd say spelling. It would be grammar if it we're a matter of two, too and to but these are two different words not one word with different spelling and meaning.

 

Hmmm...I still think that Chev has the right call. If we had to categorize it outside of the narrow parameters of spelling or grammar, then it would be vocabulary, which btw, would include spelling, meaning and usage. But as Chev has already pointed out, it is just a confusion of a near homophony.

 

Out of these choices, I would call it a spelling lesson: the confusion between the two words comes from not knowing how they should be spelled.

Of course, you could just write "Lesson of the day" in your sig

 

We have a winner. thanks Jaded Empath.

It goes against my standards to have a "homo" signature

 

And we thought it was just your New Year's Resolution....

 

Bah! I guess you don't drink homogenised milk either.