The modern use of semester also differs between languages. In English, the word refers to a study period at schools and universities. In the USA there are two semesters, spring and fall. In the UK three are three, usually called terms, autumn, spring, and summer. The sense of study period comes from German Semester. In Swedish, this is termin.

Semester in Swedish means holiday or vacation. It is not six months long, but at least five weeks with pay.

Semester is a typical false friend in English and Swedish. With the same origin, the word has very different meanings in the two languages. You can read more about false friends here.

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Over these years I have written about the difference between recollect and re-collect, grateful and thankful, discrete and discreet, different and various, technique and technology, unsatisfied and dissatisfied, and many others. I have explained how to use brackets and parentheses, how to write compound words, and how to use abbreviations. I have shown that ’they’ can refer to one person and clarified the difference between compare to and compare with. I have written about false friends and about English idioms, and I have explained what a backronym is.

After 115 blog entries, I hope that I have been able to help my readers understand English better and avoid making mistakes that could be both embarrassing and disastrous.

In the column on the right, you can find all my blog posts. You can see a list of the latest topics and you can search for a particular word that you would like to know more about.

Let me know if there is a word or an expression that you would like me to write about. And if you are writing your dissertation or a paper for a scientific journal and would like me to copyedit it before submitting, send an email to info@copyeditor.se.

Seven years after the start, this is my first blog entry in 2026. I hope there will be more.

The post Seven years! appeared first on copyeditor.se.

Connotations are associations and feelings that a word evokes. They can be positive, negative, or neutral. Connotations are shaped by culture and context and may differ from person to person.

The difference in connotations between two languages must, of course, be taken into consideration by those communicating in the two languages.

Connotations can be shared by many people. The English word house to most people has a neutral connotation – it means a type of residential building, especially a one-family dwelling. The word home, on the other hand, has positive connotations of warmth, security, and family life.

Connotations may differ also between languages. While the Swedish word hem has the same connotations as the English home, Swedish hus has wider connotations than English house and may refer to any residential building irrespective of size, such as a block of flats.

Another example of a word with different connotations in English and Swedish is villa. In English, a villa is a large and luxurious country house, especially in continental Europe. In the UK it is a large, detached house in a residential area, especially from  Edwardian or Victorian time. Villa can also refer to a large country house of Roman times with farm and residential buildings around a courtyard. The Latin word villa meant manor, country estate.

In Swedish, a villa is a one-family house or a bungalow. The main goals in life of medelsvensson, the average Swede, are said to be villa, Volvo, vovve, a house, a Volvo, a doggie.

To make things more complicated, the Swedish word villa can also mean illusion or delusion.

A city in English refers to a large town. In Swedish, city has the connotation of downtown.

An amusing, and arguably misleading, example is North American restroom, a euphemism for lavatory or toilet. To non-native speakers the connotation with the verb rest, relax, will be natural. In my book about English–Swedish false friends I relate a story about an American who was picking up his Swedish friend at an airport. When they got in the car, the American said, ”Perhaps you need to go to the restroom?”, and without hesitation, the Swede answered, ”No, I can do that in the car”.

To recognize connotations is crucial in localization, by which a product is adapted to a specific market. You can read more about it here.

Finally, a denotation is the dictionary definition of a word, the objective meaning of the word.

The post Connotations in English and Swedish appeared first on copyeditor.se.

UNSATISFIED

When you are unsatisfied, you are not yet satisfied or fulfilled. There is incompleteness, a lack of something. You are not getting everything that is needed. Unsatisfied can refer to both people and things and ideas.

Children often feel an unsatisfied hunger for love and acceptance.
The defendant argued that the obligations under the contract were unsatisfied.

DISSATISFIED

When you are dissatisfied, you feel unhappy, displeased, disappointed, frustrated. Dissatisfied refers to how people feel.

Fred was dissatisfied with the wallpaper in his living-room.

To sum up,

Unsatisfied = unfulfilled
Dissatisfied = annoyed, not happy

Some related words:

Dissatisfaction – disappointment, discontent
Dissatisfactory – causes dissatisfaction 
Unsatisfactory – inadequate
Unsatisfying – failing to satisfy

Read about uninterested and disinterested here.

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PRICE

Price refers to the amount of money you pay when you buy something.

The price of coffee had gone up by 12%.

Price is also used figuratively in the sense of consequence or cost:

He had to pay a high price for his support of the party’s failed candidate. 

Price can also be used as a verb meaning to put a price on something, to say how much something costs or is worth.

He was reluctant to price the old furniture.
The young couple thought the house was priced too high.
Entrance is priced at €7 for adults and €5.50 for children.

To price in (with the stress on in) has two meanings:

1. To include the cost of something in the total price

You need to price in the cost of packaging and freight.

2. To consider a factor when deciding a price

We must price in the risk of increased raw material costs.

PRIZE

Prize (with a voiced s-sound) refers to an award earned in a competition or through talent. It is associated with achievement and recognition.

My daughter won first prize in the baking competition.

A prize flower or animal is one that is of very good quality, one that has won or deserves to win a prize.

A prize idiot is the same as a complete idiot.

As a verb, to prize has two meanings:

1. To value highly

That old photo is one of my most prized possessions.

2. To force open (sometimes also spelled prise)

I prized the lid open with a spoon.
She prised the little boy’s fingers apart and took the pill from him.

The post Price or prize? appeared first on copyeditor.se.

THERE

There is an adverb. It refers to a special place and means in (or at or to) that place.

I have read a lot about Stockholm and I have always wanted to go there.
You can put you bag over there.
We go there every summer.

There is also used in a more abstract sense:

Hello there!
There you go (=Now it starts again).
There, there, it won’t hurt much longer now (said to comfort).

There can also be used as a formal subject, usually to say that something exists.

There is a nice pub just round the corner.
There is a new edition of her guidebook.
There seems to be a slight mistake here.

While there has many functions, their and they’re have only one meaning each.

THEIR

Their means belonging to them.

Have you seen their new house?
Their daughter is fifteen.

THEY’RE

They’re is a contracted form of they are.

They’re waiting for us at their hotel.

See also my post about it’s and its.

The post There, their and they’re appeared first on copyeditor.se.

It is clear that false friends may give rise to amusing and sometimes embarrassing mistakes, but they can also cause potentially disastrous misunderstandings with serious consequences.

Here are some examples of English false friends in other languages
(The first letter in German nouns is upper-case):

English–French

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A critic in English refers to a person. It is someone who criticizes something, in other words, expresses criticism.

A critic is also someone who gives an opinion about books, films, music, etc., usually professionally in a paper or magazine or on radio or television. A critic writes a review.

A critique is a detailed analysis and assessment, usually of a literary, philosophical, or political theory.

The problem for Swedish speakers of English is that both criticism and critique correspond to the same word in Swedish, kritik, and that critic can be mistakenly taken to mean kritik.

The post Critic or critique—what’s the difference? appeared first on copyeditor.se.

TECHNIQUE

Technique refers to how you carry out a particular task, an efficient way of achieving something or the skill needed to do so. In order to swim fast, for example, you need a good technique. The corresponding adjective is technical.

TECHNOLOGY

Technology is applied science, the use of scientific knowledge and methods to accomplish a task. Technology is used to improve products and services. The corresponding adjective is technological.

To sum up, technology gives us the tools and technique determines how the tools are used.

The post Technique and technology appeared first on copyeditor.se.

The two words biannual and biennial are easily confused.

Both come from Latin bi-, twice, and annus, year.

Biannual means occurring twice a year, and biennial means occurring every second year – think of the Venice Biennial (in Italian la Biennale di Venezia).

Perhaps you polish your car or clear out your garage twice every year – then that is a biannual activity. If you go to a conference that is held every two years, you attend a biennial conference.

Biennial can also refer to a plant that blooms or bears fruit in its second year and then dies.

Instead of biannual, you can write semiannual; both words refer to something happening twice a year or every half year.

Biweekly and bimonthly don’t have this distinction – there is no vowel as in annus that could show the difference. Biweekly could mean both twice a week and once every second week. A bimonthly magazine could be one that is published twice a month or every two months. As a writer, you need to make it clear what you intend to say.

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