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.

The post Semester – work or leisure? appeared first on copyeditor.se.

Rapport in English refers to a harmonious relationship, a good understanding, or an ability to communicate well. A speaker wants to have a good rapport with his or her audience. They are, as the saying goes, on the same wavelength. In Swedish, this would be bra publikkontakt, bra relation.

Rapport comes from the French word rapporter, to bring back. This is also reflected in the Swedish meaning of the word, which is report. That was also the original sense of rapport in Middle English. The sense of good understanding emerged in English in the mid 17^th century.

The news on one Swedish TV channel is called Rapport.

You can read more about false friends here.

The post Rapport isn’t what you think it is appeared first on copyeditor.se.

Black is Swedish slang meaning broke, without money. In English, to be in the black means just the opposite, profitable, having money in the bank.

The English expression in the red means that you are in debt or that you are losing money. The idiom comes from bookkeeping, where losses were recorded in red ink.

So, to be black in Swedish is the same as being in the red in English.

You can read about many other such false friends in my book.

And if you want to learn more about English idioms, you will find some here and here. Some idioms are unique to English, while others are identical in English and Swedish.

The post When you’re black, you’re in the red appeared first on copyeditor.se.

Fart in English is what you do when you let out gas through your anus or the sound of that action. A nicer way to express this is to say break wind, which is what Old English feortan meant. The corresponding Swedish verb is fisa or prutta.

Fart in Swedish comes from Low German faren, to travel.

In Swedish, fart means speed, velocity, or movement. Not surprisingly, traffic signs including the word are popular objects for English-speaking tourists taking photos. Infart means entrance and utfart exit from property premises.  Farthållare is Swedish for cruise control, fartkamera is speed camera, and maxfart is top speed. If you are fartblind, speed blind, you don’t realize that you are driving too fast—you have got used to the high speed. Then you may be considered a fartdåre, a speed maniac or a fartsyndare, literally ‘a speed sinner’, a speeder.

Elevators in Denmark often have a sign saying I fart meaning under way. An anecdote says that, during a visit by Queen Elizabeth II, somebody realized just in time what the sign meant in English, and it was rapidly covered up.

Fart is a typical example of a false friend. False friends are words in two languages that look and/or sound similar but whose meanings are completely or partially different. See some more English–Swedish false friends here and examples from a few languages here. You can read about more than 400 English–Swedish false friends in my book (copyeditor.se/books).

The post Taboo or innocent? appeared first on copyeditor.se.

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.

When General Motors in Canada launched their Buick LaCrosse, they had to rebrand it after realizing that the name referred to masturbation in French Canadian slang.

Exactly the same mistake was made by Mitsubishi in Spanish-speaking markets. The name of their Pajero is Spanish for masturbation (the word can also refer to a lazy or stupid person). 

Ford Pinto was a popular model in Europe, but when it was launched in Brazil, the importers discovered that the name is Brazilian–Portuguese slang for small penis. The car was renamed Corcel, which means horse.

A similar mistake was made by the Chinese auto maker Chana. In Brazil, chana sounds like the slang word for female genitalia, and so the name was changed to Changan.

Arguably, localization is crucial for brand reputation, and it is important to know about false friends (which you can red about here).

The post Examples of failed localization appeared first on copyeditor.se.

Localization adapts content to suit local and regional norms. A product is adapted to a specific market. In business, it is crucial to understand what connotations a word may have in a certain region.

The South Korean car maker Kia presented a new model at the Geneva Motor Show in 2013. The car was named Provo, which, according to Kia, referred to the Italian word prova, test or prototype. (Provo is also the name of a city in Utah, USA.)

However, the name of the car was met with strong reactions in the UK, particularly in Northern Ireland, where the name Provo is short for the Provisional IRA, an organization that was blamed for almost 2 000 deaths during the so-called Troubles in Northern Ireland 1970–1997, a campaign of violence to gain independence from Britain. The Provos were also blamed for bombings and murders in England.

After a member of the British Parliament tabled a motion that said that the name would be offensive to many victims of the Provisionals, Kia issued a clear statement that they would not launch the model in the UK.

To succeed with localization, you must understand what connotations a word has for your target audience. I will have more examples of failed localization in my next blog post.

The post Localization 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.

The post Unsatisfied and dissatisfied appeared first on copyeditor.se.

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.