3 ms·
The wary/weary mixup is so strange to me, especially because it seems relatively new (last 5-10 years at most).
by nerdponx 2y ago
The wary/weary mixup is so strange to me, especially because it seems relatively new (last 5-10 years at most).
- pavlov 2y agoIt’s not that strange? The words are homophones and both express a reticent emotional state.
- robin_reala 2y agoWhere in the world are you that weary and wary are homophones? Genuinely interested, I can’t think of a dialect where that’s the case.
- Majestic121 2y agoAs a non-native speaker, 'to be wary' is not really in my vocabulary, while 'to be weary' seems much more common, and both sound pretty close to each other even if there is a difference even with my accent, so I could see myself making the mistake. It looks similar to than/then, but than/then is much more jarring to me for some reason.
- pavlov 2y agoThey are not homophones? I’m not a native speaker and I’ve simply always assumed they are. I lived in London and the US for many years, but these are not common words in speech so I never got corrected. I guess that must mean “wear” and “weary” have a different pronunciation for “ea”. This vowel digraph remains my eternal nemesis… Ever since I learned as a child that “bear” doesn’t rhyme with “fear” and found myself faced with the overwhelming realization that I will never speak this language 100% correctly, no matter how much effort I put into reading and writing.
- marssaxman 2y ago> I guess that must mean “wear” and “weary” have a different pronunciation for “ea”. Indeed so! "Wear" and "ware" are homophones, having the same vowel sound as "wary". "Weary", on the other hand, rhymes with "cheery" or "dreary". > I will never speak this language 100% correctly I am a middle-aged native speaker, an avid lifelong reader with a love for the language, and I still occasionally discover that I am mispronouncing words I have known for years.
- harimau777 2y agoI pronounce weary with a long e sound and wairy with a vowel sound between long and short a (similar to "air"). To me they are very similar and rhyme but not identical.
- hermitcrab 2y agoNative Enlish speaker here (from the UK). I feel so sorry for anyone learning English as a foreign language - it's a mess!
- mannykannot 2y agoWhile they do both often express a reticent emotional state, the cause of that state is different: for 'weary', it is exhaustion from past events, while for 'wary', the concern is to avoid undesirable events in the future. There is arguably some overlap where someone is being wary because they are weary of similar situations turning out badly all too often in the past.
- LgWoodenBadger 2y agoIt’s similar to dominant/dominate and should’ve/should of. People these days…
- blacksqr 2y agoMy wife started using the word this way about 20 years ago, I also heard it on TV ads at the time. I always assumed it was a confused fusion of "wary" and "leery".
- nerdponx 2y agoI always assumed it was just a misspelling of "wary" by analogy to "wear". You're telling me that people actually say "weary" when they mean "wary"? That's very different from what I thought.
- blacksqr 2y ago> people actually say "weary" when they mean "wary"? Yes, that's my experience.