Capital letter or not?

Question

Hi, there!

Please, I have a question:

I believe we write the school subjects in lower case. E.g.:

I study geography and math on Mondays and Fridays.

I study history and science on Wednesdays.

But in:

E.g. She finds Portuguese difficult. So she prefers to study English, math or chemistry.

I believe only the words Portuguese and English were written in capital letter because they can also refer to nationalities/languages. Is that the reason?

Second question:

Does the word flower and floor have the same pronunciation? I have already listened to them in a dictionary on-line and both seemed to have the same pronunciation. But I'm in doubt because their phonetic transcription are different.

Many thanks for helping me,

Andreas

Mr Wordy · Accepted Answer

Anonymous
I believe we write the school subjects in lower case. E.g.:

I study geography and math on Mondays and Fridays.

I study history and science on Wednesdays.

Correct. You may sometimes see people capitalising these words, but this is unnecessary.

Anonymous
But in:

E.g. She finds Portuguese difficult. So she prefers to study English, math or chemistry.

I believe only the words Portuguese and English were written in capital letter because they can also refer to nationalities/languages. Is that the reason?

Yes.

AnonymousDoes the word flower and floor have the same pronunciation?

No. In my (British) accent they are quite different. Which dictionary did you listen to?

BarbaraPA · Answer

Hi Andreas,

AnonymousHi, there!

Please, I have a question:

I believe we write the school subjects in lower case. E.g.:

I study geography and math on Mondays and Fridays.

I study history and science on Wednesdays.

Right. The exception would be "I will take World Geography 201 and "Physical Chemstisy 302" where you are listing a specific name of a college class. For plain old "geography, math, history, and science" use the lower case.

Anonymous But in:

E.g. She finds Portuguese difficult. So she prefers to study English, math or chemistry.

I believe only the words Portuguese and English were written in capital letter because they can also refer to nationalities/languages. Is that the reason?

Exactly!
Anonymous Second question:

Does the word flower and floor have the same pronunciation? I have already listened to them in a dictionary on-line and both seemed to have the same pronunciation. But I'm in doubt because their phonetic transcription are different.

No, but flower and flour (the stuff you bake with) sound the same. Are you sure you looked at the right word? Flower and flour have two syllables, and have an "ow" like "cow" sound while floor has only one syllable and the "or" is like "door" or "ore."
Anonymous Many thanks for helping me,

Andreas

You're welcome. Why not sign up in the forums so you can more easily track your posts?

Anonymous · Answer

Hi, My Wordy!

Thanks for helping me. Sorry, in spite of writing flower and flour, I wrote floor . I heard the pronunciation at the site www.yourdictionary.com

Best wishes,

Andreas

Anonymous · Answer

Hi,Grammar Geek!

Thanks for the help. Sorry, but in spite of writing flour I wrote floor.

I heard the pronunciation of flower and flour at the site www.yourdictionary.com Interesting to notice that these words have different phonetic transcription, but the same pronunciation as you said, don't they?

Phonetic Transcription:

flour (flo?ur)

flower (flo?u'?r)

Is it common to find words with different phonetic transcription, but same pronunciation?

Thanks for inviting me to sign up in the forum. I will!

Andreas

Anonymous · Answer

I am an older US speaker of English.  For me, there is no difference.  I pronounce (and hear) both as flou'-er.  On the other hand, the Webster's New World Dicitonary gives flour: flour and flower: flour or flou'-er.  (I'm not sure I could pronounce /flour/, at least not without straining.

Capital letter or not?

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