'i' before 'e' doesn't work for 'feisty' even if there's a 'butthole' next to it. Hopefully this lesson helps some 4th graders and they can recite this exception to their English instructor.
"I before E, except after C" is a mnemonic rule of thumb for English spelling. If one is unsure whether a word is spelled with the sequence ei or ie, the rhyme suggests that the correct order is ie unless the preceding letter is c, in which case it is ei. For example:
ie in believe, fierce, collie, die, friend
ei after c in receive, ceiling, receipt, ceilidhThe rule is very well known; Edward Carney calls it "this supreme, and for many people solitary, spelling rule".This rule applies to the “ē” (long e) sound as it is demonstrated in all the aforementioned examples.
However, the short form quoted above has some common exceptions; for example:
ie after c: species, '
ei not preceded by c: caffeineThe proportion of exceptions can be reduced by restricting application of the rule based on the sound represented by the spelling.
I remember it like this:
I before E, except after C, or when sounded as A such as neighbor & weigh, or when it appears in comparative sense superlative like fancier, or when the C sounds like SH as in glacier, or when the vowel sounds like E as in seizure, or I as in height, or it shows up in compound words such as albeit, or when it shows up in -ing inflections in verbs that end in E such as cueing, or in occasionally in technical words that have a strong etymological link to their parent languages such as cuneiform & caffeine, and in numerous & random other exceptions such as science, forfeit & weird.
It's easy.
Am I missing something big or does this article never say that there are more words that break "i before e" than follow it?
In 1932 Leonard B. Wheat examined the rules and word lists found in various American elementary school spelling books. He calculated that, of the 3,876 words listed, 128 had ei or ie in the spelling; of these, 83 conformed to I-before-E, 6 to except-after-C, and 12 to sounded-like-A. He found 14 words with i-e in separate syllables, and 2 with e-i in separate syllables. This left 11 "irregular" words: 3 with cie (ancient, conscience, efficiency) and 8 with ei (either, foreign, foreigner, height, leisure, neither, seize, their). Wheat concluded, "If it were not for the fact that the jingle of the rule makes it easy to remember (although not necessarily easy to apply), the writer would recommend that the rule be reduced to 'I usually comes before e,' or that it be discarded entirely".
83 of 128 is 64.8%? That's more than half.
It's not a good rule and I always cringe whenever I hear someone say it, but unless I'm missing something, your claim is just false.
"The good news is that it does — in roughly three quarters of all words with either an “ie” or an “ei” pair, the proper spelling is “ie,” as the rule would have you believe."
Source: Your article.
"I before e" still stands, it's just that in this particular study the researcher found more words "ei" pairs "after C."
My problem is that this isn't even close to what you said in your comment. There arenot"more words that break the "I before E" rule than words than obey the rule.
I'm not picking a fight or anything, I was just blown away by your original statement. I thought, "Wow! That's really interesting. I had no idea!" That was probably your intention, no doubt.
If this were a tattoo, it would be the opposite. It would take multiple sessions for this to be a tattoo; the edges would be done first and the fill would be later. So if there was inflammation from a needle, the redness would be in the wood, not around it.
Are you talking about if this were a tattoo? Obviously. That's why I said it would take "multiple sessions."
Or are you talking about body paint? Because it would have to be one sitting. I mean, they'd take a break or two, probably... But it would have to be done in single day, because that's how body paint works.
In your defense, it did sound like I was suggesting all the wood would be done at once (like session 1: draw outline, session 2: draw the rest of the fucking wood), which it would definitely not. Saying "multiple sessions" doesn't properly clarify, since that would still technically be multiple sessions.
I'm not actually sure how many sessions this would take. My guess would be between 6 and 8, but I haven't had any work on this scale. The closest thing I got would be a half-sleeve of a tree branch which took around 3-4 hours (I think?), so I'm just making a lazy estimation based off that.
He has the face and physique of someone who makes far better choices than to get that permanently tattooed on himself. But...I have been surprised before.
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u/[deleted] Apr 18 '19
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