‘E’ is the most commonly used letter in the English language. In fact, as many as one in eight of all the letters written in English is ‘e’.
More English words begin with the letter ‘S’ than any other letter of the alphabet.
“I am.” is the shortest complete sentence in the English language.
Some words exist only in plural form, for example: glasses (spectacles), binoculars, scissors, shears, tongs, gallows, trousers, jeans, pants, pajamas (but note that clothing words often become singular when we use them as modifiers, as in “trouser pocket”).
Do you know what is special about the following sentence? ‘The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog’. This type of sentence is called a ‘pangram’ as it uses every letter in the English language.
There is no word in the English language that rhymes with month, orange, silver or purple.
The longest word in any of the major English language dictionaries is ‘pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis’, a word that refers to a lung disease contracted from the inhalation of very fine silica particles, specifically from a volcano;
‘The word “uncopyrightable” is the longest English word in normal use that contains no letter more than once.
‘Pronunciation’ is one of the most mispronounced words in the English language!
Due to a printing error, there was a word in the English dictionary from 1932 to 1940 which didn’t have a meaning. The word was ‘Dord’ and it became known as ‘ghost word’.
Approximately one new word is added to the English language every two hours and around 4,000 new words are added to the English dictionary every year.
There are nine different ways to pronounce ‘ough’ in English. This sentence contains all of them:
‘A rough-coated, dough-faced, thoughtful ploughman strode through the streets of Scarborough; after falling into a slough, he coughed and hiccoughed.’ You can search for these words on the Cambridge Dictionary website to listen to their pronunciation. http://dictionary.cambridge.org/
“Pad kid poured curd pulled cod.” Researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology found this particular combination of words may be the most difficult tongue twister in the English language, tripping up volunteers so badly that some stopped talking all together.
English is the official language of the sky! It doesn’t matter which country they are from, all pilots speak in English on international flights.
