definition homonymy, homophone and homographs

homonym

A homonym is a word that is said or spelled the same way as another word but has a different meaning. "Write” and “right” is a good example of a pair of homonyms.

Homonym traces back to the Greek words homos, meaning “same,” and onuma, meaning “name.” So a homonym is sort of like two people who have the same name: called the same thing but different. A homonym can be a word that sounds the same as something else — like by (“near”) and buy (“purchase”) — or it can be spelled exactly the same way and pronounced differently — like minute (unit of time) and minute (“tiny”).

 

homophone

A homophone is a word that sounds the same as another word but has a different meaning and/or spelling. “Flower” and “flour” are homophones because they are pronounced the same but you certainly can’t bake a cake using daffodils.

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Other common homophones are write and right, meet and meat, peace and piece. You have to listen to the context to know which word someone means if they’re spoken aloud. If they say they like your jeans (genes?), they’re probably talking about your pants and not your height and eye color — but you’d have to figure it out from the situation!

 

homograph

Use the noun homograph to talk about two words that are spelled the same but have different meanings and are pronounced differently — like "sow," meaning female pig, and "sow," to plant seeds.

The word homograph merges homos, the Greek word for "same," with graph, "to write." If two words are written identically but don't share a meaning, they are homographs. Some examples are close ("to shut") and close ("nearby"); and bass ("deep") and bass ("the fish"). Homographs are confusing at first glance, but once you read them in the context of a sentence or hear them spoken aloud, you'll easily figure out which word is intended

 SUMMARY CHART

 

HOMONYM WORDS SOUND	HOMOPHONE WORDS type of homonym
same sound	same sound
same OR different spelling	different spelling
fair (county fair)   fair (reasonable)   pear (fruit)   pair (couple)   Buzzy Bee Riddle #6; boo bee, booby   Buzzy Bee Riddle #14; hum bug, humbug   Buzzy Bee Riddle #13: cell, sell	pear (fruit)   pair (couple)   Buzzy Bee Riddle #6; boo bee, booby   Buzzy Bee Riddle #14; hum bug, humbug   Buzzy Bee Riddle #13: cell, sell

HOMOGRAPH WORDS SPELLING	HETERONYM WORDS type of homograph
same OR different sound	different sound
same spelling	same spelling
lie (untruth)   lie (lie down)   tear (in the eye)   tear (rip)   Buzzy Bee Riddle #4; spelling bee, spelling bee	tear (in the eye)   tear (rip)

DETAIL CHART

	Same Sound / different meanings				Same Spelling / different meanings
	Homonyms		Homophones		Homographs	Heteronyms
			Different Spelling			Different Sound
see  (with your eye) sea  (the ocean)	see sea		see sea		n/a	n/a
to  (preposition) too  (as well) two  (2)	to too two		to too two		n/a	n/a
there  their  (possessive) they're  (contraction)	there their they're		there their they're		n/a	n/a
bough  (tree limb) bow  (front of a boat) bow  (at the waist) bow  (tied with ribbon) bow  (shoots arrows)	bough bow bow	bow bow	bough bow	bough bow	bow bow bow bow	bow bow	bow bow
lead  (to guide) lead  (the metal) led  (guided)	lead led		lead led		lead lead	lead lead
lie  (untruth) lie  (lie down)	lie lie		n/a		lie lie	n/a
fair  (appearance) fair  (county fair) fair  (reasonable)	fair fair fair		n/a		fair fair fair	n/a
bass  (fish) bass  (low note)	n/a		n/a		bass bass	bass bass
tear  (in the eye) tear  (rip)	n/a		n/a		tear tear	tear tear