What is the word that describes words that sound alike but are spelled differently like "sea and see"?

Try homophone

Hi, Darrell, good to have you.

'Nother piece of trivia: if the same set of letters can be re-arranged to make two or more different words, the words are anagrams of each other.

For completeness' sake:

homophone: same sound, different spelling, e.g., right (correct) and rite (ceremony)

homograph: different spelling, same sound, e.g., tear (water from your eye) tear (rip)

homonym: same sound, same spelling, e.g., bear (animal), bear (carry)

Row, of course, is a homophone, homograph, and homonym.
row (propel boat) v. roe (fish eggs)
row (propel boat) v. row (argument)
row (propel boat) v. row (line)

Bingley

homograph: different spelling, same sound, e.g., tear (water from your eye) tear (rip)

Deliberate mistake time?

BTW, I thought that a homophone was a gay chat line.

homophone was a gay chat line...

No, surely it's the long distance service used by backspeaking aliens?

long distance service used by backspeaking aliens?

It's no good, but I give up. Maybe it's too late in the day (nearly knocking off time) [which I suppose means something else to many board members - to me it means "home time"] or maybe I'm terminally stupid. what the blazes do you mean, Mav?

what the blazes do you mean, Mav?

I thought this was a ref. to the movie ET (extra-terrestrial), with its famous line, "ET, phone home".

"ET, phone home"

And can you just imagine the cross-currents of cultural confusion over those distances

Jackie and I are obviously on a worryingly bizzare tangent, here!

its famous line

And a big hand for J who with 700 posts to her name must be just about able to string a cable to ET

And a big hand for J who with 700 posts to her name must be just about able to string a cable to ET

oh boy, that means just 100 more until we find out what the next title is!!

...which won't be too long a wait at all!

Gah!! I stand corrected. Jackie, upon reaching 700 posts has become an "Old Hand". The left side of my brain assured me that the next title would come at 800.

(Goes off to sit in a dark closet.)

In reply to:

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homograph: different spelling, same sound, e.g., tear (water from your eye) tear (rip)

Deliberate mistake time?

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Humble apologies, time to prostrate myself in the gutter etc. It should read
" homograph: same spelling, different sound, e.g., tear (water from your eye) tear (rip)",

as indeed it did until I decided to make it clearer!



Bingley

homophone and homonym

I thought this was a ref. to the movie ET

Thank you, Jackie, you have saved the day again. I should have picked up this ref, even though I did not see the film. As you say, the line IS famous enough for it to be generally - indeed, universally - known.

Mav's remark does raise a question, though. What do you do with all those posts, Jackie? Do you string your washing line between them? Do you play the last one at sundown each day? Do tell!

ET is "universally" known--GOOD one!

Now--thanks very much, to you and tsuwm both, for making me want to slide under my chair in complete mortification.

Do you play the last one at sundown each day? Do tell!

Would this be a reference to that exotic game called cricket?

reveille... post... taps = bugle calls (sunrise, sunset, lights out)

Would this be a reference to that exotic game called cricket?[\green]

Aah, yes. The identifying mark of Americans, an inability to grasp the wonder that is cricket. Apart from Meat Loaf and John Paul Getty Junior, I can't think of any Americans I've heard of or had contact with who can appreciate the glory of cricket. "Baseball on valium" was one description I read somewhere. Tragic! The real tragedy is the imagery lost to Americans through the alienation from cricket, "playing with a straight bat" and, of course, "it's just not cricket" spring to mind, to say nothing of the fact that cricket is the only game in which one can bowl a maiden over on live television.