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Joined: Jul 2012
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J Linn Offline OP
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i came across the word "resiliency" in a sports column and wondered: "What happened to resilience?" which means the same? Then it occurred to me there is a group of abstract nouns formed from adjectives that follow the same pattern. Constance/constancy. Hesitance/hesitancy. Dependence/dependency. And so on. (But not independence/independency.) What is going on here? Why the duplication?

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Pooh-Bah
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Maybe its just personal choice....

Good observation though.

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Pooh-Bah
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But they're not always interchangeable:

"His excellence and constancy are an example to us all."
"His Excellency and Constance are an example to us all."

Then there's emergence/emergency... wink

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Carpal Tunnel
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I hope you're not expecting consistency from language, nor consistence neither.


Moderated by  Jackie 

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