Heroine v heroin and other stories of the most often confused words
Understandable, perhaps. Even yours truly had not noticed the mistake. People, including journalists and other professionals, commonly confuse “heroin” with “heroine”.
The story is headlined “How I conquered heroine addiction.” Karen Rothmyer emailed saying her immediate thought was Mudhafar Yusuf Musa had stopped reading about successful women! Karen, who lives in Catskills, New York, is a former public editor of The Star.
There is indeed a woman in the story, published in Nation.Africa on August 16, 2023. But that’s not what Karen had in mind. The woman is a Spanish doctor Musa met on the beaches of Lamu Island. “The lady would spoil me with cash,” he says.
“Life was good. It was during this time that a fellow beach boy, who was also in a romantic relationship with a foreign fiancée, approached me and advised me to consider using heroin as a sexual booster to retain my ‘mzungu’ lady.”
“The headline was hilarious, ” Karen says. But for the better part of two weeks, the headline remained on the front-page of Nation.Africa, staring at readers. But no reader raised his voice. Nor did the writer of the story, Kalume Kazungu, or his online editor, move to strike out the “e” in the word “heroine.”
Understandable, perhaps. Even yours truly had not noticed the mistake. People, including journalists and other professionals, commonly confuse “heroin” with “heroine”. The two words are homophones.
They sound similar but have different meanings. So, it’s very common to write “heroine” when you mean “heroin.” You’ll find a number of headlines and stories in Nation.Africa with such errors. “Heroine” and “heroin” are particularly confusing, with the only thing standing between them being the letter “e”.
Even police, prosecutors, magistrates and judges in some cases refer to heroin as heroine and convict people using the misnomer.
Other homophones that commonly confuse journalists include result v resort, stationary v stationery, envelope v envelop, affect v effect, collaborate v corroborate, just to mention a few.
In my article last Friday, “The unanswered and unmasked questions in Ngunyi interview”, I was also caught in the homophone trap. A reader, a Mr Muya, pointed out that I used the word “reducted” five times instead of “redacted”.
Another reader, who wanted to remain anonymous, said: “I have noticed lately (twice in the last week) that the Daily Nation has used the word “reduct” when it actually meant to use the word “redact”, you included. Kindly look into it and do the needful.”
The reader was also probably referring to John Kamau’s “CIA, prostitutes, crocodiles and other African espionage stories” (Nation.Africa, August 15, 2023), in which the investigative journalist used the word “reducted” instead of “redacted”.
It’s readers who usually identify such mistakes, not editors. The ever-polite Githuku Mungai is one of the most hawk-eyed. He read the article “What does a weak shilling mean for the economy?” (Saturday Nation, Aug. 12, 2023) by former Laikipia Governor and Nation columnist. “Dear editor,” he wrote to mailbox. “That was a good article by Ndiritu Muriithi in the Saturday Nation. I have a small observation: In the last paragraph, 'may result to' ought to be 'may resort to'.”
The offending sentence in the article reads: Responding to this inflationary pressure, Central Bank, may result to the only tool they have, and increase the interest rates again.”
Mistaking “result” for “resort” is a common ailment among many. But perhaps it’s envelope and envelop that are most commonly mistaken. For example, in many of the stories about the Waki Commission, which investigated the post-election following the 2007 presidential election, the envelope containing names of six suspected masterminds of the violence handed over to the ICC chief prosecutor Moreno Ocampo is referred to by many of journalists as the “The Ocampo Six envelop” or “an envelop to chief mediator Kofi Annan”.
And so, it goes on and on. Bribes are often delivered in an “envelop,” not “envelope,” and tender envelopes are often referred to as “bid envelops,” and wedding couples are said to ask for “envelop gifts.”
The envelop v envelope confusion is widespread. Accomplished columnist Jaindi Kisero writes about “resource envelop” in reference to the budget. Prof. Peter Kagwanja, the Sunday Nation columnist, talks of “Big envelop politics” in reference to the Kenyatta succession in Mt Kenya. The homophone confusion is no respecter of persons. But editors have a duty to be on the lookout, for they get the final blame.
- The Public Editor is an independent news ombudsman who handles readers’ complaints on editorial matters including accuracy and journalistic standards. Email: [email protected]. Call or text 0721989264
