Focusing (focussing?) on the English language
As I was typing the other day I had a mental blank and couldn’t remember if “focusing” needed one “s” or two. So, I typed it both ways just to check.
“When we are focussing only on SEO, we are not focusing on readability.”
The squiggly red line failed to appear. Apparently, both spellings were correct. But they couldn’t be, surely. I looked back at my handwritten notes, where “focusing” spelt with a single “s” looked just fine to me. At school, spelling was never my strong suit, but a love of writing (and the tendency to write on paper, without the benefit of spellcheck) means I’m now pretty good at it.
Still, I make mistakes, and it was comforting the day I found out that even the great Jane Austen didn’t always get it right. Maybe, even Shakespeare’s famed invention of words sprang from gaps in memory or inattention to detail.
SHAKESPEARE: Not a word? What do you mean it’s not a word? Well, I don’t care, it fits the meter, I’m using it anyway.
This still didn’t fix the problem I was meant to be focusing (focussing?) on.
Maybe my poor little spellchecker was suffering from language whiplash. I change it back and forth so often, depending on whether I am writing for an Australian, British, or American audience that it may finally have had a meltdown. So I tried my problem on a different spellchecker — one that is usually more reliable anyway when it comes to the finer details.
Whilst both focusing and focussing remained un-flagged, this time focussed was definitely out.
“It appears that your sentence or clause uses an incorrect form of the verb focussed. Consider changing it.”
Google, my dear friend, what is going on here?
The Macquarie online dictionary had this to say.
“Also, focussed”? Macquarie, that is not helpful!
The discussion on English Language & Usage Stack Exchange under “Rules for doubling the last consonant when adding -ed” went back and forth, back and forth. It was fascinating for anyone wanting a detailed answer to their question, but as I scrolled down it turned from detailed explanation to detailed debate.
I really just needed an answer so that I could return my focus to the article I was meant to be writing. I finally found an answer that was satisfying (and satisfyingly short) from Lifehacker.
“In Australian English, the more widely accepted spelling is the single-letter version (and that’s why it’s the version we use here at Lifehacker): focusing and focused, not focussing and focussed. The Macquarie Dictionary explains that this is a reflection of the normal rules that apply to stressed consonants in English”.
So, there I had it. It wasn’t exactly an intercontinental quirk of the English language in the same vein as the s/z replacement. Although I’d better not start on that or I’ll want to know why spellchecker now allows organise and organize as accepted spellings within the one document.
I guess all I’ve really learnt (or re-learnt) is that the English language is complicated, and ever-evolving, and… weird. Just plain weird.
