My son goes to an Australian school and they just gave him the word “judgement” on his spelling list.
In America, we call that “judgment.”
Is “judgement” considered correct in Australia?
It certainly is in UK English, and I believe Aussie spelling tends to follow our form rather than the US’s.
The Macquarie dictionary, 3rd ed., offers both “judgment” and “judgement” as possible spellings.
Whew. Thanks.
As an Aussie teacher, I have only ever seen it spelt judgement. Judgment looks wrong to me, but my spell checker says it is also acceptable.
We follow British spelling, as jjimm mentioned, but American spelling is becoming acceptable.
You’ll find that judgement is also an acceptable alternative in the US, as witness Merriam Webster.
The American Heritage dictionary (USA) says:
**judg·ment also judge·ment ** --n. 1. The act or process of judging; the formation of an opinion after consideration or deliberation.
“Judgment” is the earlier form, but (at least in the UK) “judgement” has more or less superceded it. The first edition of the OED had only “judgment”.
I use judgement, because judgment looks like the “g” should be hard for some reason.
heh heh. “spelt.” heh heh
Oh, thank god! I can stop correcting myself every single time I type that word!
Judgement. Judgement. Ha ha! Damn the little red line in Firefox’s spellchecker, I’ll spell it the way it makes sense: judgement!
I feel freer already.
(Except that “freer” looks totally wrong.)
I have the same problem with arguement - I mean argument. It looks incomplete to me when it’s written correctly. I wish I had the same latitude that judgement / judgment permits.
The tv show “The A-Team” opened Season 4 with a two-hour long episode called “Judgment Day” (sp?). As is typical with double long episodes, the syndication eps are shown as “Part 1” and “Part 2.” I don’t recall which is which, but one part spells it as “Judgement” and the other as “Judgment.” Don’t know how it was originally spelled when it aired in one piece.
I am confused. Is it the way I spelt spelt? Ahh - the American spell checker doesn’t like that either. Spelling isn’t my strong point, but spelt is a legal form of spelled.
Lucky for my students I teach mostly maths (yes, maths not math), science and IT, all as extension units for bright kids. I also teach creative writing, being an author myself, and emphasise (with an ‘s’ at the end) the importance of spelling, while offering thanks to the gods above for spell checkers.
We nearly share a common language with America.
One last word: Merriam-Webster joins variants “or” if they are considered “equal variants.” That is, you frequently see both versions, but with the first one slightly more often.
It joins variants by “also” if the secondary entry is occasionally seen, but much less commonly.
The examples that they give are in fact [judgment or judgement] and [quintet also quintette].