Ennervate & Innervate

[Steve]

No: HPFGUIDX 122693


--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "Geoff Bannister"
<gbannister10 at a...> wrote:

> 
> Geoff:
> Interesting that I'd never come across innervate before. It is not 
> listed in the two modern dictionaries I often consult - Heinemans 
> and Readers' Digest Word Power but it is in my old Concise Oxford.
> 
> The prefix "en-" to me implies an expansion rather than a 
> contraction - "enfranchise" and "ennoble" spring to mind.
> 
> And, as I pointed out yesterday, the Bloomsbury edition do use the 
> correctly spelt "Enervate" with only one "n".
> 
> Geoff 
> (having a pedantic moment)

bboyminn:

Certainly, Innervate is not a common word, I don't think I've ever
heard any one use it in speaking or writing in my entire substantially
long life. 

I have an American Heritage CD-ROM dictionary that I use most often.
Since I reply and post using the group's web interface, and therefore
don't have a spelling checker, it comes in handy.

It was there that I found 'enervate' while looking for 'enNervate'. I
saw that the meaning was the opposite of what I thought it should be,
then started looking for alternate spellings to see what I could find.
Sure enough, I stumbled across 'innervate'. When the words are so
close in sound, using an 'E' instead of an 'I' would be a common
mistake. Also, one could subconsciously compound the mistake by making
an association between the 'en' in ennervate and the 'en' in energy. 

As I said before, given that JKR makes up words, and that these
particular words are somewhat obscure, I can see how the Editors
missed it.

As far as the Bloomsbury editions using 'enervate' with one 'N', I
suspect that was a Auto-Spell Checker correction. An editor running an
initial spell check may have taken it for a spelling error, whereas
the US Scholastic editors may have left it 'as is' assuming it was a
made up word.

Regardless of all that, I still think the correct word is 'Innervate'.

To be a little pedantic myself regarding your examples, could one say
that to 'enfranchise' is to become contained within a fanchise.
Example, you get a McDonalds fanchise, while your businesss is
independant, you are none the less now contain within the McDonalds
organization. To be 'ennoble' could be interpreted as being contained
within the class of nobility. Really it means more like 'to become' or
'to make', as in 'enraged' meaning to become or to make (in a state
of) rage. But one could equally say that to be enraged is be be
contained or consumed by the emotion of rage.

I guess to some extent, it's a matter of perspective.

Just a few rather pointless thoughts.

Steve/bboyminn