This week's question comes from Vukeni of South Sudan. Vukeni writes:What is the difference between "loose" and "lose"?This morning, I heard some people debating about it.Dear Vukeni,It makes sense that people were debating the difference between "loose" and "lose."The two words are commonly mistaken, even by native English speakers!It is probably because the words are close in spelling and pronunciation.In speaking, both words use the vowel sound /u/. But "lose" ends in the /z/ sound, while "loose" ends in the /s/ sound.In writing, "loose" has only one more -o than "lose."They may look and sound alike, but the two words are unrelated.Let's start with "lose," which is a verb. "Lose" has many meanings.Today, I will tell you about three.It can mean "to fail to win," such as a game or competition:
本周的提问来自于南苏丹的沃基尼。沃基尼写道：“Loose”和“lose”这两个单词之间有什么区别？今天早上，我听到有人在争论这件事。亲爱的沃基尼，人们争论“Loose”和“lose”这两个单词之间的区别是可以理解的。这两个单词经常会弄错，即使是以英语作为母语的人士。这可能是因为这两个单词的拼写和发音都很接近。在发音上，这两个单词都有元音/ u /。但是“lose”是以/z/的读音结尾，而“Loose”以/s/的读音结尾。在书写上，“Loose”只比“lose”多一个字母o。它们的书写和拼读很接近，但是这两个单词毫无关联。我们先来看“lose”，它是一个动词。“lose”有多种含义。今天，我会给你讲其中3种含义。它可以表示“未能获胜，”例如在一场比赛中：
