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I heard in some movies "I lost my glasses" (eyeglasses), but if I insert this word into search, this return some jars, bottles.

Is it wrong?

In a conversation I must use "eyeglasses", or "glasses" is enough? There is a difference between American and British English?

"I want to buy glasses."

or

"I want to buy eyeglasses."

sumitani
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  • @δοῦλος It's definitely 'fine', in the sense that people will get your meaning, but it will probably reinforce the perception that you're not familiar with the language, as most native speakers use the shortened 'glasses'. – DCShannon Feb 02 '15 at 23:42
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    @δοῦλος Agreed on all points. Any readers should be aware that using 'eyeglasses' rather than 'glasses' will be yet another awkward aspect of their speech, that's all I'm saying. I felt your first comment might be misleading in that aspect, especially with an upvote, but we're all clear now. – DCShannon Feb 03 '15 at 00:19
  • I am judging from the nature of your posts and from decades of experience in teaching/tutoring English that it is fine if you use eyeglasses whenever you are referring to the object that corrects poor vision until you are at a level in which you find it more comfortable and natural to switch between the two words. –  Feb 03 '15 at 00:32
  • Related: Eyeglasses, spectacles, goggles, glasses on ELU. – Andrew Leach Feb 03 '15 at 17:13

5 Answers5

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I'm an American speaker, but I'm not aware of any difference in American and British usage here. (See these Google ngrams for "glasses" vs. "eyeglasses": American, British.)

Generally, "eyeglasses" is uncommon (according to the above ngram links, and my personal experience) but will be understood perfectly. I would expect to see "eyeglasses" used when you need to differentiate between an ambiguous use of "glasses" (which can also mean "drinking cups, made of glass"):

"Have you seen my glasses?"

"Yes, I just filled them up with water." (This person assumes "glasses" here means "cups")

"No, I mean my eyeglasses!"

In fact, there is an old joke:

My grandmother is 90 years old, and she doesn't need glasses! She drinks right from the bottle.

The first sentence suggests "glasses" means "eyeglasses" (since eyesight degrades with age) and the second sentence reveals that "glasses" actually means "drinking glasses" (since she drinks from the bottle instead of pouring her drink into a glass).

Community
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apsillers
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    +1 for pointing out that 'eyeglasses' is mostly used for disambiguation – DCShannon Feb 02 '15 at 23:39
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    In the ngrams graphs, the British English frequency of "eyeglasses" is several times lower than the US frequency, which is in agreement with my experience that "eyeglasses" is extremely rare in the UK. – psmears Feb 03 '15 at 19:30
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The word "glasses" has several meanings. Among them are both eyeglasses and drinking glasses.

From the Merriam-Webster dictionary:

2 a : something made of glass: as : tumbler; also : glassware

2 c plural : a device used to correct defects of vision or to protect the eyes that consists typically of a pair of glass or plastic lenses and the frame by which they are held in place — called also eyeglasses, spectacles

Usually, the correct meaning is clear from the context.

I can't read these tiny letters. Let me get my glasses.

We assume the speaker means eyeglasses, because you don't use drinking glasses to read.

Would you like some water? There are glasses in the kitchen.

We assume the speaker means drinking glasses, because you don't use eyeglasses to drink.

Sometimes the meaning is unclear from the context, and then we may have to ask for details:

I have to go buy new glasses today.
Do you mean for reading or for drinking?

stangdon
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6

Of course eyeglasses is unambiguous as compared to glasses as other answers say, but I don't think it is that common when ambiguity becomes an issue. I think the main difference is that eyeglasses is somewhat archaic/formal and glasses is the usual term today. Words tend to be trimmed over time. Other examples of this kind are the archaic motorcar versus the modern car or aeroplane/airplane versus plane; here too, the former ones in the pairs are unambiguous, but they do not need to be used to for disambiguation.

J.R.
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sawa
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    No one at all says "motorcar" or "aeroplane". The word "airplane" makes me think of teaching a child objects like "car" and "ball" and "airplane". An adult would not use the phrase "airplane" (or the word "eyeglasses" for that matter, other than in formal speech or an advertisement perhaps). – taz Feb 03 '15 at 19:13
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    I completely disagree that "airplane" is that rare. – shawnt00 Feb 04 '15 at 05:28
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    I agree with @shawnt00's disagreement. 'Airplane' and the less lazy 'aeroplane' are common enough - in Australia at least - that their use wouldn't be seen as odd. – mcalex Feb 04 '15 at 05:55
  • @shawnt00 - I concur with the general disagreement about airplane as well, although I would grant taz this: in casual conversation, most U.S. natives would be far more likely to say, "My plane is delayed" than "My airplane is delayed". (That's how I'd probably say it, at least.) Maybe that's what taz was trying to get at? – J.R. Feb 04 '15 at 10:14
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    @J.R. I agree that it's very natural to shorten it to just "plane." The original comment said something like taz had never heard it said that way. I thought that claim was worth noting a minor objection. – shawnt00 Feb 04 '15 at 17:33
  • @shawnt00 I said an adult wouldn't use the phrase "airplane". In my experience as a US native from the internet age, if someone said "my airplane was delayed" they would definitely sound weird or perhaps be assumed not a native US English speaker, or maybe a specific emphasis on the "air" in "airplane", although it's hard to imagine a context in which a different meaning would be assigned to "plane" in the same sentence. "Aeroplane" is not used at all outside of a historical or perhaps specifically international context. YMMV – taz Feb 05 '15 at 13:40
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    I think that particular phrase is a bit fossilized so maybe that's why it would sound odd. In more general use I think it's fairly interchangeable and would not flag you as an ESL. – shawnt00 Feb 05 '15 at 17:48
  • My point was that those words are archaic or formal. I have no idea why taz is particularly trying to repeat that in the comment. Claiming to not even know such words just tells the ignorance of that person. – sawa Feb 05 '15 at 20:46
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In the UK at least, if you want to avoid ambiguity, you would say "spectacles", or, more likely in speech but very unlikely in formal writing, the slangy "specs".

In order of formality awkwardness to a UK speaker, most-uncomfortable-first, I'd put them roughly:

  • Pince-nez
  • Eyeglasses
  • Monocle
  • Spectacles
  • Glasses
  • Specs

apsiller's suggestion of viewing n-grams is valuable here, since it shows the relative frequency of the words between US and UK, but in the UK at least, it feels to me like "specs" is under-represented because it's slang, and they're analyzing books, not speech. But it could be that it's only a regional slang: American, British

Dewi Morgan
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    Specs gave me right images! Your list seems like a old-fashioned to 'modern' (looking for images). Monocle is only used as one lens specs right? – sumitani Feb 03 '15 at 12:34
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    Right. 'Eyeglasses' is an uncomfortable word here in the UK. It could seem antiquated or American or both. "Glasses" or (verbally) "specs" is normal usage. – A E Feb 03 '15 at 12:42
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    Pince-nez and monocle refer to specific types, though. – Random832 Feb 03 '15 at 16:42
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    If you said "spectacles" in the USA you would sound archaic or comedically British. "Specs" would not be understood in this context. – taz Feb 03 '15 at 19:15
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    Yes, I listed pince-nez and monocle to give an idea of how archaic the term eyeglasses appears in the UK, but they are not exact synonyms: they are different forms of eyewear, both considered archaic, but I suspect the heavy use of the term monocle from the 20s to 60s makes the monocle term more "familiar" to my British ear.

    These n-gram thinguses are too much fun: https://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=eyeglasses%2Cspecs%2Cmonocle&year_start=1800&year_end=2008&corpus=18

     – Dewi Morgan Feb 03 '15 at 23:51
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    @taz When I wore glasses I referred to my "specs" not infrequently, and I don't think that I confused anyone in saying it. In my mind it has a 1950's sound to it, sort of like the word "spiffy." I can imagine some Leave it to Beaver character grumbling about how his Pa was going to be sore over him breaking his specs again. – Jason Patterson Feb 04 '15 at 02:37
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    @sumitani - Just because specs gives the right images doesn't mean specs is the best word. If you told me, "I need to get new specs today," I'd wonder if you were some kind of designer, on your way to get some new specifications. – J.R. Feb 04 '15 at 10:20
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    @J.R. Oh I see, first time I thought something like this, there is ambiguity as glasses and have the same problem about context. – sumitani Feb 04 '15 at 14:04
  • Good call on the ambiguity :) – Dewi Morgan Feb 04 '15 at 18:18
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It is really about context:

Put on your glasses.

You would not think about putting on drinking glasses, but eyeglasses, here.

I can't find my glasses.

Usually a person will say the instead of my, when referring to drinking glasses, but this still could depend on what the person was last doing. Were they searching for something to pour themselves a drink into? Did they last say they were thirsty? Were they looking for drinking glasses that are special and specifically owned by them? If no to those questions, they probably mean eyeglasses, and most of the time, that is what an English-speaker is referring to. That is why we will probably say more often:

Where are the cups?

instead, and most of the time the person says glasses, especially if they wear them, they mean eyeglasses.

vapcguy
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