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Is there a rule as regards substituting the ‘s’ for a ‘z’ in American usage or does it apply to all words ending ‘ise’?

james deas
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  • Would it be a surprise if you were advised that there's a whole lot of words that comprise a list of exceptions? – KillingTime Dec 20 '21 at 07:25
  • It's becoming increasingly common in BrE to use '-ize' in place of '-ise'. Not those in the previous comment, but words which have '-ise' added to a root, for example theory – theorise (theorize). – Weather Vane Dec 20 '21 at 07:31
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    @WeatherVane Was Americanise the first of these? – DjinTonic Dec 20 '21 at 09:12
  • Wikipedia - you can check individual words in a good dictionary. – Stuart F Dec 20 '21 at 09:17
  • @DjinTonic when I enter Americanise into Lexico (from Oxford Dictionary) it comes up with Americanize (also British Americanise). – Weather Vane Dec 20 '21 at 09:19
  • @WeatherVane I think they show all or most dual spellings that way. – DjinTonic Dec 20 '21 at 09:30
  • You see the thing is I would ALWAYS want to use ‘ise’ but I am wondering if there are some instances where ‘ize’ is mandatory and the correct spelling. It becomes increasingly difficult when your spelling is second guessed by these spell checking algorithms. – james deas Dec 20 '21 at 11:18
  • I believe it only applies to verbs, but not all verbs; an exception that comes to mind is "comprise". – ophact Dec 20 '21 at 14:53

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