I'm a young phoagody and you can think of me as your friendly guide to the English language.

We talk about writing, history, rules, and cool stuff.

Today I have a segment about the difference between the words although and while and a segment

about how to write with cliches.

I often have to tell people that their pet peeves aren't actually hard in fast grammar

rules.

I have to tell people it's okay to split infinitives and that in some cases it's

fine to end a sentence with a preposition or to use the word between when you're choosing

among more than two items.

I know it's upsetting to learn your nearest and dearest beliefs are wrong.

So this week I'm going to talk about my own mistaken peeve.

That bothers me no end when people use while to mean although.

But no matter how hard I looked I couldn't convince myself that I'm right.

You see I think although means in spite of the fact that as in although Sir Freigelot

is tall, squiggly an art vark consider him an equal.

Although is what's called a concessive conjunction meaning that it's used to express a concession.

On the other hand I believe while should be reserved to mean at the same time.

It should have a temporal sense as in while squiggly gathered wood, art vark hid the

maracas.

At first I was sure I was right because in his book Usage and Abusage Eric Partridge said

that while for although is a perverted use of the correct sense of while which properly

means at the same time.

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