English Vocabulary: Policy, politics, politician. Whats’s the difference? How do we use them? How do we pronounce them? Since today is election day in the US, I thought it important to review these three common words that students often mix up.
POLICY
For English speakers there are two words for the Spanish word política. This is why speakers often confuse the difference between policy and politics.
- Policy is a countable noun.
- It is a set of ideas or rules that determine the way governments make decisions.
- Usually it is a physical document that you can read and follow.
- Does your business have an equal pay policy?
- We can expect many policy changes once the new goverment comes into power.
- Words that collocate with policy
- company, bank, government
- environmental, fiscal, foreign
- strict, loose, unjust, just
POLITICS
- Politics is an uncountable noun
- It refers to everything that people do to affect the way our countries, offices and daily lives are governed.
- It is not a physical document you can touch, like policy.
- I’m so sick of politics these days I can’t even watch the news.
- I try to avoid office politics and just do my job the best I can.
- Words that collocate with politics:
- county, domestic, local
- national, international, global, world
- modern, practical, mainstream
- enter, go into, be active in, be engaged in, participate in retire from, abandon
POLITICIAN
Pronouncing politician is more complicated for Spanish speakers as the accent is on the third syllable. po li TI cian
- Politicians are the people involved in politics.
- Sometimes we may also say someone is a politician to mean that they aren’t always truthful or have alterior motives.
- Words that collocate with politician:
- astute, clever, corrupt, experienced, shrewd
- career, professional, leading, senior, prominent
- left-wing, right-wing, conservative,
- bribe, elect
English Vocabulary
Now that you have learned about English Vocabulary: Policy, politics, politician, take a look at our other Vocab Rehab posts:
Vocab Rehab: witch hunt
Vocab Rehab: salty
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