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Specialty and speciality

Specialty and speciality

Specialty and speciality

(OP)
Is lube oil a specialty among oil refinery products or a speciality ?

RE: Specialty and speciality

Depends whether you're American (specialty) or British (speciality). Americans generally prefer less syllables.

RE: Specialty and speciality

25362: By the way, on your March 23rd post on this thread Thread1010-89360, I see that you are claiming there is a difference in meaning. Fowler says there is effectively none. When I lived in the UK, I never heard a Brit use the word "specialty", but conversely in US movies, television and print, to which I was widely exposed, I never heard "speciality", and I don't think I have heard it much since living in the USA for a quarter century. Fowler does not mention this regional difference - it's just a personal observation - but someone must agree with me since I appear to have picked up a star.

RE: Specialty and speciality

EM,

I agree with you.  I have never seen nor heard someone in the United States of America write or say speciality.

Cory

RE: Specialty and speciality

I have heard speciality one time.  It's from the movie, The Never Ending Story.  The scientist that studies the 1st Oracle declares it "his scientific speciality."

RE: Specialty and speciality

My recollection is that "speciality" generally comes with an English accent in movies.  

TTFN

RE: Specialty and speciality

(OP)
The latest I've seen (The Economist Pocket Style Book) is that specialty is used only in the context of medicine, steel and chemicals, otherwise speciality.

RE: Specialty and speciality

I take it that The Economist is talking from a strictly British perspective?

RE: Specialty and speciality

Definitely not US.
Specialty engineering is part of systems engineering and includes the following disciplines:
Reliability
Maintainability
Logistics
Safety

TTFN

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