Monday, May 7, 2012

prodigy/progeny/protégé: Common Errors in English Usage Entry for Monday, May 7, 2012.

prodigy/progeny/protégé
Your progeny are your kids, though it would be pretty pretentious to refer to them as such. If your child is a brilliantly outstanding person he or she may be a child prodigy. In fact, anything amazingly admirable can be a prodigy. But a person that you take under your wing in order to help promote his or her career is your protégé.

Avoid misspelling or mispronouncing “prodigy” as “progidy.”

2 comments:

  1. Just for amusement's sake, say you had several children who were all exceptionally talented and were apprenticing you in the family business. Would you have prodigious protégé progeny?

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  2. I think it would be "prodigious progeny protégé". :)

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