Jail And prison are often used interchangeably as places of confinement. If you want to be specific jail can be used to describe a place for people awaiting trial or incarcerated for misdemeanors, while prison describes a place for criminals convicted of serious crimes.
There are many words in English that have many meanings; with many of these, the intended meaning of a word with multiple meanings can easily be inferred from the context in which it is used. A good example of this is the word prison, which can mean (among other things) either “a public institution in which law-breakers are detained or punished” or “an official in certain Roman Catholic dioceses is the bishop empowers to deal with cases of a normal nature that are handled only by the bishop.” See if you can tell which one means what in the two examples below.
And to show how well they approved of the Gunpowder Betrayal in Rome, Gerard and Greenwoll or Tesmond, two of the main Conspirators, had so much fun there, that they escaped from National Justice. one family, the other was made a Pope’s Prison, and the other lived in the English Colledge there, and often celebrated in St. Peters at the Vatican.— Gilbert Burnet, A lecture before the Aldermen of the City of London1681
Guilty, Earl and Lester Swan were sentenced to one year and one day in state prison for stealing a $100 1941 Chevrolet from Comer Hammett.— Daily Decatur (Decatur, AL), August 1, 1947
We hope you get it right.
Although it can be quite simple to know what feeling of prison being used (made all the better by the fact that religious words are rare these days), other words have shades of meaning that are not always clearly discernible from the context . Prison And jail are all great examples of this. Each word has a general usage and a specific usage, and it is not always easy to know which word is being used.
He was sentenced to twenty years in prison, but was released ahead of time for good conduct.— The Columbus Dispatch (Columbus, OH), December 30, 1923
He was sentenced to twenty years in prison, but was released after serving fourteen years.— Wood grain reporter (Wisconsin Rapids, WI), March 21, 1907
‘Prison’ vs ‘Prison’
We determine prison as “a special detention place for lawbreakers”, and jail as “the place where lawfully detained persons are held.” Many people feel that there are specific uses for each of these words and that they should never be used interchangeably.
In fact, many people in society (including the media and popular culture) misuse the terms “prison” and “prison” interchangeably.— Ronald Burns, Journal of Criminal Justice EducationSpring 2002
It’s amazing how many lawyers can’t seem to distinguish between the two – prison sentences for crimes with a term of one year or less, and prison for crimes with a term of one year or more. years or more.— Sue Morrow, Reno Gazette-Journal (Reno, NV), May 18, 2007
While there are key differences between prisons and prisons — prisons usually hold people awaiting trial and those serving short-term sentences, while prisons hold long-term convicts — Ministry of Justice research still illustrates life behind bars…— Boston Globe (Boston, MA), April 20, 2017
Advocates of the semantic accuracy of these words will be pleased to know that we have included specific uses for each word. Prison is “an organization (such as an institution under the jurisdiction of a state) for the detention of persons convicted of serious crimes” and jail is “such a place under the jurisdiction of a local government (such as a county) to detain persons awaiting trial or those convicted of misdemeanors.” If you are serving a sentence for a misdemeanor (such as stealing something of small value), or if you are awaiting trial, you will most likely end up in jail. If you are serving a sentence for a serious crime (such as murder) you will likely end up in jail.
Use interchangeably
However, both jail And prison are very old words, both have been used for over 700 years and this distinction is not always observed. In modern usage, the words are used interchangeably so often that it can be difficult to define which one of the two words always means a certain thing.
Evidence of this lack of distinction New York Timesin a story from 1964, recruited jail in the title and then used prison the very first sentence of the story.
Hoffa gets 8 years in prison and a lecture on justice.—(title) New York Times March 13, 1964
James R. Hoffa was sentenced to eight years in prison and fined $10,000 today for conspiracy to manipulate a Federal jury.— New York Times March 13, 1964
It is worth noting that both words are figurative or somewhat more generic; prison can also mean “a state of confinement or captivity,” and jail may refer to “confinement in prison.” Both words also act as verbs, and in this role are less affected by misdemeanors or felonies than by nouns. If you want to avoid ambiguity when using, you should use prison for serious crimes with longer sentences, and jail for less serious crimes, or detention pending trial. And prisonwhen referring to hoosegow, usually means specifically “state or federal prison in the United States”
Categories: Usage Notes
Source: vothisaucamau.edu.vn
