Make Your Editor Cry: Canvass vs. Canvas
To canvass is to go through (a district) or go to (persons) in order to solicit orders or political support or to determine opinions or sentiments. Law enforcement will often canvass the residents of a neighborhood to obtain eye-witness accounts in the wake of a crime.
Conversely, canvas is a firm, closely woven cloth usually of linen, hemp, or cotton used for clothing and formerly much used for awnings, tents, and sails. Today, you may find canvas as a painter’s canvas for works of art or as the fabric that certain shoes, like topsiders and Converse Chuck Taylor’s are made from.
While the two words are homonyms and just one letter separates them, they have nothing in common.
Incorrect:
She slipped on a pair of canvass shoes.
The politician asked his aid to canvas prospective voters.
Correct:
She slipped on a pair of canvas shoes.
The politician asked his aid to canvass prospective voters.
Gregg Bridgeman is the Editor-in-Chief at Olivia Kimbrell Press. He is husband to best-selling Christian author Hallee Bridgeman and parent to three. He continues to proudly serve in the US Armed Forces and has done so in either an active or reserve capacity for more than twenty years as an airborne and air assault qualified paratrooper, earning a Bronze Star for his service. Most importantly, he was ordained in October of 2001 after surrendering his life to Christ decades earlier.