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We have two words for events occurring in periods of years - biannual meaning twice a year, and biennial meaning once every two years.

However, my colleagues talk about having meetings biweekly. This causes a lot of confusion, since it can mean either once every two weeks or twice a week.

We can use fortnightly to indicate once every two weeks and help disambiguate that way. Are there any other words we could use which could help, particularly words which mean "twice a week"? I'm looking particularly because some of my colleagues speak English only as a second language, and find fortnightly difficult to remember.

tchrist
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Lunivore
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    Related: http://english.stackexchange.com/q/18540/8019 (which mentioned "semiweekly"). – Tim Lymington Dec 05 '11 at 14:08
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    The 'semi-' prefix is pretty commonly understood to mean 'half' so that 'semi-weekly' means twice a week straightforwardly (but somewhat strangely..is that spaced like Monday/Thursday, or Monday/Friday?). It is 'bi- that confuses most people...um...gets used for both 'half' and 'twice'. Anyway, what's wrong with 'twice a week' and 'every two weeks'? – Mitch Dec 05 '11 at 16:27
  • We're all programmers. It never hurts to have single words for these things, or to indulge our curiosity! – Lunivore Dec 05 '11 at 16:42
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    I use the idiom every other week in this situation. – Gabe Dec 05 '11 at 17:37
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    @Gabe That means, "not this week", right? – James Waldby - jwpat7 Dec 05 '11 at 17:51
  • OMG! How come English should have a word meaning both fortnightly and semiweekly at the same time! – Terry Li Dec 05 '11 at 20:02
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    @TerryLiYifeng: All part of the fun of the English language! English has many words with multiple meanings, and even some with completely different and contradictory meanings, for example: Fast can mean "moving quickly" (as in "running fast") or "not moving" (as in "stuck fast"). – Hugo Dec 05 '11 at 22:34
  • @Hugo Thanks Hugo. Good refresh of memory. I guess I've seen this topic discussed on EL&U before. – Terry Li Dec 05 '11 at 22:40
  • @TerryLiYifeng Here you go: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Auto-antonym – Lunivore Dec 06 '11 at 09:00
  • @Hugo, Or you can fast by skipping a few meals. – user Dec 06 '11 at 10:01
  • A week doesn't divide into two. If you mean twice a week then you should specify what days. – curiousdannii Aug 30 '15 at 01:15
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    @curiousdannii A week divides just fine into two. I can water my basil plant on Saturday morning and Tuesday evening; twice a week. Days aren't indivisible integers. – Lunivore Aug 30 '15 at 11:24
  • @Lunivore, Sure, but there's little benefit in looking for a term to say that. Mention the days or just say twice a week. – curiousdannii Aug 30 '15 at 11:35
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    @curiousdannii I was a programmer at the time I wrote this, and looking to see if there was a succinct expression I could use for a class name. Just because it's of little benefit to you doesn't mean it isn't of benefit to someone else. There's a reason I asked. – Lunivore Aug 31 '15 at 14:43
  • @JamesWaldby-jwpat7 :) he did say idiom – Jasen May 30 '17 at 22:22

5 Answers5

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Avoid biweekly altogether. Use fortnightly for "once every two weeks", and twice a week for, well, "twice a week".

Not everything has to be a single word, so don't be afraid to use more than one word when you want to use clear, understandable, unambiguous language.

If they have problems with fortnightly, use every other week, or let them into a little secret: fortnight comes from "fourteen nights", or two weeks.

Edit: From the comments it's clear many Americans won't understand or are uncomfortable with fortnight so, to be safe, use the aforementioned every other week.

Hugo
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    +1. If using a word introduces unwanted ambiguity, just don't use that word! – Mr. Shiny and New 安宇 Dec 05 '11 at 13:23
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    Yeah, don't use 'fortnight'. Unless you intentionally want to be not understood or sound like you woke up from a 200 year coma. – Mitch Dec 05 '11 at 13:23
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    @Mitch I believe "fortnight" is quite commonly used in the UK still. – Kit Z. Fox Dec 05 '11 at 13:25
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    I do come from the UK and it's an ordinary, commonly used word here. – Lunivore Dec 05 '11 at 13:37
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    I think the word fortnight is familiar to many, even in the US. However, if there is already language barrier in play, it may better to err on the side of clarity. Unless "fortnight" is commonly used in your environment, better to use some variation of "every other week" instead. – Leigh Dec 05 '11 at 15:20
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    @Kitḫ: wasn't aware that it is common in BrE. In general AmE, 'fortnight' is largely unknown. It is certainly familiar to readers of Tolkien, which implies the previous statement. – Mitch Dec 05 '11 at 16:08
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    But how can I be sure fortnightly doesn’t mean “fourteen times a night”‽ – Jon Purdy Dec 05 '11 at 16:39
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    @JonPurdy: Because the people doing the meeting haven't already killed themselves. – Adam Robinson Dec 05 '11 at 17:23
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    The majority Americans will know what a fortnight is, but almost never use the phrase and using it for American audiences will seem out of place and awkward. I'd suggest something unambiguous like "alternating-week" or "twice monthly" or "alternating Monday". We should discuss this at the next alternating Monday meeting. – dr jimbob Dec 05 '11 at 17:53
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    @jimbob: I disagree that the majority of Americans will know what a fortnight is. I think the majority will have no idea what it is and will think it's something from the opening sentence of the Gettysburg Address. – Adam Robinson Dec 05 '11 at 19:48
  • @Adam, you are correct. I had no idea until I read Hugo's answer. I never knew it dervied from "fourteen nights". – DustinDavis Dec 06 '11 at 15:51
  • Fortnightly is not commonly use in AmE. I would bet $100 against anyone else's $10 that if you were to walk down the street in just about any town in America and ask 50 people what "fortnightly" meant that no more than 5 would come up with "every other week" – Kevin Dec 06 '11 at 22:28
  • @Kevin (and others): Thanks for clarifying the American (non-) usage of fortnight; I've edited the answer accordingly. – Hugo Dec 06 '11 at 22:47
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    @drjimbob "twice monthly" will create its own ambiguity as every other week doesn't sync up nicely with months. – Vala Jul 06 '20 at 09:21
  • @Mitch I hath arisen from a bicenturial slumber plac'd upon mine body and soul by an evil fairy godmother! Doth we not speak of fortnights in this curious time? – Mateen Ulhaq Apr 04 '21 at 23:45
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Technically, semiweekly is the term that you're looking for. But if you're trying to avoid ambiguity, then go with something like "twice a week" like Hugo suggested. Too many people get biweekly and semiweekly confused.

Brandon
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    This should be marked as the answer to the original question "Are there any other words we could use which could help, particularly words which mean 'twice a week'?". Semiweekly is defined as "occurring twice a week". – Miles Wolbe Dec 09 '16 at 20:30
  • Semiweekly immediately makes me think of "every two weeks". I see the word "weekly" is like a rate, and thus semi- halves that rate from every one week to every two weeks. Semi-weekly instead of semiweek-ly. (English is not my first language, but I learned something new today.) – Nuclear241 Jul 26 '23 at 07:24
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I agree with those who suggested "fortnightly." If someone feels that it's antiquated or "odd," that is their problem! It's a great word. Besides the ambiguity of the words "bi-weekly" or "bi-monthly," I think that they are esthetically ugly and artificial words that detract from the English language. I like to keep my Latin and Germanic mixing to a minimum. Try "twice weekly," if "fortnightly" doesn't do it for you.

Gavin Emich
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Strangely, although bicentennial, bilingual, and bipedal (among many other actual and imagined bi-prefixed words) would never be understood as referring to half- century, language, foot, etc. phenomena, biannual (or biennial) or bimonthly or biweekly (and probably bi-daily, if anyone ever tried it out on people) do elicit that interpretation (perhaps largely among the semi-, but certainly not the bi-, literate). Dictionary.com offers the following highly laudable advice:

"Since bi- can be taken to mean either “twice each” or “every two,” a word like biweekly can be understood as “twice each week” or “every two weeks.” To avoid confusion, it is better to use the prefix semi- to mean “twice each” (semiannual; semimonthly; semiweekly) or the phrase twice a or twice each (twice a month; twice a week; twice each year), and for the other sense to use the phrase every two (every two months; every two weeks; every two years)."

As for the claim that "every two" (or "every other") years/months/weeks/days beats biennial/bimonthly/biweekly/bidaily, it fails to meet the immediately-intelligible test that ought to govern all linguistic prescriptions.

Hugo
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H Stephen Straight
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  • Voted down because you shouldn't accuse people of being semi-literate without very good reason. (Against SE policies.) – Stuart F Jun 09 '23 at 09:27
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I might suggest being careful with biannual as well. It is sometimes used for meetings held once every two years. There are three times as many Google hits for semi-annual as bi-annual, so that could indicate a lack of confidence in using bi-.

Julia
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