Homographs are written identically but can be pronounced differently, as with the noun and verb forms of record.

The longer version

Record changes its stress depending on the job: the noun puts the accent on the first syllable, the verb on the second, and the vowels shift accordingly. Many English nouns and verbs behave this way, because the language prefers to move stress rather than add an ending.

Present, object, convict and produce follow the same rule, and pairs like read differ only in tense while keeping one spelling. Romance borrowings brought the pattern with them, since Latin and French also used accent to distinguish related forms. Readers handle the switch automatically from context, which is why it rarely causes trouble in speech but can slow someone reading aloud.

Where this entry sits

This category gathers small surprises about the English language, from odd spelling rules to words that quietly hide their own history. Expect palindromes, punctuation oddities, borrowed terms, and the strange ways writing systems record spoken speech. The full list sits on the Words and Language page, where every entry is listed in order.