I before e except after c

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I before e, except after c is a mnemonic used to help English students remember how to spell certain words in the English language. It means that, in words where i and e fall together, the order is ie, except directly following c, when it is ei. For example:

ie in words like siege, friend
ei in words like ceiling, receive

Unfortunately, in its short form the rule has many common exceptions, e.g.:

ie after c: science, sufficient, agencies, financier
ei not after c: their, foreign, being, neither, weird, vein, seize

The word oneiromancies (studies into the meaning of dreams) breaks the rule twice, in both ways. The words deficiencies, efficiencies, sufficiencies, zeitgeist and einsteinium break the rule twice in the same way (though the last two are of foreign origin).

An augmented American version is:

i before e

except after c

or when sounding like a

as in neighbor and weigh

which excludes many of the exceptions but still fails to correctly handle many others.

A reminder of exceptions is embodied in the sentence: Neither financier seized either species of weird leisure.

A British version is:

when the sound is ee

it's i before e

except after c

which excludes most exceptions, as well as excluding some words (e.g. friend) which are correctly handled by the American version. The most frequent everyday failures of the British form of the rule are seize, caffeine, protein and, for those who pronounce the initial vowel sound ee, either and neither. Weird and weir are often listed as exceptions but this is contentious as the 'i' is detectable in the pronunciation. Words with a plural ending in -cies (agencies, policies etc.) are exceptions to those who pronounce the ending eez, but not to those who pronounce it with a shorter iz sound.

Note: This page or section contains IPA phonetic symbols in Unicode. See IPA chart for English for a pronunciation key.

Few common words have the <cei> spelling handled by the rule: verbs ending <ceive> and their derivatives (perceive, deceit, transceiver, receipts, etc), and ceiling. Many words spelled with <ei> are pronounced ee (/iː/) in America but not Britain (e.g. sheikh, leisure, either have /eɪ/, /ɛ/, /aɪ/ respectively). In these cases, the British pronunciation is a corollary of the British rule (i.e. when spelt <ei>, the pronunciation cannot be /iː/).

[edit] Exceptions

albeit
ancient
atheism
beige
being
caffeine
casein
cleidoic
codeine
conscience
counterfeit
deficient(deficiencies)
deify
deity
deign
deil
disseize
dreidel
efficient
eider
eight
either
feign
feint
feisty
financier
foreign
forfeit
freight
geisha
glacier
gleization
gneiss
greige
greisen
heifer
heigh-ho
height
heinous
heir
heist
inveigle
kaleidoscope
keister
leisure
leitmotiv
monteith
neigh
neighbor
neither
obeisance
omniscient
onomatopoeia
peignoir
phenolphthalein
phthalein
prescient
proficient
protein
reign
reimburse
rein
reinforce
reinstate
reveille
Rotweiller
science
seeing
seiche
seidel
seine
seismic
seize
seizin
sheik
sheila
society
sovereign
specie
species
sufficient
surfeit
surveillance
teiid
their
veil
vein
weight
weir
weird

[edit] Cultural references

"I Before E Except After C" was a song Charlie Brown and Linus sing, with Snoopy playing a jaw harp, to prepare Charlie for his school's spelling bee in A Boy Named Charlie Brown. The song covered several other spelling rules, e.g., words ending in -cede, -ceed and -sede.

The "I before E" rule was debated in a Canadian TV commercial for the Hyundai Santa Fe.