Distinction in the Paronymic Pairs Skin/Leather and Forest/Forestry

As in other world languages, in the modern Macedonian language words are related on various grounds. Some of these words can be grouped according to similarity, some of them can be grouped according to difference, some, on the other hand, according to the fact that they associate with the same concept, etc. In communication between people, it happens that a word is mispronounced and replaced with another, and the reasons are mainly sought in the careless attitude during the speech act in terms of the form and semantics of the words or in insufficient command of the language. This paper is an attempt to understand why speakers substitute words for each other, that is, why one word is sometimes pronounced instead of another. Due to the similar pronunciation of paronyms, in our language it very often happens that the paronymic pair is used incorrectly in a different context. The reasons for the incorrect use of paronyms can be of various nature, starting first from carelessness, then incorrect pronunciation, insufficient knowledge of the language and low level of education. In cases where it is not known to use an appropriate equivalent word from the native language, sometimes an international word is used that is similar in sound and meaning. In this paper, through conducted surveys, the use of paronyms from the paronymic pairs skin/leather and forest/forestry is shown, and through the surveys, it becomes evident how well the students understand and correctly associate paronyms with given words in a specific context. The surveys were conducted at the four state universities in our country, with the different locations of the faculties ensuring equal representation, and thus the results obtained from the surveys apply to the entire territory of the Republic of North Macedonia. The most numerous are students from the faculties of social sciences, and a smaller percentage are students from the technical faculties. The surveys were successfully answered by the respondents. Sometimes some paronyms come close to synonyms, but still not always both words can be used in a different context, and this actually makes them paronyms. It can be noted from the survey that the majority of respondents are able to distinguish the usage of skin/leather and forest/forestry when they need to associate them with a given word, but there are also respondents who do not distinguish the meaning of the given paronymic pairs.