In Word, language is a character property, meaning that it may apply to a selection. If the problem occurs in a specific document, changing the default language is not going to fix it. You will have to select all the text and then specify the correct language for the selection. In the Language dialog box, click OK (not Set As Default). Also, turn off the option to "Detect language automatically" to prevent Word from trying to guess the language at the insertion point.
Suddenly my dictionary does not recognize as valid spelling many common words, like 'other'
During an editing session in WORD 2016 (for Mac), the spell checker started flagging many (about 10%) of the common words I typed as misspelled. I did nothing, as far as I can tell, to trigger this. This problem is now showing up also in Power Point.
Microsoft 365 and Office | Word | For home | Windows
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3 additional answers
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Anonymous
2017-01-04T02:23:46+00:00 Hi RWest1234,
Please check the Language settings in your Word and set the document as well as the default as English (U.S) or your main language to see if the issue persists.
Regards,
Sheen
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Anonymous
2017-01-05T09:44:40+00:00 Hi RWest1234,
Have you referred to the information I provided? Please keep us updated when you have time.
If the issue persists, you can try opening older documents and see if the spell checker also flags correct words.
Regards,
Sheen
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Anonymous
2017-01-09T06:23:56+00:00 Unfortunately this did not help. I checked the language, and although it was set to British English, it is flagging as misspelled 'Temperature', 'Title', 'Your', 'Search', 'Engine'.