diff --git a/hadoop-mapreduce-project/hadoop-mapreduce-client/hadoop-mapreduce-client-core/src/main/java/org/apache/hadoop/mapred/lib/MultipleOutputs.java b/hadoop-mapreduce-project/hadoop-mapreduce-client/hadoop-mapreduce-client-core/src/main/java/org/apache/hadoop/mapred/lib/MultipleOutputs.java
index a214420df8059..e4adc7993dad4 100644
--- a/hadoop-mapreduce-project/hadoop-mapreduce-client/hadoop-mapreduce-client-core/src/main/java/org/apache/hadoop/mapred/lib/MultipleOutputs.java
+++ b/hadoop-mapreduce-project/hadoop-mapreduce-client/hadoop-mapreduce-client-core/src/main/java/org/apache/hadoop/mapred/lib/MultipleOutputs.java
@@ -203,7 +203,7 @@ private static void checkTokenName(String namedOutput) {
         continue;
       }
       throw new IllegalArgumentException(
-        "Name cannot be have a '" + ch + "' char");
+        "Name cannot contain a '" + ch + "' char");
     }
   }