Week 16 - Points for Creativity

Having mastered French in the last couple of weeks, let's switch back to English and do a couple of word-for-word exercises. We'll then finish (I'm building the suspense here) with a couple of real winners in the realm of creativity -- definitely worth waiting for.

In vs. into

I ran across a sentence the other day, one of many examples that have cropped up over the years, something like:

When I walked in the room, I noticed a book lying [not "laying," mind you -- see Week 8] on the table.

The problem with this one is that when you move from one place to another, you should use "into" or "out of," since "in" and "out" refer to positions, not motions. Our sentence above should have been

When I walked into the room, ....

Alternatively, if you noticed the book in the course of a circumnavigation inside the room, you might have said

When I finally got up off the couch and walked around the room, I found the xzl!*& book on the table, right under my nose.


Appraise vs. apprise

This one is a frequent source of confusion, since the two words sound so similar. My sample sentence should make the distinction crystal clear:

Shortly after Bob came to appraise our house, he was able to apprise us of the current value.

How can you remember this one? Well, "apprise" almost always has a person (or people) as a direct object [Shaky on direct objects? See Week 1], as in "to apprise us...," and "appraise" almost always doesn't (it's usually about money). [It's easy to remember the "money" angle -- ...raise = money, get it?] Occasionally, you'll find an example of someone doing a financial appraisal that does involve people (or at least their bodies). Remember Sean Penn's line, "Righteous bucks!" from Fast Times at Ridgemont High?


Persons vs. people

Here's one that I haven't looked up to make sure I'm not crazy, but I've always been bothered by sentences like

Will all persons who need tickets please form a line over here?

I always thought that the plural of "person" was "people," but maybe I'm just old-fashioned. It's pretty hard to defend the English language on this one, though -- isn't it perverse enough that the plural of "woman" is "women" (and they're not even pronounced the same) and that the plural of "deer" is "deer?"


Likely vs. liable

This one shouldn't be too tough:

If you tick me off again, I'm liable to open a can of Whoopie on you!

I guess it's always hard to use perfect grammar when you're really angry, but in the example here, the tickee should have said "I'm likely to open a can...." On the other hand, that doesn't sound very scary, so maybe it should have been

Tick me off once more, I'm a mess you up real bad.

Either way, since violence isn't condoned in polite society (except in sports, of course), our tickee could definitely be liable (in court this time) if s/he actually carried out the threat.


OK, the moment you've all been waiting for, the Points for Creativity section. There's always confusion about the distinctions among "insure," "ensure," and "assure," even after we talked about those in Week 7. But I saw a perfect solution a couple of weeks ago on a slide at a conference:

Essure that no auditors come to your campus except on routine visits.

Finally, the prizewinner for creativity is a tour guide at a museum we visited the other day. We were getting ready to take a walk into [not "in," mind you] the rural Chinese house that was relocated to the Peabody Essex Museum in Salem, Mass., and the guide said

When you get withinside, please activate your audio devices to hear more about the house.

Well, it's a beautiful early spring day here in Boston. I hope none of you is withinside reading this blog -- please wait until it starts raining again!

Week 15 - How to Speak French

I hope you realize that the title of this week's blog is false advertising, which should of course be avoided if you're selling something. Since I'm selling good grammar, I've erred (which rhymes with "bird," not with "aired," by the way), but I did so because I was just reading a great blog (http://www.copyblogger.com/copywriting-101/) that talks about the primary goal of a headline, which is to get you to read the first sentence. And the goal of the first sentence is to get you to read the second sentence, and so on until you make your sales pitch, which is of course so persuasive that lots of readers buy your product.

So I'm not going to teach you how to speak French (I couldn't anyway -- I'm having a hard enough time with English!), but lots of French words have crept into our everyday usage, and it's good to know how to pronounce them. Last week we learned that French words ending in "er,", "et," and "ez" (but not "es") all sound as if they have an English long "a" at the end. Words that end in "é" have that same long "a" sound. One that comes up all the time is a favorite cooking technique, "sauté," whose first syllable is pronounced just like the English word "so," not like "saw." Same goes for the popular wine, Sauvignon Blanc, and remember not to pronounce the second "n" in Sauvignon or the "c" in Blanc. The last sound in each of those words is that same nasal "on-without-the-n" sound that doesn't occur in English -- good luck!

Here's one more that came up this week, "laissez-faire," meaning "hands-off," as in a "laissez-faire attitude." How do you say it? Well, "faire" is pronounced just like the English word "fair," the "ez" is just like long "a," and "laiss" is easier than it looks, sounding just like "less" in English.

OK, another technique for keeping people interested through a piece of writing is to maintain a level of suspense, in this case "When is this guy going to stop speaking French, already?" I've gotten some suggestions for topics from friends and family -- let's do some of those.


Apostrophes, revisited

Ellen asked me to revisit apostrophes (remember Week 6?), since they're involved in so many common mistakes. Here are a couple from this week. She saw a sign in a department store recently that said

Men
Women
Kid's

It's hard to imagine why someone would want to put an apostrophe in "Kid's" in that context. If the sign had said "Men's, Women's, Kids'," that would have been OK, since the three words would all have been possessives. Or if it had said "Men, Women, Kids," that would have been fine, since they would all have been plurals. But as written, the sign mixed a singular possessive with two plural non-possessives -- amazing!

I always get a few holiday cards that say (name changed, of course)

Greetings from the Smith's

which has exactly the same problem as "Kid's" in Ellen's sign -- using a singular instead of a plural, and using a possessive where it wasn't warranted. All of the variants below are fine, of course:

Greetings from the Smiths

Greetings from a Smith

Greetings from the Smiths' Dog

Greetings from a Smith's Cat


Lose vs. Loose

This one's for Scott of the HDC. It seems easy -- maybe the mistakes he sees are just typos:

You can lose your grip if your grip is too loose.


Led vs. Lead

Another easy one (haha), also from Scott. Isn't English grand?

Professor Calligraph led the way in inventing the lead pencil; some say he took the lead in its manufacture too.

The first "lead" is pronounced like "led," but that's the only resemblance, since it's really a noun used as an adjective. The second "lead" is also a noun, but it's pronounced the same as the present and future tenses of the verb "to lead," of which "led" is the past tense, as in

If I lead today, having also led yesterday, my legs will feel like lead tomorrow.


Anxious vs. Eager

This one's for my sister Eleanor, perhaps even more of a grammar fiend than I, who suggested a clarification on "anxious vs. eager" months ago. "Anxious" means that someone is nervous, typically about a future event; "eager" describes someone with an enthusiastic, positive attitude.

I'm anxious about my upcoming audition, but I'm eager to put it behind me and move on.

Thanks for all your suggestions and comments. Keep 'em coming!

Week 14 - How about some French?

Still busy working on that project, but every once in awhile, I get the itch to blog, so here goes....

A couple of people now have pointed me toward a very comprehensive grammar blog, from Paul Brian at Washington State University: http://www.wsu.edu/~brians/errors/index.html

Paul's blog leaves few stones unturned, so if you really want the definitive word on words, that's the place to go. I was also impressed by his treatment of the delicate question that I tiptoed around in my Week 1 post, i.e. why is it important to use correct grammar in the first place? Paul doesn't beat around the bush at all on this topic:

"The aim of this site is to help you avoid low grades, lost employment
opportunities, lost business, and titters of amusement at the way you write or
speak." and

"...if your standard usage causes other people to consider you stupid or
ignorant, you may want to consider changing it."

Delicately put, if I do say so myself!

OK, first a couple of word-for-words:

Farther vs. further

A lot of times, "farther" and "further" seem pretty interchangeable, but as it turns out, "farther" has to do with physical distance, and "further" refers to more metaphorical separation. As my friend Dawn's mother always used to tell her,

Furthermore, it's farther away.


Comparatives and superlatives

Lots of people are using superlatives these days when they should really be using comparatives. Here's a typical (incorrect) example:

Chris is the oldest of my two children.

Comparatives ("older" in this case) are used when there are two items (or people) being compared, and superlatives (like "oldest") are for more than two items.


Through vs. thru

"Thru" is an example of a common contraction that has its place (in cellphone text messages and other notes in shorthand) but should be avoided in any formal written communication. [I admit I've taken to text messaging quite enthusiastically, and it's fun to see how clearly you can communicate with as few letters as possible.] So in a text message you might say

R u thru w/ that book?

and you might forgive the signmakers who say

New York Thruway 10 Miles

since they'd have to make a bigger sign to have room for "Throughway,"

but in regular old written English, you should say

When you're through with that vampire novel, I'd love to read it.


I want to get to French pronunciation in a minute, but by way of transition, let's take a brief digression into Italian. Almost all the Italian I know is related to music, and I've been thinking about music quite a lot recently because three of the people I work with most closely are in a band together (how many people think the "Grateful Deadlines" is a terrific name for a bunch of research administrators?). Anyway, my current bugbear from the music world is people's misuse of the word "crescendo," which is Italian for an increase in the volume of a musical phrase. The typical misuse is in sentences like

As the music built to a crescendo, the audience became more and more excited.

I realize it doesn't sound as fancy to say

As the music got louder, so did the audience.

but there's no such thing as "building to a crescendo."

French Pronunciation 101

OK, now for some French. I studied French for quite a while, long enough to be willing to try my accent on some real French people in France (with mixed success, I might add, because they can be pretty fussy about pronunciation), and I really like France and my friends there. There are times, though, when I wish that the French hadn't colonized the USA with restaurants whose names are so hard for Americans to pronounce. Yes, I'm talking about Au Bon Pain, which has two words with sounds that don't exist in English and a third that's widely mispronounced. I'm not even going to try to describe in writing how to say that nasal "on" or "ain" sound in French, but I will say, for those of you who try so hard to get it right, that in general (with hundreds of exceptions, of course), you don't pronounce final consonants in French. So in this case, "bon" is not pronounced like the English word "Bond" without the "d," nor is "Pain" pronounced like the English word of the same spelling. All is not lost, though, because Americans are perfectly capable, without years of study, of pronouncing "Au" correctly -- it sounds just like the word "oh" in English (but not like the word "aw").

One more (pretty good) generalization about French consonants -- when a word of French descent ends in "er," "et," or "ez," it's almost always pronounced as if there's a long "a" (and no consonant) at the end of the word. This is one case where they've made it easier for us -- all three endings sound the same, and that sound is one we use all the time in English.

Week 13 -- Happy New Year!

I had the pleasure of picking up my son Chris at the airport a couple of weeks ago and surprising my wife and my daughter with his visit. A wonderful moment!

Chris made my week a second time a couple of days later when I told him about my grammar blog. He got excited immediately. "At last," he said, "a cure for my insomnia!"

My friend Amy was carrying around a copy of Strunk's and White's The Elements of Style the other day. I can't remember why she had it, but I have some chemistry in my background, so when I see the word "element," I often think about that previous career. I get reminded of it in other venues too. For example, we went to see Avatar the other day, and I liked the name for the new metal they had discovered under the Na'vis' rain forest, (possibly) with all the best qualities of uranium and titanium: unattainium. [Shucks -- Carol tells me that it's "unobtainium," but either way, let's not be too negative -- we all think we might succeed in some of our New Year's resolutions.]

While we're talking about Strunk and White, it's worth mentioning a concept that they raise pretty early on, not strictly a grammar issue, but one that we should all think about in our writing. There are several good examples in their section, called "Omit needless words," of phrases that don't add anything to a sentence. We all succumb to the temptation to wax poetic and flowery on occasion, but in business writing, it's better to be direct. When you send out a memo, for example, you probably have your audience for only a couple of sentences, so you'd better make them count. I caught myself twice just the other day. First, I wrote:

I'm in the process of finalizing that spreadsheet on xyz.

which could have been written more directly as

I'm finalizing that spreadsheet....

Then, a couple of sentences later, (writing to persuade, as usual!), I said:

In my opinion, we should blah blah blah.

Since I hadn't mentioned that I was relaying someone else's opinion, I was obviously talking about my own, and I could have saved three words and a comma by saying just

We should blah blah blah.

OK, let's do a couple of word-for-words. Here's one that has become so widespread that maybe, like "hopefully" from Week 12, it's a lost cause. I hope [not Hopefully!] I'm wrong.

Quality vs. high-quality

"Quality" is a noun, so when you want to use it as an adjective, you need to say what kind of quality you're talking about:

Eastern Mountain Sports sells quality products to its customers.

should be

Eastern Mountain Sports sells high-quality products to its customers.

Of course, we all remember from Week 5 that compound words like "high-quality" have to be hyphenated, to avoid giving the impression that EMS sells "high" products.


Piqued vs. peaked

I ran across this one (or something like it) on someone else's blog the other day:

The mysterious item in his refrigerator peaked my curiosity.

I suppose that if your curiosity was already at a high level, then the mysterious item could have pushed it over the top, but the correct word is "piqued," from the French verb "piquer," to prick or irritate.

Gone vs. went

Grammarians will probably tell you that this distinction is one between the past tense and the past perfect (pluperfect?) tense, but since we're just ordinary people, let's learn by the following example:

I should have went to the meeting yesterday.

should be

I should have gone to the meeting yesterday.

The simple past tense of "I go" is "I went," and some fancier past tense is "I have gone," not "I have went." When I heard this one at the office a couple of weeks ago, I was tempted to write it off to regional preferences for particular idioms, but the old curmudgeon in me still says it's incorrect.

Along those same (curmudgeonly) lines, I'll leave you this week with one last diagnosis from my son Chris: his parting words on the subject of grammar were "Dad, I don't know about this blog of yours. I think you may have Irritable Vowel Syndrome."

Week 12 - Back in the saddle

Big project at work -- sorry for the hiatus. I just got re-inspired by reading a friend's blog, even though the spreadsheets beckon.

Before we get started with the grammar, I'll pass along a little kitchen humor overheard recently:

"Dad, who's making charcoal in the toaster oven?" and
"Don't you wish Mom would stop using the smoke alarm for a kitchen timer?"

[This latter not true, of course, but it makes a good story....]


Now, let's clean up a little old business. I said in Week 8 that I didn't have a good mnemonic for the use of "principal" as a noun, but my brother Dan pointed out that "principal" ends in "pal," obviously a person of some sort, while "principle" doesn't, meaning it must be a thing. Thanks, Dan.


Which vs. that

I prefer gas stations which are on the right-hand side of the road.

Elke likes designer boots, which often make quite a fashion statement.

Grammar experts will tell you that the sentence about gas stations above should be written

I prefer gas stations that are on the right-hand side of the road.

since the clause "that are on the right-hand side of the road" is a restrictive clause, one that narrows down the field of gas stations to just some of the possibilities, and you always use "that" rather than "which" if the clause is restrictive.

In the second example, the clause "which often make quite a fashion statement" is a nonrestrictive clause -- it doesn't narrow down the field of designer boots, it merely adds something about all of them. "Which" should be used instead of "that" for a nonrestrictive clause, and since that type of clause is parenthetical, it should be preceded by a comma.

She also likes small dogs, which usually eat less than big ones.

Other people prefer small dogs that eat a lot, since they seem so healthy.

In these last two examples, the usage of "which" and "that" is correct in each case. In the first sentence, we're saying that all small dogs usually eat less than big ones -- the "which" clause is nonrestrictive. In the second sentence, the clause "that eat a lot" is restrictive, since it divides the field of small dogs into those that eat like birds and those that eat like pigs.

Talking about the word "that" reminds me to mention again the conversation we had in Week 3, when we agreed that in written English, "that" refers back to things, and "who" refers back to people. The following sentence is correct twice:

The students who [not "that"] gave the correct answers in class were enthusiastic; the rewards were candies that they really liked.


Revert back vs. revert

This is an easy one: "revert" means "go back," so when you say "revert back," you're really saying "go back back," which is redundant. So always say "revert" when you're tempted to say "revert back."


Hopefully vs. I hope

This one is getting so ingrained, at least in spoken English, that it may be a lost cause by now. 'Hopefully" is an adverb, so I should say

I hope Sheila will enjoy her new job.

The sentence we hear more often,

Hopefully, Sheila will enjoy her new job.

means that Sheila, looking for ways to enjoy her new job, will try to do it hopefully, rather than, say, joyously, or frivolously, or occasionally, or some other way.


In vs. within

People have started using "within" when they don't need to -- I'm not sure why. Most of the time when you're tempted to say "within," you should just say "in" instead.

There are at least a hundred departments and centers within the Faculty of Arts and Sciences.

This sentence should use "in" in place of "within." "Within" doesn't add anything -- it should be reserved for more esoteric situations, like

Our most enthusiastic employees find ways to tap into the passion that lies within.


We've been serious for quite awhile now, so let's close with a bit of levity. I got this request from a female colleague the other day in an email:

"I'm confused by these fringe rates, so please bare with me."

All these years, and I never realized that research administration could be so much fun!

Week 11 - Comic Relief

Thanks, David, for finding this timely reminder to not take ourselves too seriously!

Week 10 - A Few More Areas of Confusion

There are literally thousands of websites devoted to good grammar, and some of them try to be comprehensive, including every possible rule in the language. I've been focusing more on mistakes I see around the campus, which narrows the field quite a bit. I've covered quite a few of the common areas of confusion in the past few weeks, but just when I think I'm running out of timely topics, a couple more show up. Here are some I've seen just in the past few days.


Single quotes vs. double quotes

When do you use single quotation marks, and when do you use double quotes? This one is simple: you always use double quotes, unless you need to quote something and you're already inside a (double) quotation.

Our Accounting 101 teacher, Gail, told us today that "The 'income statement' for a company is a report that provides a periodic summary of its income and expenses."


How

"How" is usually an adverb, according to the dictionaries. There are obscure usages in which it can be a noun, as in

Dawn explained the hows and wherefores of grants administration to a rapt audience.

A common misusage of "how" shows up in sentences like

We were encouraged to include an example of how the obscure word could be used.

I was always taught that the correct usage in a sentence like the one above would be

We were encouraged to include an example of the manner in which the obscure word could be used.

but "...the manner in which" is pretty stiff, so another alternative to consider is

We were encouraged to include an example of the way the obscure word could be used.

Why is it wrong to say "...an example of how...?" Remembering back to Week 1, "of" is a preposition, and prepositions take objects that are nouns or pronouns, not adverbs.


Can vs. may

Here's one I saw just yesterday (well, one like it anyway):

Hannah bought an axe, so now she may cut down that tree in her yard.

The correct sentence, assuming she wouldn't prefer to use her chain saw, is

Hannah bought an axe, so now she can cut down that tree in her yard.

The distinction between "can" and "may" is that "can" is about ability, and "may" is about permission:

Hannah talked to the town authorities yesterday, and now she may cut down that dead tree.


Here are a couple of quick "word-for-word" examples to end on for the week.

Adverse vs. averse

She wasn't adverse to going to the beach on Saturday. [incorrect]

People use "adverse" all the time when they really mean "averse."

In such an adverse situation, he wouldn't be averse to running away.

"Adverse" is an adjective that describes things, and "averse" describes people.


Contingent vs. contingency

Here's another common misusage:

Yulanda was part of a contingency that went to the beach every Sunday afternoon.

"Contingency" should never refer to a group of people -- the correct word for them is "contingent."

The contingency plan, if Crane's Beach is full, will be to load the whole contingent back onto the bus and head for Plum Island.

Happy writing! See you next week.