A little "fatal" goes a long way

from Wikipedia.com
in case you were curious

According to NPR reporter Greg Allen, dengue fever is “very fatal.” My first reaction to this September report was not to research the disease, but to wonder what it means to be “very fatal.”

“Fatal” means “to cause death.” The last time I checked, humans (unlike cats) have only one life, so we can only die once. Other than dying more than once, what could “very fatal” mean? How is dengue fever different from afflictions that are only plain, ordinary fatal, like a fatal car crash or a fatal heart attack? Once we are dead, we are dead. End of story. 

Reporters seem determined to hype everything, even events that need no hype. “Fatal” is a strong word, and adding “very” diminishes its strength. This addition serves as a reminder that sometimes enough is, well, enough. The modifier simply makes the entire story silly. I was so busy giggling about the unnecessary hyperbole that I failed to pay attention to what could have been a concern for my family. The hype diverted my attention rather than cause the alarm the reporter was trying to convey.

Why do writers of all stripes add ‘very” so often? I suspect this usage goes deep into their writing heritage, back when a teacher assigned a 500-word essay on a topic where they only had 200-words of information. How did they reach the limit? By adding unnecessary words. Instead of fostering economy and precision, these assignments promote bloated, nonsensical prose. If an adjective or adverb isn't strong enough, it's enough for many writers to slap a “very” in front of it and be done with it, instead of diving deeper into their vocabulary well to find a more exact word to express the idea more precisely. 

Writers have a responsibility to their readers to weed out redundancy. Listeners and reader have become almost immune to some of the most egregious examples: free gifts, future plans, unconfirmed rumors, false pretense, dead corpse. Seriously, who pays for a gift? Aren't all plans in the future? Aren't rumors by definition unconfirmed? If it's a pretense, can it be true? A corpse is a dead body, so is a dead corpse a dead, dead body? Maybe that's what Allen was trying to say about dengue fever, but I doubt it. He was probably against a deadline and needed a longer sound bite. I'd rather listen to dead air myself. Wouldn’t you? 

The power of positive thinking

This blog has given me a venue to expose grammar gaffes and pet peeves, but with the start of the new school year, I'd like to recognize excellent writing and writers. As the old saying goes, you can catch more flies with honey than vinegar. Perhaps by sharing beautiful prose (and explaining why I like it), you will want to both embrace and emulate it.

A friend gave me a copy of The Light Between Oceans by M. L. Stedman, and I fell in love with the prose, the story, and its universality. It's a lovely novel set in post-World War I Australia. The main characters are a lighthouse keeper and his beautiful wife. You may ask, "How in the world is a story about an Australian lighthouse keeper universal?" It is universal in love the couple shares, the hardships they face, and their struggle to overcome hardship.

Stedman's writing brings these characters to life almost as certainly as the midwives helped usher my children into the world. Isabel and Tom are with me a month after finishing the book. The story begins...

   "On the day of the miracle, Isabel was kneeling at the cliff's edge, tending the small, newly-made driftwood cross. A single fat cloud snailed above the late-April sky, which stretched above the island in a mirror of the ocean below. Isabel sprinkled more water and patted down the soil around the rosemary bush she just planted.
   "'...and lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil,' she whispered.
   "For just a moment, her mind tricked her into hearing an infant's cry. She dismissed the illusion instead drawn by a pod of whales weaving their way up the coast to calve in warmer waters, emerging now and then with a fluke of their tails like needles through tapestry. She heard the cry again, louder this time on the early morning breeze. Impossible."

This passage begins with a certain attention grabber, "On the day of the miracle." Stedman does not question miracles, nor does she immediately explain the miracle in question. The last sentence of this passage is a fragment, "Impossible." It is separated from the word miracle, but it is close enough for a careful reader to see the connection that miracles are impossible.

It is not just a cross that Isabel tends, but a "small, newly-made driftwood cross." The carefully selected adjectives introduce us to Isabel's grief but spares the reader a maudlin explanation. Her word choice is exquisite--the cloud "snailed"  describes its movement with precision. She uses alliteration to capture the movement of the whales, and the repetition of the sound of the initial consonant of the mammals being described is both elegant and whimsical. Stedman introduces this biological fact that the whales know enough to move to warmer waters to calve before she tells us about Isabel's loss.

Stedman sets this introduction in late-April, a month that TS Eliot describes as "the cruelest month," a month where Chaucer's pilgrims begin their journey. Is she alluding to these writers? Who knows? But a writer should make every decision count, and by choosing April, Stedman allows us the opportunity to consider the connection to these writers, as well as to remember that April is the harbinger of spring, of new life. The fact that she is tending a rosemary bush near a newly-made cross is ironic. And if Stedman did not want us to consider allusions, why plant a rosemary bush? ("Rosemary for remembrance," you might remember, is spoken by Ophelia in Hamlet.) April is often associated with rain, but Isabel is sprinkling the rosemary bush with water, suggesting that nature is perverse in Isabel's world.

The second paragraph is from The Lord's Prayer, but Stedman elects to include only the last line. The reader is forced to ask, what temptation? What evil?

In three short paragraphs, Stedman introduces and denies a miracle. She juxtaposes a recent death with whales getting ready to calve. She alludes to Chaucer and Eliot and Shakespeare but introduces these allusions lightly, with no particular demands on the reader except to make him or her want to learn more about Isabel and her world.

I will not spoil this book by telling you more, but you can expect a story that will keep you engaged and prose that will make you wish the book will never end.

Nails on a chalkboard: apostrophes

It's happened again, my friends. I've flipped out over something that any normal human would simply ignore. I know that I overreact, but why oh why do writers use apostrophes when forming a simple plural?

My morning had been reasonably calm, a cappuccino on the deck while writing down my goals for the week before sitting down to the computer. Clearly, my mistake was checking a popular social networking site. A post that was intended as cute brought my blood to the boiling point. It was about yarn, for crying out loud. Basically, it said that we should keep yarn away from "cat's and kid's." "Cat's and kid's WHAT?" I screamed at my screen.

I think my anger escalated because the quotation had been added to an illustration, and it flowed perfectly around a line drawing of a woman crafting a list. The writer of the post had taken care with presentation but not with grammar. It was as if she carefully iced a cake before baking it.

How do we know when we need an apostrophe? It's easier to figure out when we don't need one. If you are writing about more than one object, it's plural. Plural nouns do not take apostrophes. I repeat, they do NOT take apostrophes. One cat, many cats; one dog, many dogs; one kid, many kids. See the pattern?

So when DO you need an apostrophe? The primary use is to show ownership. If you are writing about the sound that belongs to a cat, it's "the cat's meow." If you are writing about the end that belongs to a dog, it's "a dog's tail."

The location of the apostrophe can be a little tricky. If the noun is singular, the apostrophe goes between the singular noun (cat) and the "s" that indicates possession, as in "cat's." If you are writing about more than one cat, the apostrophe follows the plural noun. We have two cats, and if I'm writing about playthings they share, it's "the cats' toys." Our cats happen to be very proprietary, so if I'm writing about the toys that belong to one cat or the other, it would be "the cat's toys." Can you see why the position of the apostrophe is important?

There are numerous other occasions where the apostrophe is used, and it can be difficult to keep track of them all. For less common uses of the apostrophe, you should bookmark a reliable on-line resource, such as Grammar Girl's  http://grammar.quickanddirtytips.com. It's a searchable guide that is easy to understand. An online resource for more scholarly writing is hosted by Purdue University: http://owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/resource/747/01/.

If you consider yourself a serious writer, you should invest in the style guide related to your field. These include the MLA Manual, the Chicago Manual of Style, and Gregg's Reference Manual. While you might not spend your free minutes reading the style guide to find interesting anomalies of grammar, it is a comfort to have it at hand, knowing that you will always be able to check your writing before you hit "Post."

P.S. When I went back to look at the offending social networking site's post, I found that it was gone. Do you think it was my comment that made it disappear?

Are you there or their or they're?

Grammar mavens know the difference among these three homophones, but do you? Take this quick quiz to test your knowledge. Select the correct spelling in each of the following sentences.

Who's (their/there/they're)?

They had better watch (their/there/they're) backs.

(Their/there/they're) going to be in big trouble.

Before I reveal the answers, let's inspect each of these three words to see how they are supposed to function.

THEIR
"Their" is a possessive personal pronoun, so it is used to show ownership. It is always used before a noun. Their cat, their books, their vacation, their phobias, their unusual collection, their twin Porsches, their quant, unpretentious home on the Riviera are all proper uses of "their."

THERE
"There" is an adverb and is used to indicate position or location. Put the marble bust over there on the mantle. I want to go there.

"There" is also used as a noun meaning that place or that position. For example, "Chris will drive to Paoli and take the train from there."

"There" can also be used as a pronoun, usually as the subject of a sentence that uses some form of the "to be" verb (is, are, was, were, will). Here are some examples: "There are 26 letters in the alphabet."  "There Will Be Blood."  "Is there any reason why I should believe you?"

"There" can also be used as an interjection, a word that shows strong emotion or sentiment. You can imagine your sweet Auntie Eustace saying, "There, there, dear. Don't worry."

THEY'RE
"They're" is a contraction, a substitution for "they are." Contractions give a more conversational tone to your writing. "Have you tried Eclat caramels? They're my favorites." "They're waiting." "They're watching the children."

Some helpful hints:

First, notice that all three words begin with THE. Forget the i-before-e rule--it's THEIR.

Second, when in doubt, substitute.

• If the sentence makes sense if you substitute "his" or "her," then "THEIR" is the correct choice. (His cat, her book, her vacation, his phobia--you get it, right?)
• If it makes sense using "here," go with "there."This substitution only works if "there" is used as an adverb, but if neither of the other substitution tricks work, you are safe in assuming that "there" is the word you want.
•  If it makes sense using "they are," use "THEY'RE." (They are my favorites; they are waiting; they are watching the children.)

Third, notice that "there" can be used in four very different ways. In most instances, it is the right choice.

Finally, if you are still not sure, the safest trick of all is to rewrite the sentence to eliminate the word "there" entirely. The result will usually be a stronger sentence.

Do you want to go back and check your answers? Go ahead.

Drumroll, please ....
Who's there?
(In this case, there is an adverb showing position. You could substitute the word "here" and the sentence would still make sense.)

They had better watch their backs.
(Here, the word "their" tells us whose backs they are watching. To check your response, you have to do a little more work in the substitution--We had better watch our backs--but it still works.)

They're going to be in big trouble.
(In this sentence, "they're" is a contraction. You can substitute "they are" and the sentence will be grammatically correct.)

If you answered all three correctly, give yourself a pat on the back.

Please let me know if you have other questions about homophones.

Collaborate vs corroborate

The words collaborate and corroborate don't fall under the category of homophones (see last post), but people do confuse them on occasion. This confusion causes more problems in speaking than in writing, which makes me think the misattributions are more a slip of the tongue than an actual lack of knowledge. Sometimes people substitute a less frequently used word under the assumption that it makes them sound smarter. Sometimes people don't even recognize that there is a distinction.

Regardless of why they are confused, it's easy to separate the two words, despite their similarities. How are they similar? Both are transitive verbs that form nouns the same way (the verb collaborate turns into the noun collaboration, and the verb corroborate turns into the noun corroboration), and they both have to do with working together in some capacity.

How are these words different, then?

Collaborate means to work together. For example (shameless plug here), my mother and I collaborated on Pizza Friday. Lennon and McCartney formed one of the most successful musical collaborations of all time.

On the other hand, corroborate means to confirm or give support to a statement, theory or finding. Your doctor might use corroborate this way: "The tests corroborated my diagnosis." A detective might say, "Fingerprint evidence corroborated the witness's testimony that you were in the apartment."

Looking at the history of a word can help clarify meaning. I love to explore the roots of words both because I can get a more precise definition and often expand my vocabulary in the process of seeing other related words. Remember, I was an English major, and I take my fun where I can get it!

The root of collaborate is "laborere-" (to labor). In addition to the word labor, other words that come from the same root include elaborate and laborious.

The word corroborate comes from the root "robor-" (strength). Another word that comes from this same root is robust.

The bottom line: To collaborate is to labor or work together. To corroborate is to provide strength, um, evidence.

If you have pairs of words that you'd like to learn more about, please let me know. Happy Sunday!

Compliment or complement? Homophones, part one

What in the world are homophones? Homophones are words that share the same pronunciation but have different spellings--and different meanings. These pairs are different from homonyms, words that share the same spelling and pronunciation but have different meanings. "Compliment" and "complement" sound alike, but they different spellings and different meanings, so they are homophones. The word "tire" is a homonym--even though it is spelled the same way, it can mean a part of a car or bicycle, or it can mean fatigue. While you might not really care what these crazy things are called, you really should care about how a difference in spelling changes meaning.

Believe it or not, "compliment" and "complement" were originally used interchangeably. Over time, the two words have come to have two different definitions. I listed "compliment" first because it more commonly used. "Compliment" with an "i" is something nice you say to someone. For example, "I love your blog" is a compliment. The way I remember to use "compliment" when I write, "Thank you for that lovely compliment," is by thinking that I like to receive compliments, and there is an "i" in the correct choice.

"Complement" has to do with making something complete. My husband's willingness to do dishes complements my love of cooking. In other words, when we are in the kitchen together, our strengths allow us to complete the task. If you have a necklace or a tie that is especially effective with an outfit, it complements it. People also will write about a "full complement." For example, "Microsoft Office and Apple Works both offer a full complement of computer programs." If you are writing about things that complete, you need to use "complement," and complete has two "e's" in its spelling.

Did you notice that my explanation focuses on writing? When we talk, we don't need to think about the fact that there are two different spellings, but it is important to know the difference when you are writing because you want to make the best impression possible.

Again, here are my tricks: I like to receive compliments, but to complement is to make complete.

This blog on homophones is the first of a series. Do you have any demons that you would like me to slay? Leave a comment or send me a message, and I'll try to help.

The semicolon, part two

Now that you have had a few weeks to digest the first lesson on semicolons, I'd like to offer you an additional option for using this sometimes maligned mark of punctuation. In the 15th edition of The Chicago Manual of Style (you all have copies on your desk, right?), there are six rules for the use of the semicolon. Here is Rule 6.60:
"In a series. When items in a series involve internal punctuation, they should be separated by semicolons."

Perhaps that rule isn't very clear. Let me try to explain just what it means. Have you ever been confused when reading a list? I would bet that the reason for confusion is because the writer included supplemental information in the list. What do I mean? It's easier to give examples than to explain.

Here is an example of a sentence that includes a confusing list:
Representing the United States are Joe Biden, Vice President, John Kerry, Secretary of State, Leon Panetta, Secretary of Defense, and Arne Duncan, Secretary of Education.

Mind you, the above sentence is grammatically correct. You certainly may use commas to separate the items in the list and their titles, but when you read the list, you have to wonder just how many people are in attendance. To make this list easier to follow, use a colon AFTER the descriptor. I've underlined the semicolons to make them stand out.

Representing the United States are Joe Biden, Vice President; John Kerry, Secretary of State; Leon Panetta, Secretary of Defense; and Arne Duncan, Secretary of Education.

Here is another example of using a semicolon in a series:
The trip includes stops in Dublin, Ireland; London, England; Paris, France; Rome, Italy; and Athens, Greece.

Another advantage of using the semicolon in this example is that it forces the writer to keep the list parallel. Notice that each item gives the name of city followed by the country rather than a hodgepodge of cities and countries. The reader knows exactly what the trip includes.

By using a different (and stronger) mark of punctuation to separate the items in a list, it is easier for the reader to grasp what you are trying to communicate. While it's easy to forget sometimes, our job as writers is to make our meaning clear. Punctuation is designed to help. If it doesn't help, then we need to either use punctuation differently or rewrite the sentence to make the meaning clear.

Letters that didn't make the cut

"12 Letters That Didn't Make the Alphabet," appeared in the The December 13, 2012 edition of Mental Floss. It should be required reading for everyone who loves language and its history. Do read it, and as you read, think about the reasons we still might encounter these graphemes as well as why we no longer teach them to children learning their ABC's.

M. Asher Cantrell gives us a look at letters/graphemes that have been discarded for a variety of reasons. For some, type setters found substitutions, but we still see them in specific situations. For example, if you have been to Williamsburg or watched movies set before the American Revolution, you will see the thorn in signs (for example, Ye Olde Tavern). While the thorn looks like a "Y," it should be pronounced with the strong "th" sound that appears at the beginning of its name. In this case, the language was becoming more streamlined. Printers didn't need to include another letter in their type drawers, but they were still able to convey the sound without any confusion. That is, they didn't have confusion back in the old days. Now, as often as not, people will pronounce the thorn with a "yuh" sound and say, "Yee oldeee tavern" and think they sound literate.

Some of these characters are still in use, but they are not included in our recitation of the alphabet song,  the ampersand (&), for example. It was the final letter of the alphabet before it was cast aside. Then, as now, "&" meant "and." According to Cantrell, because of its terminal position in the alphabet, people said, "and, per se, and," which eventually was changed to "ampersand." (Hmmm. Think about how we slur together "LMNOP" when we say the alphabet. I hope we don't lose any of those letters!) When we want to conserve space, we still substitute the ampersand for the word "and." For sign painters, it can add an interesting flourish and can help with spacing. Long before Twitter limited us to 144 characters in a message, we had telegrams where we paid by the character. In this case, the ampersand's brevity was allowed a place on our keyboard but not when we recited the alphabet.

Another letter that you have seen is the ash, the combination of AE that dates back to Old English. We still see it in churches and in words like aeon (eon) when a writer wants to lend a sense of age or gravity to a piece. The reader has to pause and recalculate the word, which gives the word and the surrounding text more weight. Most word processing programs include the ash under special characters (along with dingbats), so you, too, can integrate it into your writing. It's probably fortunate that it is a little more labor intensive to use the ash than an ordinary "a" or "e." Including it too often would take away some of its grandeur. It's a little like keeping your tiara in your jewelry box for special occasions. If you used it every day (just as if you wore your tiara with your jeans), it would become a joke.

The article goes on to describe nine other characters that have been dropped from our alphabet. I hope you will take time to read about them--and to check out other articles in Mental Floss. Let me know what you think!

The elegant semicolon, part one

The semicolon is a particularly elegant mark of punctuation. That is, it can be elegant when it is used correctly. The semicolon is often confused with its distant cousin, the colon. It is sometimes used instead of a comma. Many people don’t use it at all because they have forgotten the rules, if they ever learned the rules to begin with.

The most basic use for the semicolon is to separate independent clauses in a compound sentence. Ooops! The eyes of most readers just glazed over. What exactly is an independent clause? Let’s break it down: a clause is a group of words that contains a subject and a predicate. “Mary sings” is an example of a very simple independent clause. How is an independent clause different from a dependent clause? An independent clause expresses a complete thought. When you hear “Mary sings,” you might still have questions. What is she singing? Is she a soprano or an alto? Does she have a good voice? However, even with your questions, the writer did express a complete thought.

A dependent clause also has a subject and a predicate, but it can’t stand by itself. “When Mary sings,” is an example of a dependent clause. We are left holding onto a branch at the edge of a cliff wondering what happens when Mary sings. Does glass break? Do savage beasts become tame? We will never know until the writer revises the sentence to include a dependent clause.

A compound sentence, by the way, is a group of two or more independent clauses. Why would you put together two or more independent clauses? It’s a style thing. Joining the ideas together into one sentence makes for a more interesting sentence; it combines similar ideas; it changes the pace of a piece of writing. (Did you notice that I used semicolons here?)

OK. Now that you understand the difference between an independent and dependent clause, we can continue with our discussion of semicolons. When you want to make the link between two ideas even more conspicuous, use a semicolon between them. In my compound sentence in the last paragraph, I wanted to emphasize that there are several reasons for using a semicolon. Let’s look at three paragraphs, two without semicolons and one with semicolons.

Seth saw the snow. He ran to the garage. He took out his sled. He raced toward the hill. He threw himself down the incline. He felt the icy wind on his cheeks. He crashed into the snow fence.

Seth saw the snow, and he ran to the garage, and he took out his sled, and he raced toward the hill, and he threw himself down the incline, and he felt the icy wind on his cheeks, and he crashed into the snow fence.

Seth saw the snow; he ran to the garage; he took out his sled; he raced toward the hill; he threw himself down the incline; he felt the icy wind on his cheeks; he crashed into the snow fence.

When the writer uses only simple sentences, as in example one, the narrative is choppy. It sounds like something from a Dick and Jane reader from the 1950’s.

When the writer uses a conjunction plus a comma, as in example two, the writing sounds like a first grader telling a story. Each idea has equal weight, and it is left to the reader to find emphasis.

With the semicolons, as in example three, the narrative builds in intensity to the final independent clause.

Each is correct. The writer must decide the message s/he is trying to communicate.

Is there a rule? Yes. A semicolon is used to replace a period or a comma plus a coordinating conjunction.

Quiz: Who can name all the coordinating conjunctions? Leave a comment if you think you have them all!

That’s the first use of the semicolon. I’ll be back with other uses soon. In the meantime, keep writing!

Disincentificationing?

Did I make you blink? Yesterday morning someone on NPR actually used that word. I got so discombobulated at hearing the word that I don't remember anything else about the broadcast.

It reminded me of a similar experience when Colin Powell was on NPR speaking as Secretary of State. He used the word "incentify," and I went ballistic. I screamed, "Aren't there other perfectly good words out there without turning 'incentive' into a verb?" Later in the morning, I posed that very question to my AP Language & Composition students, some of the brightest kids in a school that is ranked among the top in the nation. We talked about synonyms (motivate? bribe? prod?), and eventually someone searched the internet for other uses of the word.

We found that Colin Powell did not coin the word. In fact, even back then we encountered hundreds of hits in Google. "Incentify" had been in use in business for several years, and it contains within its definition motivation that is extrinsic, unlike "motivation" alone where the source of reinforcement can be either intrinsic or extrinsic. My very bright students convinced me that the world needed a more subtle word for extrinsic motivation, especially since the word "bribe" (a word that also describes extrinsic motivation) has such negative connotations. Their research and logic allowed me to get off the ledge without jumping.

Mind you, I was not completely happy. "Incentify" is not completely transparent, after all. One use I found read something like this: "The CFO was incentified to reduce staff." Yes, someone received a bonus for finding ways to get rid of jobs, but doesn't the word incentify lessen the blow? 

Let's fast forward to yesterday. It was early, before 6:00. I hadn't had my morning cappuccino. I wasn't even completely dressed, for heaven's sake, and I heard plain as a bell this new word:

Disincentificationing.

Actually, it wasn't plain at all, and certainly not plain as a bell. It doesn't roll of the tongue. It doesn't make sense even without the "-ing." Eight syllables. Count 'em. What the heck does it mean? 

Yesterday I challenged my AP Lang & Comp students to find a more elegant way to express whatever idea the addled speaker might have been trying to communicate. I'm opening up the challenge to you, my gentle reader, as well. Is there a cleaner way to communicate "disincentificationing"? I'm dying to hear!

Give a little, take a little

Now that Labor Day is behind us, it's time for your favorite grammar person to take a stab at yet another grammar issue, one that many teens and adults "take" for granted. That's right: I'm going to write about the difference between "bring" and "take."

The word "take" is used in so many idioms that sometimes it gets used in place of the word bring. Maybe you have what it takes. We all know it takes one to know one, it takes two to tango, and sometimes you'll witness something that takes the cake. My students, I hope, will take notes. You get the picture.

Idioms involving "bring" add to the confusion. "Bring home the bacon" and "bring it on" are both examples of idiomatic usage of "bring" that violate the rules concerning these words.

What is the difference between the two words? It's pretty simple. You choose the word based on location and destination. "Take" is used when the object is going away from your location. "Bring" is used when the object is coming toward your location. For example, I will take my famous pork sandwich filling to the party. (I'm at home, and I'm going somewhere, in this case to a party, and the pork is going away from me.) If I am feeling under the weather, I might ask my husband to bring me a cup of tea. (In this case, the tea is coming toward me.) In school, I could ask a student to take a book to another teacher (the book is going from my room to different room, again away from me), or I could ask them to bring me their homework (the homework is in their notebooks, and it is moving toward me).

It might take practice to use "bring" and "take" correctly, but you will sound smarter if you make the effort!

Summer reading

What are you reading this summer?

When we visited Mylène in St. Thomas and stayed at the Ritz, I wanted to see what the other half read. While there were plenty of people texting, I saw no books. Zilch. Nada. Grandmothers, hipsters, vacationing business types, teens, no one had a book open. Maybe it was too hot to read, but I thought I would see a book or two and get an idea of how the rich were different from me in their taste for novels and non-fiction.

It isn't as if I don't have any ideas for books this summer. Right now I'm reading Wolf Hall (I know, I know, that was so last summer) and Edgar Sawtell. Waiting for Stone is waiting for me on my Kindle. There's a stack of books on my nightstand and a bigger stack in the dining room (don't you have stacks of books in YOUR dining room?), but I want to know what other people are reading; I want to be a part of your discussion about your books; I want to hear about books that are so good that I will want to drop what I'm doing right now and leap into a new book.

So, what are you reading? I'm counting on you!

Please forgive the delay between posts, but I forgot my login information—even my gmail login. So, take this word from the senile: keep a log of any accounts you use infrequently. It will save hours of trial and error! I hope that you’ll come back and read my blog.

Count to Ten

If you listen to You Bet Your Garden on WHYY on Saturday mornings, you probably realize that Mike McGrath, while very knowledgable about all things horticultural, is not a model for grammar and usage. Therefore, I was not surprised when he used the phrase "totally decimated" this week.

The practice of decimation has its roots in Roman history as recorded by Livy. It was a form of punishment for mutinous or cowardly soldiers. Soldiers were divided into groups of ten, and within each group, one soldier would be chosen by lot and killed, either by clubbing or stoning. In other words, decimation is the destruction of one in ten. If you look at the word, you can even see the prefix "deci" that comes from the Latin for ten.

"Total decimation" is an oxymoron. If one tenth is destroyed, nine tenths survive. If you want to show that every member of a group was killed, "total destruction" is a more accurate way to express your meaning.

And when you hear someone else say "total decimation," join me in counting to ten before venting your frustration.

One of a kind

Summer in Chester County has been a scorcher with record temperatures and consistently high humidity. I've heard meteorologists describe the number days in the 90-degree range "very unique," and I cringe.

"Unique" is a word that should not take any qualifiers (words like very, a little, somewhat, etc.). "Unique" means "one of a kind." Something either is or is not one of a kind. If there are two of an object, then the object is not unique. Copies of the Declaration of Independence printed in 1776 might be rare, but they are not "unique." More than one exists. Ergo, any copy is not unique.

Years ago, I had a student argue for an entire term that she was "very unique." While she certainly worked very hard at being different, and while every student is unique in his or her own way, neither she nor anyone else is "very unique." The logic is all wrong! How can you be "very" one of a kind? While we immediately see the problem when we hear someone talk about a "dead corpse" (is there such a thing as a living corpse?), many speakers and writers don't recognize the incongruity of amplifying "unique." When we add the adverb we are in fact weakening the language--and the value we place on originality.

If I had my druthers, I would argue that writers cull the word "very" from their vocabularies entirely. Find the right shade of meaning and you don't need to amplify. Visit the Visual Thesaurus website (a wonderful tool for writers) to find the word with exactly the right nuance, and you can eliminate the pesky little word while making a greater impact on your reader. In that way, you can be unique (no modifier required).

Grammar at the Constitution Center

The Ancient Rome and America exhibit at the Constitution Center ends on August 1, so we headed into the city on Sunday morning to see it before it was too late. The artifacts ranged from a ring worn by Caesar Augustus to modern reproductions of busts of famous Romans. The exhibit ended with a video contemplating the fall of Rome and whether America will share Rome's fate. If a failure to use proper grammar is any indication, maybe America is doomed.

Sometimes a grammar problem is only evident in print. The difference between "it's" and "its" is a case in point. In the subtitles of the brief video, the producers used the two words interchangeably; however there is a difference between the two. "It's" is a contraction of the two words "it is." For example, "It's (it is) my party, and I'll cry if I want to." "Its" is a possessive pronoun. In other words, it is used to show ownership by an inanimate object. For example, "Don't judge a book by its cover."

Why do so many people have problems with these two tiny words? I think it is because there are two uses for the apostrophe:

1. The apostrophe is used to indicate missing letters in a contraction. Could have= could've

2. The apostrophe is used to show possession. The book that belongs to Barbara=Barbara's book

When a writer has to decide between "it's" and "its," these two rules seem to collide. But they don't really. Look at the other possessive pronouns:

I=my (I brought my book to the beach.)

You=your (or yours) (You watched your money grow in your retirement account.)

He=his (He played his guitar at the coffee house.)

She=her (or hers) (She kicked her soccer ball in the park.)

We=our (We finished our dinner with homemade gelato.)

They=their (They drove their car across the state.)

Notice that none of the possessive pronouns uses an apostrophe! If you remember that none of the other pronouns uses an apostrophe to form its possessive, you'll never make this mistake of usage.

And you can save America from its (not it's!) decline and fall.

Ten items or...

You are in the grocery store, juggling a gallon of milk, a pound of butter, a loaf of bread, and a carton of eggs. Your biggest decision at this point is whether to get in line behind the woman with the screaming child and a cart full of Captain Crunch and Fruit Roll-ups or the dapper older gentleman with fixings for sandwiches for the week. Suddenly you notice the light pop up over the Express Lane. Yes! Score!

If you are a grammar maven, it might pain you to see the small print. Express Lane: Ten items or less. OUCH! Since the object is question is "items," the grammatically correct expression is "Ten items or fewer."

While this turn of phrase might sound pompous, the use of "fewer" for things that you can count (teeth, books, spoons, chickens, chairs) dates back to 1770. "Less," on the other hand, is used for things you can't count (sugar, sand, flour, water). These words (which grammarians call mass nouns), can be counted if they are paired with a unit of measure. So, it would be grammatically correct to say, "I use less sugar in my coffee than my daughter," or "I use fewer pounds of sugar each week now that I don't bake as often." Another example of this phenomenon is "Put less water in the glasses so they don't spill," or "Use fewer bottles of water to reduce waste."

Granted, "less" has been used with countable nouns since the time of Alfred the Great, and many people have never been taught this nicety of grammar. If that's the case, why do I care whether I stand under a sign that says "Ten items or less"? Or, more important, why should you care? When I see a printed sign, a sign that has been reviewed by the marketing department, the legal department, the executives at the highest level, and it contains a grammatical error, I wonder what other corners have been cut, what other rules they have ignored, what other ways the store relies on the lowest common denominator. If they don't hire writers who know the rules of grammar and usage, what are their qualifications for the people who handle meat or produce?

Sure, people do speak informally on a daily basis, but in my humble opinion, written text needs to be held to a higher standard, and people who design posted signs that will be read by thousands should be held accountable for their language usage.

And that's my pet peeve for the week.

Between you and ...

Quick. How did you finish the phrase? Did you say "between you and me" or "between you and I"?

What's the problem? The English language, unlike, say, Latin, is not concerned with case (giving a noun a different ending depending on how it is used in a sentence). However, pronouns DO change depending on how they are used. For example, we say, "I have the ball," but "Give the ball to me." Only little children might say "Me have the ball."

When we get to today's pet peeve, people get nervous and use a hyper-correct form ("I" sounds more formal, doesn't it?)

The word "between" is a preposition. In languages that rely on endings to convey the relationship between words, nouns connected to a preposition take the objective form. Nouns in English don't change because English is a word-order language. However, pronouns break that rule. Any time a pronoun is part of a prepositional phrase, it needs to take the objective case. (Subject forms: I, you, he, she, it, we, they. Objective forms: we, you, him, her, it, us, them.)

Examples of pronouns following a preposition: Repeat after me. Charlie ate lunch with Josh and him. The ball flew over them.

If you said "between you and me," you were correct. That's music to my ears!

Welcome to Grammar Mom

Grammar Mom is a site for me to vent about issues of grammar and usage that drive me crazy as a mom and as a teacher, as a reader and a writer, as a person who thinks about words.

I hope this site will also be a place for people to go who aren't sure about a language problem, about word choice, about the niceties of style.

What are my credentials? I teach high school English. I have taught college-level writing courses. I attended parochial school long ago when grammar was king. I read voraciously and omnivorously.

Come in to my world. Read about my pet peeves. Ask questions, if you like. Learn about language. Love language.