July 3, 2023

'Less' and 'fewer' aren't just about mass nouns and count nouns

People who are careful about their grammar take extra care with “less” and “fewer.” Most of the time, the results are good. “Ben has fewer worries this year” sounds better than “Ben has less worries this year.”

But even though they make good choices most of the time, sticklers on the less-and-fewer issue usually don’t understand the grammar as well as they think they do. So when they take a hard line approach, they set themselves up for a fall.

Ask anyone who’s careful with “less” and “fewer” to explain the difference, and they’ll tell you this: “Less” is for mass nouns and “fewer” is for count nouns.

Mass nouns are things that aren’t counted, like “music,” “air” and “energy.” Count nouns, as the name suggests, can be counted: “song,” “molecule,” “volt.”

Mass nouns have no plural form. You say, “I love music,” not “musics.” You say, “I breathe air,” not “airs.” And you say, “He has so much energy,” not “so many energies.”

Count nouns have a plural form and a singular form. So you can say, “I like that song” or “I like those songs.” You can say, “one molecule” or “two molecules.” You can say “one volt” or “100 volts.”

So if it’s true you must use “fewer” for count nouns, then those grocery store express lane signs that say “10 items or less” are grammatically incorrect. After all, as any stickler will tell you, “item” is a count noun. And if count nouns require “fewer,” then those checkout lanes are wrong to use “less.”

A better guide for when to choose “less” or “fewer” isn’t about mass nouns and count nouns. It’s about singulars and plurals. Consider this scenario: You’re in the express lane, which is for 10 items or fewer, and you realize you have 11 items, so you take one out of your cart. You now have one less item, not one fewer item, since “item” is singular here. Here's the full story in my recent column.

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June 26, 2023

'Less' and 'fewer' isn't just a matter of mass nouns vs. count nouns

People who are careful about their grammar take extra care with “less” and “fewer.” Most of the time, the results are good. “Ben has fewer worries this year” sounds better than “Ben has less worries this year.”

But even though they make good choices most of the time, sticklers on the less-and-fewer issue usually don’t understand the grammar as well as they think they do. So when they take a hard line approach, they set themselves up for a fall.

Ask anyone who’s careful with “less” and “fewer” to explain the difference, and they’ll tell you this: “Less” is for mass nouns and “fewer” is for count nouns.

Mass nouns are things that aren’t counted, like “music,” “air” and “energy.” Count nouns, as the name suggests, can be counted: “song,” “molecule,” “volt.”

Mass nouns have no plural form. You say, “I love music,” not “musics.” You say, “I breathe air,” not “airs.” And you say, “He has so much energy,” not “so many energies.”

Count nouns have a plural form and a singular form. So you can say, “I like that song” or “I like those songs.” You can say, “one molecule” or “two molecules.” You can say “one volt” or “100 volts.”

So if it’s true you must use “fewer” for count nouns, then those grocery store express lane signs that say “10 items or less” are grammatically incorrect. After all, as any stickler will tell you, “item” is a count noun. And if count nouns require “fewer,” then those checkout lanes are wrong to use “less.”

But there are a few problems with this reasoning. I explain here in my recent column.

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June 19, 2023

AP softens on the Oxford comma

“We don’t ban the Oxford comma.”

That was the subject line of an email the Associated Press Stylebook editors recently sent to subscribers. To anyone who’s been on the frontlines of the comma wars, the message seemed like an olive branch — or possibly a white flag.

Not familiar with the Oxford comma controversy? It’s a tempest in a teapot — a trumped-up battle between people who eschew an optional comma, called the Oxford or serial comma, and the devotees of this little punctuation mark.

The Oxford comma, or serial comma, comes before the conjunction in a list of three or more things. If you write, “The flag is red, white, and blue,” you’re using an Oxford comma. If you write, “The flag is red, white and blue,” you’re not. Either way, you’re using correct punctuation because this comma is optional.

The publishing world’s two major style guides take different positions on whether editors should use this comma. The Chicago Manual of Style, followed by many book and magazine publishers, is in favor.

“When a conjunction joins the last two elements in a series of three or more, a comma — known as the serial or series comma or the Oxford comma — should appear before the conjunction,” says the Chicago manual’s 17th edition, adding for emphasis: “Chicago strongly recommends this widely practiced usage.”

AP is mostly opposed. “Use commas to separate elements in a series, but do not put a comma before the conjunction in most simple series,” the stylebook advises. But unlike Chicago, AP editors don’t use the next sentence to strenuously underscore their point. Instead, AP emphasizes that the rule is flexible. “Include a final comma in a simple series if omitting it could make the meaning unclear.” Dig a little deeper into the Chicago manual and you see they make exceptions, too, albeit reluctantly. I explain why in my recent column.

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June 12, 2023

'People like you and I feel betrayed'? Or should that be 'me'?

“People like you and I feel betrayed.”

See anything wrong with that sentence? Most people probably don’t, but there is a problem with it and, for me, the problem is eye-opening.

Here’s the issue: If you want to be as proper and correct as possible, that “I” should be “me.” And for all the years I’ve spent attuned to the finer points of choosing “me” over “I,” I don’t believe I ever considered this situation until I came across this sentence recently in an article I was reading.

I know what you grammar-savvy types are thinking: “I” is a subject here. It’s performing the verb “feel.” And you’re right that “I feel betrayed” is normally the correct choice over “me feel betrayed.” The “you” doesn’t change that. It’s “you and I feel betrayed,” not “you and me feel betrayed.”

But there’s more going on in this sentence than meets the eye. And to see why “me” is the better choice here, it’s best to start with a review of subject and object pronouns.

When a pronoun is performing the action in a verb, it’s a subject. The personal pronouns in subject form are: I, you, he, she, it, we and they.

When a pronoun is receiving the action of a verb, it’s an object. The personal pronouns in object form are: me, you, him, her, it, us and them.

You’re probably already a master of subject and object pronouns in most situations. You wouldn’t say, “Us watched a movie,” using the object form. You’d say, “We watched a movie,” using the subject form, because that’s who’s doing the watching. That’s why “I feel betrayed” is normally correct and “Me feel betrayed” is not.

But our sentence, “People like you and I feel betrayed,” is a trap. “I” looks like a subject. But it’s not. The real subject of this sentence is “people”: “people feel betrayed.” Read more about it here in my recent column.

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June 5, 2023

'Enjoy summer better'?

Here’s an interesting email I got a while back:

<<I enjoy your column and am curious about your opinion of the Time Warner ads enticing us to “Enjoy summer better” and “Enjoy back to school better.” My initial reaction was a snicker and comeback: “I already enjoy it good,” but I can’t figure out why it irks me. Is it nasty grammar, stinky syntax, or just me?>>

Usually people who write me have a specific problem with a usage and ask me whether I agree that a usage is wrong. But in this case, she didn’t have a specific problem. It was kind of my job to figure out her problem -- then address it.

I did the best I could. Here was my response:

<<I'm not sure what exactly the issue is with "Enjoy summer better," either. Perhaps it's rooted in an idea that "better" is an adjective and therefore can't modify a verb like "enjoy"? It actually is both an adjective and an adverb: http://www.yourdictionary.com/better. In the latter form, it means "in a more excellent manner" or "in a more suitable way."

So "better" is grammatical as a modifier of "enjoy." But it's a little unidiomatic. It's more common to say you enjoy something "more" than to say you enjoy it "better." So, yeah, it's a kind of odd.

The other issue could be that "better" always suggests a "than."

"I like Joe better" only works in a context in which the listener already knows who I'm comparing Joe to.

Your example sentence leaves the "than" concept implied. "Enjoy summer better than you would have without our service" is, I suppose, the general idea. But without an explicit "than" or any context to suggest one, a lone "better" seems a little out of place.

As for "Enjoy back to school better," it's a bit of a stretch -- though not wrong, per se -- to treat "back to school" as a noun. Still, I'm sure most linguists would argue that it's sufficiently established as a noun to render this sentence grammatical.

Hope that helps!>>

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May 29, 2023

Dissociate/disassociate, preventive/preventative, recur/reoccur and other mischievous/mischievious word pairs

We’ve all been there: You’re about to write or say a word when you realize there are two forms and you don’t know which is correct. One of them is shorter, like dissociate, the other seems more logical, like disassociate.

Maybe you’re struggling to choose between preventive and preventative. Or recur vs. reoccur, dissemble vs. disassemble, mischievous vs. mischievious, flammable vs. inflammable, comment vs. commentate.

Which do you choose? And how do you know?

Sometimes in language there’s a blanket solution, like “The one that sounds best is probably best.” But with these word pairs, there’s no one-size-fits-all strategy. The only way to be sure is to look them up.

Here are some word pairs you can only navigate with a dictionary.

Disassociate/dissociate. I’ve never been comfortable with either of these words. They both sound a little wrong to me. So I usually find a workaround, like “avoid” or “not associate with” or “sever ties with.” Now that I’ve finally looked them up, I can see that all my mental gymnastics were unnecessary: dissociate and disassociate are synonyms, according to Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary, which argues that playing favorites here is silly: “Dissociate is recommended by a number of commentators on the basis that it is shorter, which it is by a grand total of two letters — not the firmest ground for an endorsement. Both words are in current good use, but disassociate is used more often in the U.S.”

Disassemble/dissemble. If English were logical, disassemble/dissemble would work just like dissociate/disassociate. But it’s not, so these words have two completely different meanings. To disassemble means to take something apart — to do the opposite of assembling it. But to dissemble means to lie or otherwise misrepresent something. They’re not interchangeable.

For more, see my recent column here.

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May 22, 2023

Can 'either' refer to three things?

“Every outfit I tried on was either too casual, too loud or too frumpy.”

A funny thing about language: When you use it without thinking, you usually do just fine. It’s only when you stop and question words, grammar and meaning that you realize you don’t understand some element of the language as well as you thought you did.

I was reminded of this recently when someone asked me about “either” to introduce three things, as it does in the sentence about the outfits. Doesn’t “either,” by definition, refer to a choice between exactly two things? A statement is either true or false. A protagonist is either good or bad. Your car either runs or it doesn’t.

So how can “either” set up three things?

Well, according to some people, it can’t. Merriam Webster’s Dictionary of English Usage lists 10 grammar experts who, in the early 1900s, started saying it’s wrong to use “either” to refer to more than two things. Oddly, grammar experts in the mid- to late-1800s had no problem with it, but this new crop of scolds started a trend.

There’s a flaw in their logic, as Merriam’s points out: The experts who say “either” must refer to only two things don’t take into account that it can be a pronoun, an adjective or a conjunction, and it works differently in each role.

Here’s my recent column showing why in one of its jobs, “either” can refer to more than two things.

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May 15, 2023

'With regularity'?

Here’s a before-and-after, but not necessarily in that order, from the world of editing. See if you can tell which phrasing for a light feature article was penned by the writer and which is the edited version.

If you fly United with regularity …

If you fly United a lot …

I suspect your inner editor cringed at “with regularity.” It’s stuffy. It’s wordy. It’s vaguely reminiscent of a laxative commercial.

If you had this reaction, congratulations: You have a better sense of language and communication than the real-life editor who changed “a lot” to “with regularity” — much to the writer’s chagrin.

I know this because I’m the chagrined writer.

In this column, I usually share experiences from my work as an editor. In that role, I have a bird’s-eye view of many common writing problems and how to spot and fix them. It’s the job. And it produces a lot of useful examples for anyone who wants to write better or just understand good writing.

But sometimes I wear the other hat, the writer’s hat. And in that role, I am, from time to time, the victim of editorial malpractice. “With regularity” may be the worst assault against my prose yet.

So what’s so bad about “with regularity”? A number of things.

For starters, skilled editors know that, in publishing, conciseness is a virtue. Every word that can be cut, should be cut. Why? Because, as PlainLanguage.gov puts it, “unnecessary words waste your audience’s time.” The prepositional phrase “with regularity” contains more words and syllables than you need: “a lot,” “often” or “regularly” would be more efficient.

Another problem with “with regularity”: People don’t talk that way. Feature articles are supposed to meet the reader on her own turf. As PlainLanguage.gov puts it, “Great writing is conversational.” Know who shares this belief? The very organization that employs that editor. Here’s a line from that company’s own editing guide: “Always edit for tight writing. Aim to be as succinct as possible while telling readers what they need to know.”

Also, “regularity” is a nominalization. Most editors I know are not familiar with this term, but they don’t need to be. They understand it instinctively. Harvard professor and linguist Steven Pinker explains in a 2014 article in the Chronicle of Higher Education titled “Why Academics Stink at Writing — and How to Fix It: “English grammar is an enabler of the bad habit of writing in unnecessary abstractions because it includes a dangerous tool for creating abstract terms. A process called nominalization takes a perfectly spry verb and embalms it into a lifeless noun by adding a suffix like -ance, -ment, or -ation.”

I would add “-ity,” to Pinker’s list of nominalizing suffixes and note that you can nominalize adjectives as well as nouns. For example “actuality” is a stuffy noun form of the adjective “actual.” “Curvilinearity” is a silly derivative of the adjective “curvilinear.” And “regularity” is a clumsy nominalization of the adjective “regular.”

Why are nominalizations bad? Here’s Pinker again: “Instead of affirming an idea, you effect its affirmation; rather than postponing something, you implement a postponement. Helen Sword calls them ‘zombie nouns’ because they lumber across the scene without a conscious agent directing their motion. They can turn prose into a night of the living dead.”

One final problem of “with regularity”: By searching Google’s Ngram Viewer, we can see that “regularly” is about 20 times more common in published books and articles than “with regularity,” meaning professional editors and writers consider “with regularity” bad form.

So why on earth would a professional editor change “a lot” to “with regularity”? I’m not sure. But in an age when ranking high on Google searches counts more than quality writing, it seems fewer and fewer editors know how to edit. In my experience, some seem to think that editing means just putting the writer’s words into your own words, without regard for whether they’re better.

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May 8, 2023

Waked up, woked up?

“Something that drives me crazy is the word ‘awake,’” a reader in California wrote to me. “I hear newscasters saying, ‘I was woked up. He woked me up. I was waked up, wokened up.’”

This issue gets tricky. According to Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary, “wake” gives you a number of past-tense forms to choose from.

For the simple past tense, Merriam-Webster’s prefers “woke.” But it also recognizes “waked.”

Yesterday I woke.

Yesterday I waked.

And, yes, you can use “up” if you want to with any of these, according to Webster’s.

Yesterday I woke up.

Yesterday I waked up.

As for the past participles, Webster’s allows three forms. (Remember that past participles the ones that work with forms of “have.”) For wake, the preferred past participle is “woken.” But they also allow “waked” and “woke.”

In the past I have woken.

In the past I have waked.

In the past I have woke.

In the past I have woken up.

In the past I have waked up.

In the past I have woke up.

There is no “woked.” But it’s not wrong to say “I was waked up.”

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May 1, 2023

Waver vs. waiver

Here’s a word I never fail to stumble over: waver. As in the recent Yahoo News Headline “Apple wavers as court Reverses Ban on Samsung Smartphone.”

Every time I see “waver” in print, I experience one brief moment of thinking it should be “waiver.” And vice-versa: anytime I see “waiver” I think it should be “waver.” It only takes me a split second to realize I’m wrong. But it’s still a little unnerving to have my mental defaults exactly backward.

For the record, here, per Merriam Webster, is the difference.

waver: verb. to vacillate irresolutely between choices; fluctuate in opinion, allegiance, or direction

waiver: noun. the act of intentionally relinquishing or abandoning a known right, claim, or privilege; also : the legal instrument evidencing such an act.

More simply, to waver is to change your mind. A waiver is a legal relinquishment or exemption.

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