Malapropisms

A malapropism is the use of an incorrect word in place of another similar sounding correct one, often with unintentionally amusing effect. The name comes from the character Mrs. Malaprop in the eighteenth-century play The Rivals by Richard Brinsley Sheridan. Her name is actually a play on the French mal á propo, literally “poorly placed.”

The character of Mrs. Malaprop uses wrong words that sound like the correct ones—for example, saying “allegory” instead of “alligator,” “pineapple” instead of “pinnacle,” and “epitaph” for “epithet.”

We might hear someone say, “Jesus healed the leopards [lepers],” “He is a man of great statue [stature],” or “We went to Vatican City to visit the Sixteenth [Sistine] Chapel.” All of these mistakes fall into the category of malapropisms.

Mondegreens

A similar usage error is the mondegreen, a word or phrase that results from a mishearing, especially of something recited or sung. The term derives from a misheard line in a Scottish folk song. The song’s lyrics include the line “laid him on the green,” but listeners thought they were hearing “Lady Mondegreen.”

Mondegreens aren’t always related to misheard song lyrics, but examples from popular music are certainly frequent and familiar. For instance, Jimi Hendrix did not sing, “Excuse me while I kiss this guy,” and Creedence Clearwater Revival did not point out that “There’s a bathroom on the right.”

Many years ago, I misheard a line from “The Tears of a Clown” by Smokey Robinson and the Miracles. I thought “just like Pagliacci did” was “just like my Yahtzee kid.” While I had never heard of Pagliacci, I had played Yahtzee.

I also mistook “I thought the major was a lady suffragette” in Paul McCartney’s “Jet” for “I thought the major was a lady, so forget!” A friend of mine thought Elton John’s rocket man was out in space “burning all the shoes he ever owned” instead of “burning out his fuse up here alone.” No doubt you’re guilty of a few mondegreens of your own.

Eggcorns

Once described as a “slip of the ear,” an eggcorn is a usage mistake that results from a seemingly logical alteration of a misheard word or phrase. Have you ever heard someone say that something does not “pass mustard,” that they take something for “granite,” or that they are repeating an “old wise tale”? These misheard words and phrases are all “eggcorns.”

The word “eggcorn” was coined by a linguist after he heard of a woman who complained about  “eggcorns” falling from an oak tree onto her car. She was obviously referring to an “acorn,” but she may have heard it as “eggcorn” all her life. Regardless, the mistake is actually rather sensible given that acorns are egg shaped and their seed looks much like a kernel of corn. In any event, linguists soon adopted this word to apply to all such mistakes.

Unlike mondegreens and malapropisms, eggcorns make a modicum of sense and therefore have the possibility of becoming widespread and perhaps even replacing the original term. A person might mention entering “unchartered waters,” a phrase quite close to the correct “uncharted waters,” or point out that someone is “scandally clad.” If we have never seen the written word “scantily,” we might easily think we heard “scandally” instead. After all, if someone is scantily clad, that person may indeed cause a scandal in certain contexts, no?

Sometimes a Misreading Sticks

Perhaps my favorite instance of an eggcorn is “helpmate.” In the King James Version of the Bible, Genesis 2:18 says that God will make a “help meet” (Eve) for Adam. When the KJV was produced in the seventeenth century, “help” could mean a companion and “meet” meant appropriate or fit. Seeing that the animals were not suitable companions for Adam, God creates Eve. Later readers could not make sense of this two-word phrase and substituted “mate” for “meet,” which makes better sense to readers unaware of the older use of “meet.” And because the two words sounded as if they were one word, we ended up with “helpmate.”

Of course, the meaning of a word can legitimately change over time, and in a future article we will talk about some of the more interesting shifts. For now, I hope you have enjoyed this review of some of the quirky ways we (mis)use our language. Until next time, “gentile” readers, it may be a “doggy-dog world” out there, but don’t curl up into a “feeble position.” Charge into the linguistic sea, “full stream ahead”!

PS: If you have a favorite “slip of the ear,” please share it in the comments below. I’d love to hear it!

* * * *

Dr. Ron Cooper, the author of this blog post, has written three other posts on this site: “Curmudgeon Bemoans Confusion,” “You’re Still on My Lawn,” and “Begging the Question.”  A senior professor of philosophy at the College of Central Florida in Ocala, Florida, Dr. Cooper is also a novelist and poet. In 2018, he won a Florida book award for his latest novel, All My Sins Remembered. He is an amateur bluegrass musician who challenges anyone to play and sing worse than he does. 

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If a newspaper is published every two weeks, it is a biweekly or a semimonthly publication?

The answer is not simple.

If we check Webster’s for definitions of each prefix, we find that although semi always means “half,” the prefix bi can mean either “every two” or “twice.” Thus, bimonthly can mean either “every two months” or “twice a month.”

Webster’s warns us that when using the prefix bi, we should give the reader clues about which meaning we intend. And when you are the reader, you should make sure you know which meaning the writer intends.

Before you decide to pay $19.95 for a bimonthly magazine, read the fine print to find out if you will receive six issues a year or twenty-four.

When we mean twice (as in “twice a week” or “twice a month”), we can avoid ambiguity by using the prefix semi (as in semiweekly for “twice a week” and semimonthly for “twice a month”).

Three final notes:

1. We have a special word—biennial—that means “occurring every two years.” The word biannual has only one meaning: “occurring twice a year.” Biannual is thus interchangeable with semiannual, although biannual is less preferable if we wish to avoid any chance of misreading by folks who are not thoroughly familiar with these definitions.
2. Never use a hyphen with either of these prefixes unless the root word begins with the letter i, as in semi-independent, semi-invalid, and semi-infinite.
3. English speakers outside of the United States frequently employ the very useful word fortnight, which unambiguously describes a period of two weeks.

TEST YOURSELF:

Which prefix—bi or semi—would be the better (that is, the less ambiguous) choice for a word to describe each situation below?

1. occurring twice a week
2. occurring every two months
3. occurring every two years
4. occurring twice a year
5. occurring twice a month
6. occurring every two weeks

ANSWERS:

1. semiweekly (Biweekly is acceptable but potentially ambiguous.)
2. bimonthly (Be careful to provide context clues so the reader does not think you mean “twice a month.”)
3. biennial
4. semiannual (Biannual is also correct but potentially ambiguous to readers unfamiliar with the difference between biennial and biannual.)
5. semimonthly (Bimonthly is acceptable but potentially ambiguous.)
6. biweekly (Something that occurs every two weeks happens more often than something that happens twice a month since a year comprises 52 weeks but only 12 months.)

Copyright 2023 Get It Write (rev. from original 2001 publication)

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1. 1. 1. Our children are (anxious/eager) to go to Disney World, but my husband and I are (anxious/eager) about the cost of the trip.
      2. Having heard on the morning news that the stock market was sluggish, we are (anxious about/eager to learn) the current market value of the stocks we purchased yesterday.
      3. Having heard on the morning news that the stock market had opened strong, we are (anxious about/eager to learn) the current market value of the stocks we purchased yesterday.

At first glance, the adjectives anxious and eager seem interchangeable. In fact, Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary lists anxious as a synonym for eager and vice versa. Like all synonyms, however, each word bears a slightly different meaning.

To be anxious is to be uneasy, to be worried, to feel a sense of dread or disquietude. You may have felt anxious about taking your driver’s test or about going on a job interview or blind date. To be eager, on the other hand, is to be pleasantly excited, to be looking forward to something with hopeful and positive anticipation. Many of us will vividly recall how eager we were (and maybe still are!) to open our presents on Christmas morning or to move into our first solo apartment.

As Webster’s clearly notes, whereas anxious means “characterized by extreme uneasiness of mind or brooding fear about some contingency,” eager means “marked by enthusiastic or impatient desire or interest.” We can remember the difference by recalling that the adjective anxious resembles anxiety, its noun counterpart.

Thus, in sentence 1, the children would be eager (enthusiastic, perhaps even impatiently so) to go to Disney World, while their parents would likely be anxious (worried) about the cost of the trip.

Another way to distinguish between these two words is to remember that eager is often followed by the to of an infinitive, whereas anxious is often followed by a preposition, most commonly about. We are eager to do or to be something, but we are anxious about something. If we are tempted to use an infinitive after the word anxious (as in “we were anxious to go on vacation”), most likely we should be using eager instead.

Feelings about the current market value of our stocks can be marked by either enthusiasm or worry, depending on what we have recently heard about the state of the stock market. Since the writer in sentence 2 has heard reports that the market has been sluggish, the phrase “anxious about” more accurately expresses uneasiness and perhaps even anxiety.

In sentence 3, however, the writer will be eager, having heard news of a strong market opening.

For further reading, scroll down on this page to read Webster’s astute commentary about anxious and eager and to see the helpful list of nuanced synonyms for anxious.

TEST YOURSELF: Which word—eager or anxious—is the better choice in each sentence?

1. 1. 1. We were ___________ to find out what grade we had earned on our history exam because we had studied well and felt as though we had answered each question thoroughly.
      2. The board of directors was __________ about having to cut each department’s budget by 15 percent, for they knew that some people would lose their jobs.
      3. I was _________ about buying a new car because I was not sure I could afford one.
      4. I was _________ to buy a new car even though I was not sure I could afford one.
      5. We were ___________ concerning the plans for a new hazardous waste disposal site near our home.

ANSWERS

1. 1. 1. 1. 1. eager
            2. anxious
            3. anxious
            4. eager
            5. anxious

      This blog addresses a number of confusing word pairs, including effect and affect, sit, set, and seat, bad and badly, and lie and lay. Scroll through GIW’s complete blog post list for more.

      Copyright 2001 Get It Write. Revised 2022.

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Many of us were taught the partial truth that good is an adjective and well is an adverb, but both words also serve other functions. To further complicate matters, the verb to feel holds different meanings, in some cases requiring an adjective and in others, an adverb.

Good

It’s true that good is used primarily as an adjective modifying a noun, as in the phrases “a good year,” “a good plan,” or “a good person.”

The adjectival good is also used with linking verbs—verbs that describe a state of mind or being rather than an action.

For example, in the expressions “the dog is good,” “the violin sounded good during the performance,” and “the dress looked good on her,” is, sounded, and looked are linking verbs that call for adjectives to describe the dog, violin, and dress—so good is appropriate in these sentences. (Grammarians call modifiers functioning in this way “subject complements” or “predicate adjectives.”)

Sometimes the word good is a noun, as when we refer to “the public good”—so good can be an adjective or a noun. The word well, however, is more complicated.

Well

We think of well most commonly as an adverb that modifies an action verb: we say, for instance, “the violinist performed well,” “the house was cleaned well,” and “the story was written well.” And well, like good, also plays the noun role on occasion, as when “the neighbors’ cat fell down the well.”

But the plot thickens: well can also be an adjective, synonymous with healthy, as in “Nora had COVID-19 but now she is well.”

So much for the oversimplified formula that good is an adjective and well is an adverb!

To Feel

Some of the confusion surrounding feeling good vs. feeling well arises from the fact that the verb to feel has two meanings.

First, it’s an action verb when it describes how we use our sense of touch, and we would appropriately use the adverb well to modify an action verb. A person with sensitive fingers (a pianist, say) could be described as feeling (think touching) well because in this context to feel is an action; something (a keyboard) is physically being felt.

But to feel is a linking verb in sentences such as “We feel good about our retirement investments” and “The sunshine feels good on my skin”; here, the verb is describing the subjects’ state of mind or being rather than an action.

The bottom line: “I am good,” “I feel good,” “I am well,” and “I feel well” are all grammatically correct responses to the question “How are you?” Since both to be and to feel are linking verbs in these sentences, they require adjectives to describe their subjects. And in this situation, both good and well (think healthy) are adjectives.

A Final Thought

Keep in mind, though, that both good and well are weak, vague modifiers—generalized, overused words that lack precise connotations. As careful writers, we should choose instead words that make our sentences as clear and meaningful as possible.

TEST YOURSELF: Good or Well?

1. The orchestra performed _____ and sounded _____ for the entire three-hour concert.
2. Computer technicians with _____ skills are in high demand.
3. Samantha looked _____ in the blue suit and hat.
4. After Bob lost his ring, he asked all of us to look _____ under our desks and in the wastebaskets.

ANSWERS

1. The orchestra performed well and sounded good for the entire three-hour concert. [Performed is an action verb, so we need the adverb well, but sounded is a linking verb calling for the predicate adjective good.]
2. Computer technicians with good skills are in high demand.
3. Samantha looked good in the blue suit and hat. [In this sentence, looked is a linking verb, not an action verb; thus, good is a subject complement describing the noun Samantha.]
4. After Bob lost his ring, he asked all of us to look well under our desks and in the wastebaskets. [In this sentence, look is an action verb, so we use the adverb well to modify it rather than the adjective good.]

Other articles on this site deal with confusing words pairs, such as sit, set, and seat; lay vs. lie; and effect vs. affect.

Copyright 2001 Get It Write. Revised 2018, 2022.

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The wording of the tweet itself was somewhat problematic: the pronoun they had always been nonbinary and had always been in the dictionary. But what was new (and, oddly, missing from the tweet) was the inclusion of a definition for they that sanctions its use as a singular pronoun in certain circumstances.

This pronouncement set a lot of people’s hair on fire (read, for example, the comments below the tweet) and garnered the attention of prominent media outlets, including NBC News, the Washington Post, and the New York Times. Today, it is rare to find a reputable usage guide that is not on board.

If you already understand that pronouns are supposed to agree with their antecedents, skip the following section and go on down to the next one, which focuses on the most recent aspect of the debate. But if you’re wondering what the fuss is all about, this next section is for you:

Pronouns Need to Agree with Their Antecedents

Some readers may be thinking that the use of they or their or them in reference to something singular sounds just fine. But many people (I’m looking at you, my fellow English teachers and grammar purists) would find the italicized plural pronouns in the following sentences problematic:

1. Everyone came to our office party and brought their favorite dessert.
2. Each employee has to sign their annual evaluation and return it by December 31.
3. Someone forgot to lock the front door last night when they left the building.
4. Anyone who has worked for the company for at least six months is eligible for retirement benefits, but they have to complete the appropriate forms.

All of these sentences use a plural personal pronoun (namely, they and their) to refer to a singular antecedent (everyone, employee, someone, and anyone).

Everyone, someone, and anyone are singular indefinite pronouns, so called because they do not refer to a specific person, place, or thing.  Other singular indefinite pronouns include each, neither, either, and one.

Until very recently, most English teachers insisted that pronouns referring to singular antecedents, including these indefinite pronouns, should also be singular.

The traditional way to correct the sentences above, then, would have been to replace the plural personal pronouns with their singular counterparts. For a long time, we replaced them solely with masculine pronouns and would have said “Everyone came to our office party and brought his favorite dessert.”

We eventually wised up to the notion that it is not OK to default to masculine pronouns when we intend to refer to a group that is not all male, and we began using compound constructions:

1. EVERYONE came to our office party and brought HIS OR HER favorite dessert.
2. EACH employee has to sign HER OR HIS annual evaluation and return it by December 31.
3. SOMEONE forgot to lock the front door last night when HE OR SHE left the building.
4. ANYONE who has worked for the company for at least six months is eligible for retirement benefits, but SHE OR HE has to complete the appropriate forms.

But Agreement Is Not the Only Issue

No one has ever really liked the wordy and sometimes awkward compounds “his or her” or “she or he” or the even more distasteful constructions “s/he” and “her/him.”

But the more significant issue is that all of these singular alternatives reinforce the gender binary; they assume that everyone identifies as either female or male. (Onlea.org has produced an excellent short video explanation that is helpful if you are unfamiliar with nonbinary gender identification.)

Unfortunately, in English we do not have a gender-neutral, singular, third-person pronoun. We use it in reference to inanimate objects, but we have no singular pronoun to use in reference to individual people when we don’t know their gender or when they themselves do not identify as either male or female.

As we have awakened to an understanding that gender identity is more fluid than the socially constructed male-female binary suggests, it has become increasingly more important to find a non-gendered alternative.

Through the years, linguists and others have attempted to introduce a new non-gendered singular pronoun into our language, such as ze, but those attempts failed.

If you need no further encouragement, skip down to the section on strategies. But if you still aren’t convinced, read the next two sections first.

Descriptive Dictionaries vs. Prescriptive Style Guides

Far more newsworthy than M-W‘s September 2019 tweet is the fact that several prominent style guides had already changed their prescriptions about the use of they.

While virtually all dictionaries are descriptive (they describe how people are actually using a language, while noting that some usage is considered “nonstandard” or “colloquial” or “slang,” etc.), style guides are prescriptive: each style guide tells us what we should do if we choose to adhere to that particular set of usage guidelines.

While we might expect style guides to lag behind dictionaries in changing their ruling on the use of the singular they, both the New York Times and the Associated Press began allowing the use of the singular they in 2017, as explained in this interesting article.

The widely used Chicago Manual of Style notes that the singular they is preferable to the generic he, even in formal writing, but encourages the writer to avoid it whenever possible (see suggestions below). Chicago (as well as other style guides) goes on to note that a writer should always honor a person’s preferred pronoun, and when an individual prefers they to he or she, any subsequent verb should be plural.

If a person has a roommate who prefers to be referred to as they, we should say, for example, “we hope they don’t snore,” not “we hope they doesn’t snore.”

Change Is Hard, but History Helps

For those of us who have spent decades insisting that they is plural, adjusting to a singular they isn’t easy.

It helps to know that what we perceive as a change is, in fact, not new at all. Webster’s (as well as many other sources) notes that using they to refer to singular indefinite pronouns can be traced back for centuries. Strict insistence on its being plural is a relatively recent development.

Grammar purists don’t have to like the use of the singular they, but they cannot fairly point to this change as an example of English grammar “going to hell in a handbag” (as we like to say down South when something has changed for the worse).

It’s also helpful to remember that change is inevitable with all languages. Spend five minutes perusing the Oxford English Dictionary if you don’t believe that words change as needed to reflect an ever-changing and evolving world.

Strategies for Making Pronouns Agree without Reinforcing the Binary

Let’s look again at the four sentences above: one solution, of course, is simply to stick with the italicized plural pronouns. As we have noted, prominent dictionaries and style books are in your corner.

But since that option still sounds wrong to many people, the very best solution is perhaps to avoid the pronoun completely or to change the antecedent to a plural noun or pronoun:

1. EVERYONE came to our office party and brought a favorite dessert. [This revision avoids having the plural their refer to the singular everyone.]
2. ALL employees HAVE to sign THEIR annual evaluations and return them by December 31. [This revision changes the singular each to the plural all, but it isn’t as clear as the original because it sounds as if each person is signing all the evaluations, not simply that person’s own evaluation.]
3. SOMEONE forgot to lock the front door last night when leaving the building. [This revision avoids the use of he or she.]
4. ANYONE who has worked for the company for at least six months is eligible for retirement benefits but has to complete the appropriate forms. [This revision avoids the use of she or he.]

TEST YOURSELF

How might each of these sentences be improved? Consider not only that pronouns should agree with their antecedents but also that we want to avoid reinforcing the gender binary.

1. Everybody is leaving work early to be home with their families for a long weekend.
2. Neither of the books has writing in their margins.
3. Each of the players on the softball team has to wash their uniform between games.

POSSIBLE ANSWERS

1. ALL EMPLOYEES are leaving work early to be home with their families for a long weekend. [Changed the singular everybody to the plural all employees and kept the plural their] OR: All employees are leaving work early for a long weekend of family time at home. [Removed the possessive pronoun entirely to avoid the problem.]
2. Neither of the books has writing in ITS margins. [Because book is inanimate, it works here.] OR: in THE margins. [Removes the need for a possessive pronoun.]
3. If we know the players are all female (or all male), we could write “Each of the players on the softball team has to wash HER (or HIS) uniform between games.” If we are uncertain about the gender of the players or if the team is coed, we might write “EACH of the players on the softball team has to wash HIS OR HER uniform between games,” but that option reinforces the gender binary and ignores the reality that many people do not regard themselves as either male or female. A better option, then, might be to say “ALL of the players on the softball team have to wash THEIR uniforms between games.” The latter choice, however, is not as precise as the former because it fails to present the picture of each player washing that player’s own individual uniform. The best choice, then, is probably to use the singular their, as in the original sentence above.

Copyright 2001 Get It Write. Revised 2019 and 2022.

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Here are sentences for consideration:

1. Our new employee was graduated from Newberry College.
2. Our new employee graduated from Newberry College.
3. Our new employee graduated Newberry College.
4. She earned a bachelor’s degree in business administration and a master’s degree in finance.
5. She earned a bachelors degree in business administration and a masters degree in finance.

The Verb To Graduate

Let’s begin with a discussion of the verb to graduate.

Most dictionaries—including Merriam-Webster’s New Collegiate Dictionary and the American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language—agree that sentences 1 and 2 are both acceptable.

In the nineteenth century, the preferred use was the passive form (sentence 1). Since then, however, the intransitive sense (sentence 2) has become the most widely used and, as a result, has long been considered by lexicographers as acceptable, if not preferable. (Intransitive simply means that the subject—in this case, the employee—engaged in an action [graduated] but that action was not conferred upon anything or anyone else [e.g., a direct object] in the sentence.)

Most people would consider sentence 3 problematic. Webster’s claims that such usage is standard but points out that it is the least common of the three forms. (And remember that dictionaries tell us how people commonly use the language; they are not in the business of telling us how we might use it most logically.)

The American Heritage dictionary, however, considers this usage substandard, noting that 77 percent of its usage panel finds the use of to graduate in sentence 3 unacceptable.

I side with the American Heritage folks on this one on the basis of logic. In sentence 3, the verb is transitive active; that is, the sentence illogically suggests that the employee did something (graduated) to something else (Newberry College). We could perhaps argue that the “from” in the prepositional phrase “from Newberry College” is simply elliptical (i.e., structurally part of the sentence structure but not spoken or written), but I would reserve that usage for very informal contexts.

Sometimes the best choice in word usage depends upon the meaning the writer intends. In this case, if we want to place emphasis on the institution conferring the degrees rather than on the students who earned them, then it would be better to say, “Three hundred students were graduated from Newberry College in the spring” or even better (because it’s almost always better to have an active verb than a passive one), “Newberry College graduated three hundred students in the spring.”

Bottom line: Consider that the verb to graduate can mean either “to earn a degree” or “to confer a degree” and then decide which use is more appropriate in your sentence.

Use the Possessive Case in Reference to Associate’s, Bachelor’s, and Master’s Degrees

All dictionaries agree that when we write the names of academic degrees, we use the possessive forms because these words refer to a person at a certain level of training.

In the Middle Ages, a bachelor was a young knight-in-training. The bachelor’s degree became the name of the lowest degree a college or university can award. A master at that time was someone recognized in the guild system as having the highest level of expertise in a particular craft, above the apprentice and the journeyman. We now have the master’s degree—the next level of college degree above the bachelor’s but the lowest of the advanced degrees. Sentence 4, we thus understand, is correct, but not sentence 5.

What about Capitalization with a Degree?

When we refer to degrees generically—as we have in sentences four and five above—the first letter is not capitalized. Nor do we capitalize the disciplines in which the degrees are earned, unless they are languages. For example, we would write, “My daughter has a bachelor’s degree in mathematics (or psychology or biology, etc.) and my son has a master’s degree in English (or Spanish or French, etc.).”

Of course, if we are not writing in sentences but instead writing a heading, making a list, or perhaps identifying a speaker in a program—then we most likely would capitalize the type of degree and the discipline.

(Other articles in this blog address the tendency writers have to capitalize expressions inappropriately, including military ranks, job positions, certain kinds of words in titles, common nouns, and the spelling out of acronyms and initialisms.)

One Final Point about the Doctoral Degree

A person can earn a doctorate or a doctoral degree but not a doctorate degree.

For Further Reading

Learn more about the words alumni, alumnus, alumnae, and alumna (and why we should probably stop using all of them!) here.

Do you know a recent high school graduate who is heading off to college next fall? Consider sharing this article of advice and wisdom shared by college faculty with many decades of experience.

Copyright 2001 Get It Write. Revised 2005, 2019, 2022.

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How Much Do You Know Already?

Do you recognize which (if any) of these sentences use sit, set, and seat correctly?

1. Yesterday Suki sat in her office all afternoon completing the annual report.
2. When she finished, she sat the report on her boss’s desk.
3. Marcellus sits his books on the hall table every afternoon after school.
4. Before Mr. Jones left for the meeting, we set down with him and reviewed the agenda.
5. We were dismayed when the host sat us near the drafty exit door.

To Sit

“To sit” is an intransitive verb. It describes an action undertaken by the subject of a clause, but it cannot take a direct object: the verb “to sit” does not express the kind of action that can be DONE TO anything.

Just as we do with “to lie,” think of “to sit” as meaning “to recline.”

Here’s how we conjugate it:

• I SIT here every day. (She SITS here.)
• I SAT here yesterday.
• I WILL SIT here tomorrow.
• I AM SITTING here right now.
• I HAVE SAT here every day for years.

Notice that we never use the word set to describe the act of reclining.

To Set

“To set,” on the other hand, is a transitive verb; it describes an action and requires a direct object because it describes the kind of action that is DONE TO something. That is, something or someone in the sentence has to be receiving the action expressed by the verb.

Just as we do with “to lay,” think of “to set” as meaning “to place,” “to put.”

Here’s how we conjugate it:

• I SET my book on the table every night before turning out the light. (She SETS her book on the table.)
• I SET my book on the table last night.
• I WILL SET my book on the table tonight.
• I AM SETTING my book on the table right now.
• I HAVE SET my book on the table every night for years.

Notice that we never use the words sit or sat to describe the act of putting or placing something or someone.

Lay and lie are especially difficult because the past tense form of “to lie” is lay—the same word as the present tense form of “to lay.” Fortunately, we have no such overlap with “to sit” and “to set.”

To Seat

Keep in mind that when we talk about placing our guests in their chairs for, say, a dinner party, we are seating them, not setting them. “To seat” is also a transitive verb and will take a direct object. We conjugate it thus:

• Today I SEAT my guests.
• Yesterday I SEATED my guests.
• I WILL SEAT my guests.
• I AM SEATING my guests.
• I HAVE SEATED my guests.

How Well Did You Do?

Let’s look again at our opening sentences:

• Yesterday Suki sat in her office all afternoon completing the annual report.

Sat is correct because we mean “to recline,” and the past tense form of the verb “to sit” is sat.

• When she finished, she sat the report on her boss’s desk.

This sentence describes the act of putting or placing something—namely, the report. Because the verb takes a direct object (report), we should use the past tense form of the verb “to set,” which is set. CORRECT: When she finished, she SET the report on her boss’s desk.

• Marcellus sits his books on the hall table every afternoon after school.

As in sentence 2, the verb in this sentence describes an act of putting or placing. The books are getting placed on the hall table. Thus, we should have used the present tense of the verb “to set.” CORRECT: Marcellus SETS his books on the hall table every afternoon after school.

• Before Mr. Jones left for the meeting, we set down with him and reviewed the agenda.

Here the verb set does not have a direct object; that is, nothing in the clause is getting put or placed. Instead, the verb describes the act of reclining by the subject of the clause, we. CORRECT: Before Mr. Jones left for the meeting, we SAT down with him and reviewed the agenda.

• We were dismayed when the host sat us near the drafty exit door.

Here the verb sat should be seated. We have a direct object for this transitive verb, to be sure, but here we intend to suggest our having been given a particular seat in the establishment, rather than our having been placed, as is implied with the verb set. CORRECT: We were dismayed when the host SEATED us near the drafty exit door. 

The Rest of the Story

Remember, too, that the words we use when we conjugate “to sit,” “to set,” “to lay,” and “to lie” can hold entirely different meanings when they are not functioning as main verbs with the definitions addressed in this post and in the one on lay and lie.”

For example, set, sitting, and setting can all be used as nouns—“I have a new set of silverware,” for example, or “The movie set was expensive to create.” Likewise, the word lie can be a noun for an untruth, and when one fibs, one is lying—a definition of the verb “to lie” that certainly does not mean “to recline.”

For a fuller discussion of other uses of sit and set, read Merriam-Webster’s definitions.

In our post on lay and lie and in this one, we are dealing specifically with the often-confusing forms of these closely related transitive and intransitive verbs.

TEST YOURSELF

Can you spot errors in the use of the verbs “to sit,” “to set,” and “to seat” in the following sentences?

1. Before the guests arrive, I plan to sit several bowls of chips around the room.
2. Florence forgot that she had sat her keys on the seat of her car.
3. Ahmed complained that several dirty coffee cups had been setting on the counter all week.
4. As the board members arrived, Herb sat them in plush chairs around the conference table.

ANSWERS

1. Before the guests arrive, I plan to SET several bowls of chips around the room.
2. Florence forgot that she had SET her keys on the seat of her car.
3. Ahmed complained that several dirty coffee cups had been SITTING on the counter all week.
4. As the board member arrived, Herb SEATED them in plush chairs around the conference table.

Copyright 2002 Get It Write. Revised 2021.

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The Short Answer

Language purists assert that “try and” is often illogical. We should say, for instance, “we will try to leave early” and not “we will try and leave early” because if we are merely trying to leave early but end up leaving late, the second part of that expression (“and leave early”) will prove inaccurate.

Also, if we knew for certain that we would leave early, we would simply say “we will leave early.” To say that we are trying to leave early allows for the possibility that we may not.

The lack of clarity in the “try and” construction is even more obvious in the phrase “try to succeed and fail.” While it is possible to try to succeed but to fail, it is impossible (except perhaps philosophically) to try and succeed and fail.

What Merriam-Webster Says

My favorite lexicon, Merriam-Webster (M-W), provides historical and linguistic insight into common usage conundrums, frequently deconstructing the pet peeves of overzealous grammar pedants.

On the subject of “try to” and “try and,” M-W contends that because the expression “try and” has appeared in published works for as long as (if not longer than) “try to,” we can feel free to use it. Such an argument makes sense if we’re talking about the evolution of a word’s definition or the acceptability of, say, starting sentences with and or but. However, the argument becomes specious when it stubbornly privileges frequency of use over precision.

Consider, for example, the lack of logic in these sentences:

• The trustees will try and raise $1 million in 2022. (It’s impossible to know that they will both try and succeed at raising the funds since they have not yet even begun the effort.)
• Most children are unsuccessful when they try and walk before they are six months old. (The majority may have tried to walk, but unless they were successful, they didn’t try and do so.)
• This year, Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos will try and beat each other in a space race. (Nope, not possible; only one can beat the other.)

The trustees will “try to raise” the money but may fall short. Would-be toddlers may “try to walk” early but will often fail. In the space race, Musk and Bezos can “try to beat the other,” but only one can be first.

M-W goes to great lengths to prove that the latter is a very old construction—older, perhaps, than “try to”—claiming, it seems, that an illogical construction somehow magically becomes more logical over time.

I’m not convinced.

Would We Ever Say “Attempt and”?

One way to stress-test the expression “try and” is to consider how it would sound if we replaced try with a synonym—attempt, for example. When we do, the absurdity of the construction becomes even more apparent:

• Before we travel to Prague, I will attempt and read as many books as possible about the history of the Czech Republic.
• Her cat will often attempt and catch mice in the grass but is too well fed to be successful.
• We wanted to attempt and reach our destination before dark.

I can attempt to read books, cats can attempt to catch mice, and we can attempt to reach our destination before dark, but to use “attempt and” in these examples would render them unclear, imprecise, and illogical. So if we recognize the absurdity of writing “attempt and [verb],” why would we write “try and [verb]”?

Languages Do Change

Longtime Get It Write readers know that the advice on this site fully acknowledges and takes into consideration the fluid nature of language. We must all be willing to change as our language inevitably changes. I’ve accepted (albeit grudgingly) the fact that nauseous is now synonymous with nauseated. I wholeheartedly defend the use of the singular they, their, and them in the absence of a non-gendered third-person singular pronoun in the English language. And I’m willing to concede (sadly) that one day whom will be relegated to the dustbin of antiquated words no longer in use.

But I’m digging in my heels on the issue of treating these two phrases as if they were interchangeable. Writers should always seek to be as clear and logical as possible, and in many cases, “try and” is neither clear nor logical.

What do you think? Get It Write newsletter subscribers and learners who have taken a GIW course (online or in person) may ask to join the GIW Facebook group, where we have lively discussions. And we welcome everyone to “like” the GIW Facebook page.

©Get It Write 2021

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A Little History

Alumnus is the Latin word for one male graduate. According to Merriam-Webster, the literal translation is “foster son, pupil.” The plural, alumni, originally referred only to graduates who were male.

The Latin words for female graduates are alumna (singular) and alumnae (plural). Of course, for a very long time, women were neither encouraged nor, in many cases, even allowed to pursue an education. But when a single word was eventually needed to refer to both male and female graduates, English speakers and writers defaulted to the masculine: alumni.

Words Matter

We now realize that using masculine words to represent all people is ill advised. (If you aren’t convinced that gender-inclusive language matters, I encourage you to watch this short TED Talk on the subject.) We stopped saying, for example, mankind, mailman, chairman, fireman, and policeman and started using humankind, mail carrier, chairperson (or chair), firefighter, and police officer.

When a man is serving in a role traditionally held by women, we have learned not to add male to our description of that role: a person is not a male nurse but simply a nurse. Likewise, we avoid saying female doctor and say simply doctor. Regardless of a performer’s gender identity, we no longer distinguish between actors and actresses and refer to all of them as simply actors.

In short, we avoid suggesting that the default gender is always male and that those who do not identify as male are somehow an exception, an other, something outside the norm.

The Evolution of Alumni

Although alumni  is the masculine plural form, it has been widely used to refer to all graduates of a particular institution for as long as women have been receiving degrees. Would we have collectively accepted the use of alumnae, the feminine plural form, in reference to a mixed-gender group? I think not. Why, then, has it been OK for so long to use the masculine form?

(I likewise take issue with the use of the word guys to refer to a mixed group of people and especially groups of people who identify as women. When a server in a restaurant calls a group of women guys, I wonder: would that person call a table full of men gals? Hardly. But I digress.)

The Problem with All Four

Writer and civil rights activist Maya Angelou once said, “Do the best you can until you know better. Then when you know better, do better.” We now recognize that many words fail to acknowledge those who are nonbinary and cannot see themselves represented in any of the four words

We can do better.

A Simple Solution

Luckily, there is no need to reinvent the wheel. Authoritative dictionaries and style guides have already sanctioned an alternative to reinforcing the gender binary or to privileging the masculine: we can use alum or alums to refer to graduate(s). These shortened forms are used quite frequently in casual contexts, and there is no reason why we can’t employ them in more formal situations as well.

The Chicago Manual of Style notes that writers should strive to eliminate gender bias in their language: “Biased language that is not central to the meaning of the work distracts many readers and makes the work less credible to them. Few texts warrant a deliberate display of linguistic biases” (section 5.251).

As the venerable Merriam-Webster points out, “If you are concerned about choosing the word that is least likely to arouse someone’s usage hackles, think of alumnus & alumni as male, alumna & alumnae as female, and alum & alums as gender neutral.”

For Further Discussion

Elsewhere on this site we discuss the evolution of the singular they.

Readers may also be interested in an earlier article on the verb to graduate and on the possessive nouns bachelor’s and master’s as modifiers of the word degree.

©Get It Write 2021

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Home In On

Synonyms for the infinitive to home in on are to zero in on or to target. Think about a guided missile or rocket that has been programmed to aim for a particular location. As it moves toward its target, it is homing in on that spot. Here are more examples:

1. Scientists have been working on the problem for decades but have recently started to home in on a solution.
2. The report homes in on systemic issues that underpin homelessness.
3. The child homed in on a bowl of candy sitting on a table across the room.

Hone

To hone is to sharpen, to smooth, or to fine-tune. Here are some logical uses of the word:

1. Once they have retired, people may hone talents that have languished for decades.
2. Serving on a mock trial team helped law students learn to hone their arguments.
3. Internships hone the skills apprentices need to succeed in their professional careers.

The Verbs Home and Hone 

Home almost always functions as a noun: We purchase a home. We live in our home. We can build a home, both literally and metaphorically.

But we also see the verb form to home, meaning “to find a home for something.” Animal rescue workers frequently talk about homing (or rehoming) dogs and cats.

We use the participial form of the verb to home—homing—as an adjective to describe nouns that focus on a known or predetermined target, such as homing pigeons or homing devices. Both are zeroing in on or targeting a location: they are homing in on a particular spot.

To hone, on the other hand, is typically a transitive verb; that is, it usually takes a direct object, as in the examples above, where talents, arguments, and skills are on the receiving end of the action to hone.

Merriam-Webster notes that we also have an intransitive use of to hone meaning “to yearn after” (largely dialectical) and that we occasionally use hone as a noun—as a synonym for whetstone, a device used to sharpen or smooth.  But the verb form to hone is the most common use of the word.

Phrasal Verbs 

Note that to home conveys a meaning different from to home in on. The latter is a phrasal verb, an idiom made by adding one or more adverbs and/or prepositions (sometimes called particles) to a verb and giving it a meaning different from the one conveyed by the verb alone.

Consider, for example, the difference between the verb to turn and the phrasal verbs to turn in, to turn up, or to turn on. To make means something quite different from to make up or to make out. To dress is distinct from to dress down (as in “to reprimand severely”).

Typically, with a phrasal verb we can identify a more formal one-word verb that has the same meaning. To turn on, for example, is the same as to illuminate or to arouse. To act up or to act out is the same as to misbehave.

To home in on, as we have noted, means to target. 

We have no one-word verb for to hone in on because that phrasal verb isn’t logical. Literally, it would mean “to sharpen (or smooth) in on,” a phrase that makes no sense.  The expression, therefore, is not considered standard usage . . . or at least not yet.

Change Is Inevitable

Merriam-Webster conjectures that confusion between home and hone may have arisen when hone began being used more figuratively, in reference to ideas, skills, and arguments, instead of literally, in reference to the sharpening or smoothing of stones, tools, and weapons. We may well be witnessing the start of another shift in this particular usage.

When an expression or a word is used fairly widely but is still considered incorrect, dictionaries label its usage nonstandard or substandard. But if enough people use an expression that was once treated as nonstandard, it may eventually be deemed standard. (Remember that dictionaries, unlike style manuals, are descriptive; that is, they tell us how people actually use language, not how they should use it. Read more here.)

Take, for example, the word nauseous, which was once used to describe anything that can cause nausea, such as rotten meat or too much beer. (So telling someone you are nauseous would have meant that you make others feel ill.) But the use of nauseous to mean nauseated (experiencing nausea) has become so widespread now that dictionaries (and even some style manuals) treat the two words as interchangeable. (Read more here.)

Such changes in the language take time—decades or longer. And even after a particular usage has been deemed standard by most lexicons, it takes even more time for the self-proclaimed grammar police <insert eye roll here> to accept the change and stop judging people for employing the newer usage. In high-stakes writing contexts, then, we would be wise to remember that some people regard such issues as pet peeves and may react negatively.

It may well be the case that one day the phrase to hone in on becomes interchangeable with to home in on, but we aren’t there yet.

©Get It Write 2021

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