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Pam Nelson: The Grammar Guide

 

Archive for February 2006

Number of comments in parentheses

28: Cleaning up grammar

I received an e-mailed note from a reader who was very distressed about a blog on another newspaper site that included a comment that was riddled with typos or misspellings, most of the ‘s plural variety (new’s, countie’s). The blog writer doesn’t edit the comments posted by others, which makes perfect sense. We generally don’t fix the grammar in quotes in the newspaper, so we don’t edit comments we receive on a blog. We do block obscene comments and can delete those that are harassing or off the point. But we do not edit the comments. Is this a[.....]

26: Brush up on grammar

A couple of academic Web sites offer wonderful tools for learning or relearning grammar and punctuation. Professor Charles Darling created and maintained The Guide to Grammar and Writing at the site for Capital Community College in Hartford, Conn. Darling died this month, but I hope someone will take up the cause and keep the site going. It is a wonderful resource. One part of the site that I checked out this weekend contains PowerPoint presentations about subject-verb agreement, commas and other points of grammar and mechanics. If you have PowerPoint or a PowerPoint viewer on your computer, you can[.....]

25: Neither world

When you use the conjunctions “neither … nor” in the subject of a sentence or clause, you should make the verb agree in number with the closer subject. If the closer subject is singular, use a singular verb. If the closer subject is plural, use a plural verb. Examples:* Neither alcohol nor drugs appear to have been involved, UNC-CH officials said. (“Drugs” is plural, so the verb is plural. I suppose, though, that a writer could argue that “drugs” is one concept.) * Neither the senator nor the lobbyist was available to answer reporters’ questions. (“Lobbyist” is singular, so[.....]

23: Get your pronouns right here

One rule of grammar is that pronouns must agree in number with their antecedents. A singular antecedent needs a singular pronoun. The boy tossed on his coat and ran out. A plural antecedent needs a plural pronoun. The boys tossed on their coats and ran out. The problem usually comes with an indefinite pronoun. Although indefinite pronouns (everyone, nobody, anyone) are considered singular, we tend to use plural pronouns with them because we don’t want to use the gender specific pronouns. Everybody tossed on their coat and ran out. I think it would be better not to use “their”[.....]

22: Use or usage?

A reader asks about “use” and “usage,” having noticed both “tobacco use” and “tobacco usage” in writing. She wonders why “usage” doesn’t sound right to her. The New York Times Stylebook gives good guidance on this. “Usage,” the stylebook says, “refers to habitual or preferred practice in fields such as grammar, law or etiquette. Use is the less stilted term for employment or consumption.” So the reader was correct: The phrase should be “tobacco use.” This article was originally posted by the Raleigh News & Observer, a subsidiary of The McClatchy Co.; is posted here to provide continuity; and[.....]

21: More collective wisdom

Collective nouns “may be treated either as singular or plural, but not as both singular and plural in the same sentence,” writes John B. Bremner in “Words on Words.” I wrote about collective nouns in an earlier post. I did not cite Bremner in that post, although his wisdom also informed my continuing study of collective nouns. (Bremner, for those new to this blog, is the late distinguished professor of journalism at the University of Kansas and a hero to many copy editors, even those of us who know him only through his book.) I also relied on Bryan[.....]

20: Collective wisdom

Collective nouns have given me fits over the years. Every time I think I finally have the subject-verb agreement problem figured out, something comes along to remind me that I need to know more. Collective nouns are singular in form but plural in meaning (group, committee, board, army, class, club, team, etc.) For the most part, we American English speakers consider these words grammatically singular, and we use singular verbs with them. (By contrast, British speakers treat them as plural.) We need to be consistent, though, and use singular pronouns too. The jury reaches its verdict. The board votes[.....]

19: Up in the ivory tower

Our story today about UNC system president Erskine Bowles referred to the “ivory tower.” I also ran across a reference in a blog post to folks in “ivory towers.” The phrase refers to academic institutions or to the elitism and out-of-touch thinking that we sometimes associate with academics. I wondered how the term started. World Wide Words has a great explanation of how a biblical symbol became a poetic allusion and a common expression. This article was originally posted by the Raleigh News & Observer, a subsidiary of The McClatchy Co.; is posted here to provide continuity; and is[.....]

19: A day for presidents

So is the holiday that we celebrate on the third Monday in February this? Or this? Or this? My desk supervisor posted a note in our office last week to remind us that the style for the holiday is Presidents Day. The reason for this style is that the day is a day for presidents, not a day belonging to the president or the presidents. In fact, however, the day is still officially Washington’s Birthday. Here is an explanation of the holidays that the federal government recognizes. As to why this day has become a great day for stores[.....]

16: Misplaced phrases, again

A reader points out a recent brief that has several problems, including this sentence: With the help of a fellow officer, the boy was returned to his home nearby, where he had wandered away from shortly before Hunter spotted him. The prepositional phrase at the beginning “With the help of a fellow officer” does not refer to the sentence’s subject, “the boy,” as it should. Instead it refers to the officer mentioned in the previous paragraphs, the one who found a 2-year-old boy wandering a Raleigh street. Also, we should have edited that last part “where he wandered away[.....]

8: Apt metaphor

The word “netherworld” in a headline written by a colleague has interesting connotations. The word means the land of the dead, the afterlife or hell. But the word has a more metaphorical use. In this story with the headline “A trip to the weird netherworld of Tucker Max” about a man who sets out to be obnoxious and write about his misadventures, the word carried the connotation of a place between worlds. Tucker Max, the story’s subject, used the term himself to describe his state between being a “nobody and an actual celebrity.” In the headline, the word meant[.....]

7: You are a friend of mine

An editor asked me which of these constructions is correct: a friend of John’s or a friend of John. It is idiomatic in standard English to say or write a friend of John’s. I explained that we use a possessive pronoun in this construction: He is a friend of mine. I am a friend of his. Therefore, when we use a person’s name in this “of” construction, we make it possessive. This construction is often called a double possessive, but it also is called a double genitive. “The Writer’s Digest Grammar Desk Reference” and “The Gregg Reference Manual” point[.....]

5: Live from behind the scenes

As a copy editor, I do most of my work behind the scenes. I like it that way. If I had been a more outgoing person who was comfortable talking to strangers, I might have been a reporter. Nevertheless, I am going to be doing a live online chat through N&O Live at 2:30 p.m. Tuesday — a truly nerve-racking prospect. If you would like to ask a question about copy editing or language use, you can send one on the N&O Live page. While you are there, you can look at transcripts of past chats with N&O editors[.....]