Tag: Grammar

Q: Do you have any insights into the verb “moon,” which my dictionary says originated as student slang in the ‘60s?

A: Hmm. Your question reminds me of a “streaking” incident when I was a college student in Iowa in the early ‘70s. (In the lexicon of student pranks, the verb “streak” means to run naked in public.) But back to the subject at hand.

The verb “moon” has been around a bit longer than the 1960s. In fact, the earliest published reference in the Oxford English Dictionary comes from a 1601 translation of Pliny’s Historia Naturalis. In those days, it meant to expose to, bask in, or glow like moonlight.

By the mid-18th century, the verb also meant to act listlessly or aimlessly, according to the OED. And by the late 19th century, it took on the additional meaning of to daydream or act sentimentally.

But your question is obviously about a very different meaning of the word, a slang usage that the OED defines this way: “To expose one’s buttocks, esp. as a gesture intended to insult or shock.”

The OED’s earliest citation for this usage is from a 1968 issue of the journal Current Slang. But I prefer this 1971 citation from National Lampoon: “Have a few ‘brews,’ gross out some chicks, ‘moon’ a townie.”

Although this meaning of the verb “moon” is relatively new, the noun “moon” has been used to refer to buttocks for more than 250 years. The OED’s earliest published reference, which dates from 1756, refers to someone’s uncovered moon.

Here’s a more literary citation, from Joyce’s Ulysses (1922): “Or their skirt behind, placket unhooked. Glimpses of the moon.” And here’s one from the Beckett novel Murphy (1938): “Placing her hands upon her moons, plump and plain.”

Well, enough moonshines for today.

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Q: Why do you think computer information is “uploaded” to a network and “downloaded” from one? Why should the network be above us?

A: The verbs “upload” and “download” are defined somewhat differently in various dictionaries. But generally the term “upload” means to transfer data from a smaller computer to a larger, often remote one. And the term “download” means to transfer data from a larger, often remote computer to a smaller one.

Why “up” and “down,” rather than “left” and “right,” or “in” and “out,” or whatever?

Well, many people think of computer networks, especially the Internet, as somewhere up there in the ether – that is, in cyberspace. And networks are often arranged in a hierarchy, with the important computers on top and the subordinate ones below. But I suspect the answer to your question is more etymological than geographical, technical, or philosophical.

The verb “upload,” meaning to load up, has been with us for almost a century and a half, well before anyone ever thought of uploading computer data.

The first citation in the Oxford English Dictionary, from 1870, is in a poem by William Barnes: Low-headed horses slowly hail / The newly-made hay, uploaded high.

The OED’s first published reference for “upload” used with computer information is in a 1977 article in Aviation Week & Space Technology: “The joint program office … uploaded navigation data into the satellite by readjusting the phasing of the pseudo random noise signal employed by the navigation system.”

Interestingly, Aviation Week had used the term a year before in the older way in reference to loading a C-130 airplane: “At present most C-5C-141 pallets have to be reconfigured prior to uploading the C-130, particularly the two pallet spaces in the wheel-well area.”

So it seems to me that the digital use of “upload” probably evolved from the analog term. We can see similar evolutions with “cut,” “paste,” “spam,” “send,” “attach,” “clipboard,” and so on.

The first citation in the OED for the verb “download” is in a 1980 article in Electronic Design: “These programs are downloaded into the Microsystem Analyzer for debug and execution.”

I suspect, therefore, that the term “download” is a natural outgrowth of “upload.” But if anyone out there (or up there) in the ether has a better explanation, please let me know.

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Q: Some people use the word “myriad” as an adjective meaning numerous, others as a noun meaning a large number, and still others as a noun meaning 10,000. Which is correct?

A: “Myriad” is both a noun meaning a great number and an adjective meaning numerous. In fact, the noun came first (circa 1555, vs. 1735 for the adjective). Although “myriad” is derived from two Greek words – one meaning 10,000 and the other innumerable – the sense of 10,000 is archaic today.

I agree with Bryan A. Garner, who notes in Garner’s Modern American Usage that the word “is more concise as an adjective (myriad drugs) than as a noun (a myriad of drugs).” But Garner adds that the choice between noun and adjective “is a question of style, not correctness.”

In my opinion, “myriad,” in the sense of an indefinite large number (which is the modern meaning), is redundant in the plural (“myriads”). I’ve maintained this view in both the first and second editions of my book Woe Is I.

I’m well aware that the plural “myriads” is a very old usage (in fact, it reeks of antiquity). But since the noun “myriad” now means a great number, the plural construction (“myriads”) seems unnecessary. And while we’re on the subject of style, not correctness, I regard “a myriad of” as infelicitous for much the same reason.

But it would be wrong to call those usages incorrect. In fact, they’re “parallel with those of the original ancient Greek,” according to a usage note in The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (4th ed.).

[Update: The third edition of Woe Is I (2009, 2010) puts petty prejudice aside and bows to current usage, infelicitous though it may be. Here’s the updated entry: “MYRIAD. It originally meant ‘ten thousand,’ but myriad now is an adjective meaning ‘numerous’ (Little Chuckie has myriad freckles) or a noun meaning ‘great number’ (He has myriads [or a myriad] of them).”]

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Q: Something that drives me crazy these days is hearing people say “where it’s at” rather than “where it is.” Is the former phrase now acceptable, or is it still incorrect?

A: There are two versions of the expression “where it’s at.” One can get you a failing grade in grammar (in the few places where grammar is still being taught), but the other is an acceptable idiomatic expression.

First, the no-no. Using “where it’s at” instead of “where it is” is redundant. I’m talking about sentences like “Where are my car keys at?” The “at” is superfluous.

This usage (or, rather, misusage) isn’t especially new, however. Here’s an excerpt from John R. Bartlett’s Dictionary of Americanism (1859): “At is often used superfluously in the South and West, as in the question ‘Where is he at?’”

Now, on to the other usage. There’s nothing wrong with the colloquial expression “where it’s at,” as in “Dylan really knows where it’s at!” It may not be perfect grammar, but it’s accepted as an idiom.

The Oxford English Dictionary defines the idiomatic “where it’s at” this way: “the true or essential nature of a situation (or person); the true state of affairs; a place of central activity.”

This colloquial usage isn’t new either. The OED has published references for it going back to a 1903 article in the New York Sun, and I imagine it was used in speech quite a bit before that.

So that’s where it’s at!

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Q: Since when did “no problem” or “not a problem” become an acceptable substitute for “you’re welcome”? Go into ANY restaurant, request that your server bring you extra sauce for your shrimp cocktail, and you’ll hear one of those problematic responses in 8 out of 10 instances. Thank you for allowing me to vent my frustration!

A: This is a tic (like “have a nice day”) that will probably go away eventually. But we’ll all be retired to our rocking chairs by then, and complaining about a whole new set of verbal tics.

The expression “no problem,” meaning OK or thanks, has been with us for half a century at least, according to the Oxford English Dictionary. The first published reference in the OED is in a 1955 collection of letters between the writers Ralph Ellison and Albert Murray.

The OED citation we like best, however, is in Martin Amis’s first novel, The Rachel Papers (1977): “Finally, every time I emptied my glass, he took it, put more whisky in it, and gave it back to me, saying ‘No problem’ again through his nose.”

We can’t find a reference in the OED for the phrase “not a problem” used this way. But the dictionary does have quite a few published references dating back to 1985 for the ersatz Spanish “no problemo” (the actual Spanish word is problema).

As you might image, the word “problem” itself is quite old, appearing in the first complete English translation of the Bible (the Wycliffe version of about 1382).

Some of the more recent expressions in the OED that use the word are “problem child” (1920), “problem-oriented” (1946), “problem hair” (1967), and “problem dandruff” (1997).

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Q: Could you tell us about the history of the word “faith” and its use in US politics. I have complete faith that you can deliver the truth.

A: “Faith” is a noble old word. Old because it goes back eight centuries, and noble because it means belief, confidence, reliance, trust, loyalty, allegiance, fidelity.

The word was adopted into Middle English in about 1250, according to The Barnhart Concise Dictionary of Etymology. It was originally spelled “feth” or “feith” and was borrowed, as many words were in those days, from Old French (feit or feid), which ultimately got it from the Latin fides (trust).

The Latin fides, by the way, has given us a whole family of words including “confide” and “confidence,” “defy,” “diffident” (which originally meant distrustful, not shy), “fealty,” “fidelity,” “fiduciary,” “perfidy,” and (no kidding!) “federal”!

It has also given us expressions like “bona fides” (good faith) and “auto-da-fé” (act of faith). The term “auto-da-fé” became a notorious expression during the Inquisition, when it was used to refer to the sentencing of an “infidel” and his subsequent burning at the stake.

At first “faith” referred principally to religious faith, according to the Oxford English Dictionary, but the word’s meaning eventually widened to include broader usages, as in the adjectival phrase “faith-based,” which we hear so much these days.

Draft additions to the OED in 2007 show that “faith-based” dates back, believe it or not, to 1874. The dictionary says the phrase is chiefly American and means “(a) based on religious faith; (b) designating or relating to a charitable institution, social program, etc., created or managed by a religious organization.”

The first citation for this usage in the OED is from a poem by John Henry Vosburg: All God’s gifts are free, and hope is real, / Faith-based, to those who will not think, but feel.

The expression may have lain dormant for another hundred years, because the next citation in the OED is from a piece of literary criticism in 1972: “Ahab equates fear with orthodox belief, the faith-based laws of which he defies.”

Next comes a 1986 mention in a newspaper: “Witness for Peace is a grassroots, non-violent, faith-based movement committed to changing U.S. policy toward Nicaragua.” And then we have a citation from Newsweek in June 1998: “Congress … has swung behind a series of policy changes … which allow federal, state and local funds to flow to faith-based anti-poverty groups.”

There’s some irony, I think, in the fact that the same Latin word, fides, gave us both “faith” and “federal.” According to a recent Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life, “The United States has a long tradition of separating church from state, yet a powerful inclination to mix religion and politics.”

This inclination must be behind the rapid spread of the term “faith-based,” which has become a ubiquitous expression in politics, government, and nearly all facets of public life.

As for your faith in me, I hope it’s been justified.

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Q: I was watching an old “Star Trek” episode in which one of the characters referred to power levels as increasing “geometrically.” (This from a supposed graduate of Starfleet Academy.) Shouldn’t the levels have increased “exponentially”?

A: These two terms can be confusing, and most dictionaries aren’t a help. Despite what you seem to think, however, “geometrically” and “exponentially” can refer to the same kind of numeric growth. Here’s what I mean.

When numbers in a series increase by addition, they form an “arithmetic” (accent on the third syllable) or “linear” sequence. Example: 2, 4, 6, 8, 10, 12. (This sequence has a constant difference of 2.)

When numbers in a series increase by multiplication, they form a “geometric” or “exponential” sequence. Example: 3, 6, 12, 24, 48. (This sequence has a constant ratio of 2.)

I hope this helps.

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Q: When did the word “restaurant” come into the English language? My understanding (which I’m not sure is correct) is that it’s a very recent invention (not more than 200 years old).

A: Your instincts about the history of “restaurant” are right on the money. It’s a relatively young word, first used in English in 1827 by the novelist James Fenimore Cooper, author of such wilderness thrillers as The Deerslayer and The Last of the Mohicans.

The earliest citation in the Oxford English Dictionary, which comes from Cooper’s book The Prairie, refers to “the most renowned of the Parisian restaurans.” (Note the lack of the final “t,” which Cooper probably left off either out of ignorance or in an attempt to imitate the French pronunciation.)

It’s significant that Cooper used the word in reference to Parisian eateries, since “restaurant” is said to have originated in Paris in 1765. The French word was a noun based on the present participle of the verb restaurer (“to restore”), which came into French from the Latin verb restaurare. So when Cooper used it, the word was relatively new even in French.

The word “restaurateur,” which confuses so many people today, has had an interesting, if not confusing, history. A similar word, “restaurator,” entered English in the 1600s, but it meant “one who restores” and was first used in the medical sense.

The OED‘s first citation, from Peter Heylin’s Cosmographie (1652), refers to a “great Herbalist and Restaurator of Physick.” This word didn’t come from French, but directly from the Latin restaurare.

Surprisingly, the modern word “restaurateur” came into English before “restaurant.” The OED‘s first citation for “restaurateur” in the sense of a restaurant keeper is from a 1796 letter by Edmund Burke that mentioned the French and “all their former restaurateurs.”

The word “restaurateur,” it turns out, was also briefly used to mean the establishment itself. That usage first showed up in 1801 in a book by Catherine Wilmot about the travels of an Irish peer on the Continent, in which she referred to “Libraries, Restaurateurs, Gambling Houses, Coffee Houses.”

The erroneous spelling “restauranteur” first showed up in the 1940s and has stubbornly persisted. In fact, modern dictionaries now list it as an acceptable variant, but I’m not quite ready to throw in the towel on this one.

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Q: I’m writing a story for my college newspaper about where grammar comes from and how it’s evolving. As someone who has struggled with the rules of English, I want to find out why grammar is so embedded in our language and why it’s so necessary.

A: That’s a tall order. I can’t do the subject justice in a blog entry, but I can offer a few random thoughts that you may find useful.

We all help define what “proper” English is. It’s merely a set of conventions to make communication easier and more sensible.

Vocabulary changes very quickly, especially in the age of the Internet. Style and usage, documented in dictionaries, usage manuals, and stylebooks, evolve and change slowly over the years as public tastes come and go.

The foundations of grammar, however, are much more resistant to change. These include things like subject/verb agreement, how we form plurals, the case of pronouns (object vs. subject, for example), and so on. All these are very resistant to change, and for a good reason. Grammar is a communications tool, not a fashion accessory that is one flavor today and another tomorrow.

Some have suggested that “proper” grammar is elitist. I disagree. I come from a working-class family in which no one before me had attended college. By no means can my origins be considered elitist or “dominant class.” On the contrary.

But the one thing that was available to me, as well as to the more privileged youngsters in my Midwestern community, was a public education that gave me access to a good grounding in English grammar and composition. (Of course, this was back when grammar was actually taught in school!) I went on to become a journalist, an editor at the New York Times, and finally an author of books about language.

In the world we live in, smart kids have to know several grammars, each one with complex rules. And believe me, they do. We do youngsters a grave disservice when we label particular grammars as “elitist” or “street” or “urban” or “white” or “black.” Some kids simply have to know them all. Once they do, nothing can stop them. They must be able to think, write, read, and speak in several languages.

It’s a mistake to let any child suspect that a certain level of learning is out of his reach. That’s what we do when we expect less of some children than we do of others. Human children are geniuses at soaking up language, and we should expect the max from them, from the very earliest ages.

Grammatical quibbles may seem silly, and some of them are! But what isn’t silly is that communication is important. The ability to read and to communicate one’s thoughts unambiguously in clear English is the best gift we can pass on to any child, no matter where he or she comes from. If this is elitism, so be it. It’s elitism that should belong to everyone, and that can belong to everyone.

Grammar has not been considered an important subject in American public schools for at least the past 30 years. (Ironically, children all over the world are now learning English grammar: in China, Japan, the Scandinavian countries, India, everywhere but here.) The best way a kid in the public schools these days can get a solid grounding in English grammar is to study Spanish, French, Latin, or German. He will learn that language in general has a meaningful structure, roots that are clues to vocabulary, and so on. It’s also important to read! Children who read have better vocabularies and a better grasp of sentence structure than children who don’t.

This is a bit rambling and repetitive, and if I had more time it would be more useful to you, no doubt. But I hope it helps.

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Q: I’ve noticed something peculiar about the graduate students who help out at the senior center I attend. These students (master’s candidates in social work) all use the word “particular” for “peculiar.” Perhaps they picked it up from a textbook. In another vein, I hear people who say “in the mixed of” or “in the mist of” instead of “in the midst of.” And I’ve heard someone say, in reference to a custom no longer practiced, “It’s gone by the waistline.”

A: Thanks so much for sharing these. My favorite is “It’s gone by the waistline.” Hilarious!

As for “peculiar” and “particular,” the two words have different meanings, and I can’t imagine why those graduate students confuse them these days.

That said, I should mention that “particular” has been used sometimes in parts of England to mean, yes, eccentric. A regional definition for “particular” in the Oxford English Dictionary, with citations dating back to 1712, is “so unusual as to excite attention; peculiar, odd, strange.” One of the citations is in George Eliot’s Silas Marner (1861): “A partic’lar thing happened … a very partic’lar thing.”

I suspect, however, that those grad students may not read much aside from textbooks. If there is a decline in reading for pleasure, it might account for a lot of mis-hearings (“in the mist/mixed of” and so on). But people (both readers and nonreaders) have been tripping over their tongues for ages.

The editor of a book I’m now writing said that in childhood he thought the expression “eke out a living” was actually “eek out a living.” And come to think of it, earning a living is very often an “Eek!” experience.

These mistakes actually have a name: eggcorns. If you’d like to read more about this phenomenon, check out my March 14, 2007, blog item about a goof similar to the ones you mentioned.

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Q: I was watching a cooking show on TV and the chef got all upset about people who call sweet potatoes “yams.” Isn’t it just a regional thing from the South? Or another sense of the word?

A: Sweet potatoes and true yams are different, unrelated vegetables. Sweet potatoes come from the tropical Americas and yams from Africa and Asia, and they’re from different plant families.

Despite all that, what we call “yams” in this country (especially in the South and the West) are really sweet potatoes. How did the names of the sweet potato and yam get confused? An article by Jonathan R. Schultheis and L. George Wilson, horticultural scientists at North Carolina State University, explains it this way:

“Several decades ago, when orange-fleshed sweet potatoes were introduced in the southern United States, producers and shippers desired to distinguish them from the more traditional, white-fleshed types. The African word nyami, referring to the starchy, edible root of the Dioscorea genus of plants, was adopted in its English form, yam. Yams in the U.S. are actually sweet potatoes with relatively moist texture and orange flesh. Although the terms are generally used interchangeably, the U.S. Department of Agriculture requires that the label ‘yam’ always be accompanied by ‘sweet potato.’ “

The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (4th ed.) notes that the sweet potato is “also called regionally yam.” I’ve always heard the two terms used interchangeably, except when it comes to dessert. Sweet potato pie is always sweet potato pie in my experience, never “yam pie.”

As for the chef on that cooking show, he should relax. A sweet potato by any other name would taste as sweet. Or, as Popeye would say, “I yam what I yam.”

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Q: My brother-in-law says “R.S.V.P.” should read “R.s.v.p.” I have always seen it with all capital letters. What is the correct way?

A: The correct style, according to both Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary (11th ed.) and The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (4th ed.), is “RSVP,” all caps and no periods. “RSVP” is one of many abbreviations that have lost their dots in recent years.

The term, an abbreviation for the French phrase Répondez, s’il vous plait (Please reply), has been used by English writers since the mid-19th century.

The earliest published reference in the Oxford English Dictionary comes from The Ingoldsby Legends (1845), a collection of supernatural stories by the poet and novelist Richard Harris Barham: “Quadrilles in the afternoon, R.S.V.P.”

The OED’s first citation for the term as a verb appears in a 1969 detective novel by Raymond Vernon Beste in which the sleuth “R.S.V.Ped” to a Spanish Duchess.

If you’d like to read more about “RSVP,” check out my May 7, 2007, blog item.

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Q: When I go to see my beloved team playing in the Bronx, I go to Yankee Stadium. I am, therefore, a Yankee fan. It hurts my ears to hear somebody say, “I’m going to a Yankees game.” Why that superfluous “s”? I am on a mission to correct all who use the plural for a sports team.

A: I have to disagree with you. I think you’re a Yankees fan and you go to Yankees games. But common practice is all over the place on this. When I googled, I got twice as many hits for “Yankees game” as for “Yankee game,” but half as many for “Yankees fan” as for “Yankee fan.”

Here are my thoughts on whether a noun should be singular or plural when treated like an adjective. When a noun (say, “night” or “spring”) acts like an adjective, it’s usually singular, as in “night game” or “spring training.” This is usually true even when a singular noun looks plural (as in “news reporter” or “measles vaccine”).

But “usually” doesn’t mean all the time. Some singular nouns (such as “arm” or “farmer”) become plural in certain cases when treated like adjectives (“arms control” or “farmers market,” for example). And some plural collective nouns (like team names) can be plural in adjectival phrases if considered as a whole unit.

As for the Yankees, it depends on whether you view them as a whole team or as members of the team. For me, the word “Yankees” represents the team, so one would be a team fan (that is, “a Yankees fan”) and go to a team game (“a Yankees game”).

To use another sports example, “Red Sox” is inherently plural as a team name. A Boston fan wouldn’t say he was going to a “Red Sock game.” If the team is plural (Yankees, Patriots, Giants, whatever) I would think the plural form would be appropriate in most adjectival usages.

This is my opinion, and I may bring the wrath of “Yankee fans” down on my head. I can’t say you’re wrong, just that I disagree. But you may be interested to know that expressions like “Yankees games,” “Yankees uniforms,” “Yankees news,” and the like are listed that way on the official website of the New York Yankees.

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Q: Here’s my pet peeve: I’ve had my fill of the word “synergy.” It seemed to come out of nowhere 15 or 20 years ago, and now it’s everywhere. Enough already! Let’s show this newbie the door.

A: You’re right that “synergy” is seen a lot these days, especially in the corporate world, but it’s definitely not a newbie.

The Oxford English Dictionary has published references dating back to a 1660 ecclesiastical history by Peter Heylin: “They speak only of such a Synergie, or cooperation, as makes men differ from a sensless stock, or liveless statua, in reference to the great work of his own conversion.”

At first the word referred simply to cooperation or working together. By the mid-19th century, scientists were using it to refer to the combined action of bodily organs, mental faculties, remedies. Here’s an 1867 citation from the writings of the philosopher George Henry Lewes: “It is to be observed that the phrenologists have been fully alive to the synergy of organs in producing mental phenomena.”

The most common meaning of “synergy” now (a combined effort that’s greater than its parts) is relatively new, dating from the 1950s, according to the OED. Here’s a definition of “synergy” from a 1966 book on corporate strategy by Harry Igor Ansoff: “It is frequently described as the ‘2 + 2 = 5’ effect to denote the fact that the firm seeks a product-market posture with a combined performance that is greater than the sum of its parts.”

A related term, “synergism,” which dates from 1764, refers to a religious doctrine that human will cooperates with divine grace in the work of regeneration.

As for your pet peeve, “synergy” may sometimes be used too much, but it serves a purpose and I don’t know of any other word that means quite the same thing. On balance, I’d give it thumbs up.

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Q: Let’s dispense with “utilize.” I can’t think of a single instance when “use” would not be better (and FAR less pretentious). A professor once explained to me that “use” refers to using something in a way that’s intended while “utilize” refers to using something in a way NOT intended. For instance, he’d use a toothbrush to brush his teeth, but he’d utilize one to clean grout. Is this true? No dictionary I’ve consulted makes such a distinction, and it positively GRATES on me to hear people talk about “utilizing” ANYTHING!

A: You’re right about the inflated verb “utilize.” It usually means the same thing as “use”: to make use of or employ. People who utilize “utilize” when they could utilize “use” want to sound more authoritative than they are.

To be fair to your old professor, however, some dictionaries do make a distinction between “use” and “utilize,” though not the one he made. Although both words can mean to make use of something, “utilize” can also mean to use something in a practical or profitable way, according to The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language and Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary.

The Oxford English Dictionary has published references dating back to 1807 for “utilize” as a verb meaning to make or render useful. The far-older verb “use” has meant to make use of or to put into practice from at least the early 14th century.

So, yes, there is a slight difference in meaning between the two words, but we don’t think most people who use “utilize” are aware of it. They just want a longer word.

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Q: Why do so many people misuse the word “discomfited”? It doesn’t mean the same as “discomforted,” which ain’t even a word.

A: The verbs “discomfit” and “discomfort” (as well as their past participles “discomfited” and “discomforted”) are indeed real words. They once meant different things, but their meanings (long confused) have now pretty much merged.

“Discomfit,” which dates back to 1225, originally meant to defeat or overthrow. It comes from an Old French word, desconfire, meaning to defeat.

“Discomfort,” which dates from 1330, originally meant to discourage or dishearten, but it eventually weakened and now means to disconcert or make uneasy. It comes from an Old French word, desconforter (to make uncomfortable).

Although many sticklers insist on the original meaning of “discomfit,” the word has been used for hundreds of years to mean disconcert, as in this quote from the Dickens novel Dombey and Son (1848): “Dombey was quite discomfited by the question.”

In fact, this “new” usage is so prevalent that it has become the principal meaning of “discomfited,” according to The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (4th ed.), while the old sense of defeated or overthrown has become a secondary meaning.

A usage note in American Heritage says the use of “discomfit” to mean disconcert probably arose in part because of confusion with “discomfort,” but this meaning “is now the most common use of the verb in all varieties of writing and should be considered entirely standard.”

Thus does language change!

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Q: Why do radio hosts, when finishing a show, say, “We’ll see you tomorrow,” when it’s physically impossible? A better signoff: “Until tomorrow (or next time), goodbye.”

A: You’re right that “We’ll see you tomorrow” can’t be literally correct as a radio signoff. But I think many people consider “we’ll see you” an idiomatic expression meaning something like “we’ll be back” or “we’ll be in touch” or “we’ll be with you.”

In case you’re interested, there are many long-established non-literal uses of “see.” I’ll mention just a few.

We often say “I see” when we mean “I understand”; this use of “see” in the sense of perceiving intellectually dates back to the year 1200, according to the Oxford English Dictionary.

To “see” that something is done means to make sure it’s done. This sense of the word dates back to 1300, according to the OED.

To “see” someone’s bet (say, in a game of cards) is to match it. This usage dates from 1599.

“Let me see” or “let us see” (in an attempt to recall something to memory) is a usage dating from 1520.

The OED says the 19th-century expression “see you” (and variations like “see you soon” and “see you around”) is a “colloquial formula of farewell,” and is often used “without reference to an anticipated meeting,” much in the way the French say au revoir and the Germans auf Wiedersehen.

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[Note: A later post on this subject ran on April 28, 2010.]

Q: I thought I had “that” vs. ”which” nailed down — “that” for restrictive clauses and “which” for nonrestrictive. But I’ve seen The New Yorker, which I revere as a bastion of great writing, use “which” without a comma to introduce a restrictive clause. Is this usage acceptable where it would allow a writer to avoid using one “that” close to another? I’m thinking of a sentence like this: “I told you that the books which I ordered are not available.”

A: You do have the rule nailed down. But the rule can be bent if a writer feels “which” would be more euphonious and no misunderstanding is possible, as in the example you cite. Of course, the issue can be avoided if there’s no pressing need for a relative pronoun: “I told you that the books I ordered are not available.”

For readers of The Grammarphobia Blog who may not be familiar with restrictive (or defining) and nonrestrictive (or nondefining) clauses, let us explain the usual convention about “that” vs. “which.”

When you have a clause (a group of words with a subject and a verb) that you could start with “that” or “which,” and you can’t decide between them, here’s a hint: If you can drop the information and not lose the point of the sentence, use “which.” If you can’t drop it, use “that.”

The examples Pat uses in Woe Is I are: (1) “Buster’s bulldog, which had one white ear, won best in show.” (2) “The dog that won best in show was Buster’s bulldog.”

In the first example, the information in the “which” clause is not essential. In the second example, the clause starting with “that” is essential; it’s the whole point of the sentence. Also, as you note, “which” clauses are set off with commas, and “that” clauses aren’t.

As for The New Yorker, it doesn’t religiously observe the distinction (maintained at least in American usage) between “that” and “which.” Neither do many British publications, a fact you may already have noticed.

As it happens, William Safire, in two “On Language” columns in The New York Times Magazine in 1989, commented on this practice by The New Yorker.

In the first column, Safire wrote that it was easy to find “outright mistakes” in The New Yorker, and he cited this example: “It is only those drugs which are illegal that inspire the present public furor….” (There “which” is used, without a comma, to introduce a restrictive clause. This avoids an awkward series of repetitive sounds: “those … that … that.”)

Safire then explained the usual rule about “which” and “that” clauses, and added this quote from Strunk and White: “It would be a convenience to all if these two pronouns were used with precision.”

A month later, Safire stuck to his guns despite a challenge from the scholar and critic Jacques Barzun. “Your general principle is right,” Barzun wrote, “which is nondefining and the other defines. But Fowler, who invented the rule, makes clear that following it should not take precedence over other considerations and he mentions euphony.”

We agree with Safire for the most part. The distinction between “that” and “which” is often an aid to clarity, and clarity in expression is nothing to sneeze at. Using “which” in restrictive clauses can lead to misunderstandings. For example:

(1) “Fran collected books that were scarce in wartime.” (No way to misread this.)

(2) “Fran collected books which were scarce in wartime.” (Did she collect only scarce books, or were all books scarce in wartime? The meaning isn’t clear.)

However, we’re with Barzun on the question of euphony. If “that” proves ungainly, and no misunderstanding is possible, it’s no crime to use “which,” without a comma, to introduce a restrictive clause.

By the way, Barzun exaggerated when he said Henry Fowler invented the rule for “that” and “which” clauses. Fowler didn’t, though he certainly popularized it.

[Note: This post was updated on Dec. 27, 2022.]

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Q: I’ve heard someone, or something, from Argentina called an ar-gen-TINE, an argen-TEEN, and an argen-TIN-i-an. Which is correct?

A: The Random House Webster’s College Dictionary prefers the following English nouns (in order) for a native of Argentina:

(1) “Argentine” (pronounced ar-gen-TEEN.
(2) “Argentine” (ar-gen-TINE).
(3) “Argentinean” (ar-gen-TIN-i-an).

The adjectives referring to someone or something from Argentina are the same.

My husband, who worked as an American journalist in Buenos Aires in the 1960s, uses only the first one (pronounced ar-gen-TEEN) for both the noun and adjective.

The now old-fashioned way of referring to the country of Argentina (“the Argentine”) is usually pronounced the ar-gen-TINE.

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Q: A Ukrainian woman who is trying to improve her English asked me if there was any difference between “scrumptious” and “delicious.” Her Canadian brother-in-law had told her that “scrumptious” was used only with certain types of food and was not something one would use every day. I could not offer any concrete elaboration on the word. I’m wondering if you know something about it.

A: I was amused to get your email because “scrumptious” was a word my late mother always used and it reminded me of her. During much of my childhood I thought she had made it up, and was surprised to find in adolescence that it was a real word.

Now on to your question. Is there a difference between “scrumptious” and “delicious”? H-m-m-m. Not much, I’d say, but something that’s scrumptious may have more oomph and be even yummier than something that’s merely delicious.

“Scrumptious,” according to Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary (11th ed.), is a word dating from 1830 that today means primarily delicious, but also delightful or excellent. It’s thought to be an alteration of “sumptuous,” M-W says.

The Barnhart Concise Dictionary of Etymology says that back when “scrumptious” was introduced, the word meant stylish or splendid or first-rate. The sense of delicious was first recorded in 1881.

The Oxford English Dictionary lists these same meanings, but it has another one too: fastidious or hard to please. This meaning has only one citation (from 1845) and apparently has fallen out of use, since I don’t find it anywhere else.

“Scrumptious” these days is used mainly to describe food, and it can be applied to anything delightfully tasty; it’s not restricted to certain kinds of food. However, I can’t imagine anyone using it to describe liver and onions. (That’s just my own prejudice, though. Mom’s idea of scrumptious and mine were not always the same.)

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Q: When I intend to exclude something, I simply say “except,” as in “I finished everything except the math homework.” But I often hear people say “except for.” Which is correct?

A: In the example you give, either “except” or “except for” is OK: “I finished everything except [or “except for”] the math homework.”

Both “except” and “except for” can mean “with the exception of.” But “except for” can also mean something like “if it weren’t for.” When you can’t make up your mind, here are some suggestions that might help.

If you mean “but,” then you can use either “except” or “except for,” as in this example: “Everyone except [or “except for”] Bob had left.” However, if you cannot substitute “but,” use “except for,” as in this example: “The office would have been empty except for Bob.”

Here are two more general rules:

(1) Use “Except for” at the beginning of a sentence: “Except for Aunt Martha, everyone brought a gift.” But in mid-sentence, either is fine if you mean “but”: “Everyone brought a gift except [or “except for”] Aunt Martha.”

(2) Use “except” before a preposition: “It rained except in the city” or “I had no choice except to go.”

Unfortunately, English can be messy. This is a case where one rule won’t cover all occasions. But these tips will help solve most problems with “except” vs. “except for.”

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Q: I’ve been hearing the expression “suss out” a lot lately. What’s it all about? Did I miss a memo somewhere?

A: If there was a memo about “suss out,” then I missed it too. But I did some poking around, and there it was in my usual language references. Live and learn!

To “suss out,” it seems, is a slang verbal phrase meaning to investigate or check into or figure out something.

Both The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (4th ed.) and Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary (11th ed.) suggest “suss” is derived from “suspect.”

The expression “suss out” originated in Britain in the 1960s, according to A Dictionary of Slang and Unconventional English, by Eric Partridge.

The slang dictionary lists several other usages of “suss”: a verb from the 1920s meaning to suspect; a 1970s noun meaning suspicion, as in “he was arrested on suss”; and a 1980s noun meaning knowledge, as in “they’ve got suss.”

The Oxford English Dictionary has similar citations for “suss” (often spelled “sus”), meaning “suspicion,” “suspicious,” “suspect,” or “suspected,” and gives published references dating from the 1930s. The noun meaning know-how or understanding dates from the 1970s in the OED citations.

And that, I suspect, is what it’s all about.

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Q: My boss, the dean of a theological college, recently wrote a letter in which he referred to a “Master’s graduate” and an award for “excellency in Liturgy.” I thought he should have said “Masters’ graduate” and “excellence in Liturgy,” but the dean disagreed. We bickered over this for a while, and I offered to write you about it.

A: Both Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary (11th ed.) and The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (4th ed.) include the phrase “master’s degree” as well as the word “master’s” (as a noun meaning “a master’s degree”). Both dictionaries use the apostrophe and lowercase this usage, though M-W notes that the designations “master of science” and “master of arts” and so on are “often cap.”

The Chicago Manual of Style (15th ed.) also uses the apostrophe and lowercases the generic degrees: “a master’s degree” (section 8.32). But Chicago capitalizes the specific degrees, like “Master of Arts” and so on (section 15.21).

Since all three references (M-W, American Heritage, and Chicago) use “master’s” in an adjectival way, I would say their style calls for a “master’s graduate” (lowercase “m”).

The usual noun form of the adjective “excellent” is “excellence,” which means the quality of being excellent. “Excellency” is most often seen as a title given to dignitaries like ambassadors and such, although it is occasionally used as a synonym for “excellence.” Given a choice, I’d go for “excellence in liturgy.”

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Q: How did the term “seaboard” come to be a synonym for “seacoast”?

A: In Old English, the language spoken in Anglo-Saxon times, the term bord (the source of our modern word “board”) had two meanings: (1) a plank, shield, shelf, or table; and (2) an edge, rim, or side.

The second meaning dates back at least to the year 897, and it’s this sense that gives us the words “border” and “seaboard” (meaning seaside, seacoast, seashore).

This meaning of “board” as an edge or side also gave us the words “shipboard” (the side of a ship) and “overboard” (over the side of a ship), as well as “larboard” and “starboard.”

When the phrase “on board” first appeared in English in the early 16th century, it meant alongside a ship (or a shore), but the meaning widened by the late 17th century to include on a ship itself.

Other old nautical expressions reflecting this etymology included “board on board” and “board by board,” which described two ships coming alongside one another (side by side).

It’s often supposed that the “board” in “on board” refers to the deck of a ship, according to the Oxford English Dictionary, but the Middle English version of the expression, within schippe burdez (“within ship boards”), makes clear the word “board” actually refers to a border.

The OED says the two Anglo-Saxon meanings of bord (a plank and an edge) may have been the result of entirely different nouns from different sources, already blended by the time they arrived in Old English.

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Q: I recently read that a poll “had showed” Clinton and Obama neck and neck. The use of “showed” felt awkward to me and I wondered if “shown” would have been better. When is it appropriate to use each one?

A: The usual past participle of “show” (that is, the form of the verb used with “had” or “have”) is “shown.” But “showed” is also acceptable and not a mistake. Dictionaries these days consider both of them standard English, but list “shown” first.

The verb “show” was once spelled “shew.” Merriam-Webster’s Concise Dictionary of English Usage says the original past participle was “shewed” (it first appeared in the 14th century), followed by “showed” (15th century).

Although “shown” is the predominant past participle today, according to the Oxford English Dictionary, it only became common in the 19th century.

The OED notes that the older “showed” is still used with “have” or “had,” but it’s obscure in the passive voice. So it would be considered a mistake (or at least archaic) to say something like “the argument was showed to be false.”

If you’re using the passive voice, along with “is” or “was” or “are” or “were,” then “shown” is preferred, as in “he was shown the door” or “the paintings were shown to be forgeries” or “names are shown in italics.”

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Q: I’ve worked in the auto-repair industry for many years and occasionally hear the expression “change out,” meaning to replace, as in “change out the spark plugs” or “change out the water pump.” I’ve heard this usage from techs who were trained in Britain. Did the expression originate there?

A: I can’t find “change out” in my usual language references, but I see it a lot on the Internet, especially on auto-repair discussion sites, where it’s used the way you suggest: replacing an old set of brake pads, or whatever, with new ones.

I’ve also seen it used on sites dealing with decorating (“change out” the drapes or the color scheme), computers (“change out” a hard drive or a processor), home maintenance (“change out” siding or filters), and many technical subjects.

The expression, by the way, has been used both as a verbal phrase and a noun phrase: “to change out” is to replace; “a change-out” is a replacement.

I can’t find a source that says the expression is of British origin. In fact, I doubt it, since few of the websites that use the phrase are in the United Kingdom or other Commonwealth countries.

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Q: Target’s “Do Good” donation program makes me crazy. Shouldn’t it be “Do Well”? I was taught that an adverb, not an adjective, should modify a verb like “do.” If Target really wants to “do good,” it should use proper English.

A: In the Target ad, the word “good” is a noun, not an adjective, and the company is using it correctly. Of course, it would be an adjective if Target had suggested that people “Do Good Works (or Deeds),” but using it as a noun (“Do Good”) is OK.

In fact, the phrase “do good” (in which “good” is a noun meaning that which is good, or the opposite of the noun “evil”), dates back to the year 825, according to the Oxford English Dictionary. And it has appeared in print steadily over the last 1,200 years or so.

“Good” is also a noun in expressions like “he’s no good,” “all to the good,” “this isn’t any good,” “deliver the goods,” “dry goods,” “we’ve got the goods on these crooks,” “happiness is the ultimate good,” and so on.

All of those expressions, and many more, are on target.

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Q: Is there another way of saying “call a spade a spade”? Although it’s my understanding that the origin of this idiom is not racist, I’m not sure that the use of such an expression would “fly” in this age of political correctness.

A: I don’t necessarily agree with you about the need to avoid the expression. But if you must, here are a few alternatives: “don’t mince words,” “call them as you see them,” “don’t beat around the bush,” and “tell it as it is.”

You’re right, though, about the origin of “call a spade a spade”: it has nothing to do with race. The expression originated with the ancient Greeks, who dismissed a crude or plain-spoken person by saying he’d “call a fig a fig, a trough a trough.”

So where did the spade come from? We can thank Erasmus for it, according to the Oxford English Dictionary. The Renaissance scholar confused the Greek words “trough” (skaphe) and “spade” (skapheion) while translating a slur against Macedonians in Plutarch’s Apoththegmata.

When Erasmus’s Latin mistranslation was rendered into English in the 16th century, the Macedonians were described as not having “the witte to calle a spade by any other name than a spade.”

Nikos Saratakos, who contributes to online language discussions about classical and modern Greek, has suggested that the expression was originally a slur because the terms “fig” and “trough” used to be sexual symbols. Thus, someone who called a fig a fig or a trough a trough would be considered crude.

Interestingly, the old expression has survived in modern Greek, according to Saratakos, but it now has a positive meaning, pretty much like our version. And if it weren’t for Erasmus, we also might be calling a trough a trough today.

If you’d like to learn more, check out this excerpt from Mark Israel’s informative FAQ on the newsgroup alt.usage.english.

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Q: I was taught that, since we say “I live in New York City,” we should also say “This is a great place to live in,” not “This is a great place to live.” What do you recommend?

A: Many (perhaps most) English speakers these days commonly drop the “in” from the verbal phrase “to live in” in certain constructions. For example, people commonly say things like “San Francisco is a wonderful place to live,” but never “I’d like to live San Francisco.”

The late Gordon R. Wood, who was a professor emeritus of English at Southern Illinois University, wrote about this phenomenon back in 1966. In an article in the journal American Speech, Wood said this about dropping “in” (technically, a verbal particle) from the phrase “to live in”:

“What seems to happen is that the speakers pass the point for inserting the verbal particle in the interior of a sentence and then they become aware of it as a ‘preposition’ which supposedly, according to rule, cannot end a sentence. Rather than break the rule, they erase the verbal element and leave the listener (at least this listener) with an uneasy feeling about the sense of what has been said.”

He pointed out that the practice was often heard in the cliché about “making the world a better place to live.”

Since Wood’s day, it’s become commonplace to omit “in” when the phrase “to live in” comes at the end of a sentence. These days it doesn’t raise many eyebrows and it’s become standard practice. Wood’s theory that a reluctance to end sentences with prepositions led to this practice may or may not be correct. But it’s an interesting speculation.

By the way, that old taboo about prepositions is a grammatical myth. I’ve referred to it several times on the blog, including this entry.

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