Tag: Grammar

Q: Why do newspaper headlines refer to “investment banks” as “banks”? By using the same word for free-wheeling financial institutions on the one hand and government-regulated banks on the other, the papers have muddied the waters and perhaps contributed to the present financial crisis.

A: I don’t think newspaper copy editors (the modestly paid folks who write those headlines) should be blamed for the blunders of the fat cats at investment banks – or the politicians who ignored the shenanigans.

And as a former copy editor, I sympathize with the need to trim words to get a headline to fit the assigned space.

Nevertheless, I too have been taken aback by the frequent use of “bank” for “investment bank” in headlines as well as first references in newspaper articles.

I began noticing this about two years ago, and a quick search of the New York Times archive suggests that I wasn’t imagining it.

There has indeed been a drop in the use of “investment bank” in Times headlines over the last two years.

The full term was used four times in the first half of 2006, but not at all during the rest of the year. Since then, the full term hasn’t been seen much in headlines—only once in 2007 and once so far in 2008.

As you might imagine, there’s been no shortage of articles about investment banks in the Times over the last two years. At least seven headlines in 2007 and five in 2008 referred to them merely as “banks.”

I’m not quite sure what to make of all this, since the use of the term “investment bank” in headlines has gone up and down over the years.

For instance, it was used quite often in the late ‘90s (at least eight times in ’98 and another eight in ’99), but much less in the early years of the new millennium.

It would take a lot more research to determine how much of this had to do with editorial decisions at the Times or the ups and downs in investment banking.

By the way, I couldn’t find any citations in the Oxford English Dictionary for “bank” used on its own to refer to an investment bank. The earliest published reference in the OED for “investment banking” dates from 1922. The earliest for “investment banker” is from 1938 and for “investment bank” from 1963.

In Anglo-Saxon days, according to the OED, the word “bank” (banca in Old English) referred to a bench or platform or stage. By the 15th century, it had come to mean a money changer’s place of business (from his table or counter).

The word was first used in its modern sense (an establishment to keep money, lend it, or invest it) in the 16th century.

The entries for “bank” in The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (4th ed.) and Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary (11th ed.) make no mention of investment banks. (American Heritage has a separate entry for “investment bank,” but it doesn’t include the short form.)

The New York Times’s online financial glossary defines investment banks as financial institutions that provide such services as “aiding in the sale of securities, facilitating mergers and other corporate reorganizations, acting as brokers to both individual and institutional clients, and trading for their own accounts.”

The glossary doesn’t define plain old banks.

Should the Times (as well as every other paper) be clearer in its news pages about the difference between banks and investment banks? I think so. After all, investment banks aren’t subject to the same stringent regulations that banks are. And it never hurts to remind us of that.

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Q: In an essay on the “reality” of visual images, the filmmaker Errol Morris uses the word “fauxtograph” to describe a picture that has been doctored. He says the web designer Charles Johnson, who runs the blog Little Green Footballs, originated the term. It’s a keeper, don’t you think?

A: I love It. I predict that “fauxtography” will stay in the language (or it should, if the English-speaking public has any sense).

This neologism – or new word (from the Greek roots for “new” and “word”) – has already made a good start, with 150,000 hits on Google. Seems like the real thing!

Neither “fauxtograph” nor “fauxtography” has made it into any of the dictionaries I usually consult, but “fauxtography” and “fauxtographer” are in Merriam-Webster’s Open Dictionary, an online list of proposed entries submitted by readers.

The word “fauxtography” is defined as photography “that has been digitally manipulated to achieve a specific editorial impact.”

And a “fauxtographer” is described as someone “who takes digital images and manipulates them in a way as to appear real.”

In other words, a fauxny.

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She’ll be on the Leonard Lopate Show around 1:20 P.M. Eastern time to discuss the English language and to take questions from callers.

Q: I have always thought the word “empathetic” should be banned from the language since “empathic” covers it. Perhaps people who prefer “empathetic” are thinking of “empanada.” Am I correct in my thinking?

A: “Empathic” dates back to 1909 and “empathetic” to 1932, according to the Oxford English Dictionary, so both adjectives are relatively new.

The two words are considered standard English in The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (4th ed.) and Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary (11th ed.)

The two dictionaries define “empathetic” and “empathic” the same way: relating to or characterized by empathy – that is by identifying with another person’s feelings, motives, situation, etc.

Both words are widely used, but “empathetic” is more popular, with 2 million Google hits to 1.35 million for “empathic.” Why is “empathetic” hot?

I don’t think empanadas enter the picture. My guess is that “empathetic” has become more popular than “empathic” over the years because of its similarity to “sympathetic.” The OED makes the same case, suggesting that “empathetic” is modeled “after such derivatives as sympathetic from sympathy.”

If you associate empathy with sympathy, it’s natural to think of the corresponding words “empathetic” and “sympathetic.” (There is no modern word “sympathic.” There once was, but it’s now considered rare or obscure.)

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Q: I was taught – lo, these many years ago – that it is never correct to begin a sentence with “and.” In recent years, I have noticed more and more sentences, spoken and written by those who I thought would know better, begin with “and.” Has this become acceptable usage or is it still incorrect to use “and” in this manner?

A: Contrary to popular opinion, it has never been incorrect to begin a sentence with a conjunction (a linking word like “and,” “but,” “or,” etc.). It’s perfectly acceptable to use conjunctions to join words, phrases, sentences, and even paragraphs.

I discussed this in a posting to the blog two years ago, but I think it’s time for an update. No one’s quite sure where the old prohibition came from, but it’s mythological.

Merriam-Webster’s Dictionary of English Usage says few language authorities “have actually put the prohibition in print.” In fact, it could find only one such reference – an 1868 comment by George Washington Moon, a literary gadfly who criticized the grammarians of his day: “It is not scholarly to begin a sentence with the conjunction and.”

Merriam-Webster’s cites speculation that the belief may have come from the efforts of teachers to correct children for using “and” excessively to string together clauses and sentences.

“As children grow older and master the more sophisticated technique of subordinating clauses, the prohibition of and becomes unnecessary,” M-W adds. “But apparently our teachers fail to tell us when we may forget about the prohibition. Consequently, many of us go through life thinking it wrong to begin a sentence with and.”

And that’s the story.

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Q: I appreciate this forum and the opportunity it offers to comment and question freely. Speaking of which, when did “for free” begin to replace just “free” in a financial sense?

A: The word “free” (the adjective as well as the adverb) is quite old, dating from Anglo-Saxon days, when it referred to not being enslaved or restricted in other ways. It wasn’t until the early 17th century that it took on the meaning of without charge or payment.

One of the earliest published references, from around 1631, is in a poem by John Donne: “Love is not love, but given free; / And so is mine; so should yours be.”

Most of the early uses of “free” in a financial sense are in the phrase “free gratis,” as in this 1682 citation, via the Oxford English Dictionary, from the Liverpool municipal records: “Hee was admitted free gratis.”

The first OED citation for “free” used by itself in this sense is from an 1872 ad in the Dubuque (Iowa) Herald for Kress Fever Tonic: “Box of pills free with every bottle.”

The earliest published references in the dictionary for the phrase “for free” used instead of plain old “free” date from the late 1930s and early ’40s.

A 1943 article in the journal American Speech speculates about the origin of this new and expanded expression: “It might be reasonable to assume that for free results from the confusion of free and for nothing.”

From the OED citations, it appears that the phrase “for free” has been well-established among English speakers since the 1950s.

Here’s a colorful example from a 1957 article in the Chronicle-Telegram of Elyria, Ohio: “He … aroused the anger of Miss Hayworth’s movie boss who felt that chopping the skull off a $6,000-a-week star for free was pushing things a little.”

And here’s one from Kingsley Amis’s novel I Like It Here (1958): “Bowen tried to buy some drinks, conscious of having been fed and made drunk for free.”

The old expression “free gratis” is still popular too. I got more than 1.5 million hits when I googled it, though a surprisingly large number were for software downloads and sexual-enhancement drugs.

I see nothing wrong with using either “for free” or “free gratis” for emphasis when “free” alone doesn’t seem to have enough oomph. If emphatic redundancy is a sin, I’m a sinner.

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Q: Actors, politicians, churchgoers, and chefs are claiming that scripts, policies, psalms, and ingredients resonate with them. It’s everywhere just now. Enough already. All this resonating doesn’t strike a chord with me.

A: I agree. The strings of my heart don’t exactly zing over all the resonating in the air. The usage is stale, tired, and boring. Aside from that, however, there’s nothing wrong with it.

Although “resonate” originally meant to produce resonance in a musical sense, the word has been used figuratively for more than 30 years.

Both The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (4th ed.) and Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary (11th ed.) say it can mean to evoke a shared feeling or to relate harmoniously.

The word, which comes from the Latin resonare (to resound), is relatively new. The earliest citation in the Oxford English Dictionary is from an 1873 treatise on musical sound: “The wires of the corresponding note will of course resonate with it.”

The OED’s first reference for “resonate” used figuratively is in a 1976 issue of Publishers Weekly in which prose is described as “resonating with the illustrations.” (The editors at PW started something: the word went on to become numbingly familiar in literary criticism.)

The much older words “resonance” and “resonant” have been used in both an acoustic and a figurative sense for far longer.

The noun “resonance” referred to prolonging sound by vibration when it entered English in the late 15th century, according to the OED, but it was used figuratively as early as 1607: “So ought our hearts … to haue no other resonance but of good thoughts.”

The adjective “resonant” could refer to either resounding words or music in the 16th and 17th centuries. A 1592 citation mentions “earnest and resonant, but vndigested words,” while Milton writes in Paradise Lost (1667) of a “resonant fugue.”

In a clearly figurative use, an 1842 essay by Elizabeth Barrett Browning refers to the “resonant majesty” of the English dramatist Philip Massinger.

So, “resonate,” “resonance,” and “resonant” have a history. But that’s no reason to work these poor words to death. Let’s give them a rest. And one day, they may resonate again. Or, as Judy Garland, sang: “All nature seemed to be in perfect harmony / Zing! Went the strings of my heart.”

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Q: You recently suggested on WNYC that the adjective and adverb “gingerly” may be related to the noun “ginger.” In fact, “gingerly” comes from an Old French word for “gentle” while “ginger” is derived from a Sanskrit word for the root that gives us the spice.

A: You got me. And so did quite a few other listeners to the Leonard Lopate Show. The two words have two entirely different roots, so to speak.

“Ginger,” which is by far the older of the words, has been studied exhaustively by etymologists – “deservedly so, for its ancestry is extraordinarily complex,” says the lexicographer John Ayto in his Dictionary of Word Origins.

One of the more exhaustive studies cited by Ayto is a 74-page monograph by the British linguist Alan S.C. Ross. (Professor Ross is perhaps better known for coining the terms “U” and “non-U” in reference to upper-class and not-so-upper English.)

Ayto traces the English noun “ginger” back to the Sanskrit srngaveram, a word that describes the horn-shaped root of the plant. But the Oxford English Dictionary speculates that the origin of “ginger” might go back even further – to a pre-historic Dravidian name.

Either way, a vernacular version of the Sanskrit word passed into Greek and Latin before showing up in Old English as gingiber and gingifer around the year 1000.

The adverb and adjective “gingerly,” on the other hand, comes from the Old French word gensor, meaning pretty or delicate.

The earliest citation in the OED for the adverb is from a 1519 play: “Daunce we, daunce we … I can daunce it gyngerly.”

The adjective first appeared in a 1533 English translation of the works of the Latin playwright Terence: “We staye and prolonge our goinge with a nyce or tendre and softe, delicate, or gingerly pace.”

At first, “gingerly” referred to walking or dancing with elegant steps. But by the early 17th century, the word was being used to describe moving with extreme caution, reluctance, or distaste.

Here’s an example from The Parliament of Love, a 1624 comedy by Philip Massinger: “Prithee, gentle officer, / Handle me gingerly, or I fall to pieces.”

What about the name “Ginger”? Does it come from “ginger,” “gingerly,” or something else? I discussed this in an Aug. 4, 2008, blog item about nicknames.

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Q: I was writing dialogue for a short-story class when it occurred to me that I had seen five different spellings of a word I was about to use: “O.K.,” “OK,” “okay,” “o.k.,” and “ok.” Which is correct? Is the two-letter version an acronym? If so, what does is stand for? Where does this odd word come from? Sadly, my dictionary isn’t much help.

A: The first three spellings are OK. Forget about the last two. As for which of the three legitimate ones should go in the mouth of your character, this is a matter of style, not grammar or usage.

The New York Times stylebook, for instance, prefers the dotted “O.K.” while the Associated Press stylebook favors the dotless “OK.” Garner’s Modern American Usage says all three are legit.

“Although OK predominates in highly informal contexts,” Garner says, “okay has an advantage in edited English: it more easily lends itself to cognate forms such as okays, okayer, okaying, and okayed.”

Yes, the two-letter version is an acronym. It stands for “oll korrect” or “orl korrect,” jocular 19th-century spellings of “all correct.” You may be surprised at how much has been written about this little two-letter word.

The etymologist and lexicographer Allen Walker Read, perhaps the world’s leading authority on OK-ness, wrote six articles about the subject in 1963 and 1964 in the journal American Speech.

Read, in his research, discovered that “o.k.” (it originally had lower-case letters and dots) was just one of many whimsical acronyms coined in the 19th century: “O.W.” for “oll wright,” “K.G.” for “know good,” “K.Y.” for “know yuse,” and so on.

The earliest known published reference for “OK” is from an 1839 editor’s note in the Boston Morning Post: “He … would have the ‘contribution box,’ o.k. – all correct – and cause the corks to fly, like sparks, upward.”

But soon after “OK” made its initial appearance (no pun intended), wordies began imagining that the initials stood for all sorts of other phrases.

An 1840 article in the Lexington Intelligencer, cited by the Oxford English Dictionary, includes several of these mythical phrases and suggests that the real one is a phony:

“Perhaps no two letters have ever been made the initials of as many words as O.K. … When first used they were said to mean Out of Kash, (cash;) more recently they have been made to stand for Oll Korrect, Oll Koming, Oll Konfirmed, &c. &c.”

Hugh Rawson, in his book Devious Derivations, lists 13 of the more interesting apocryphal sources of “OK,” including these: “Old Kinderhook” (President Martin Van Buren’s nickname), a Choctaw term hoke or okey, Oberst Kommandant (German for “colonel in command”), and a word for “good” in a West African language spoken by slaves in the American South.

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Q: What is the difference between the prefixes “a” and “un,” as in “apolitical” and “unpolitical”?

A: English has a vast supply of small negative prefixes: “a,” “de,” “dis,” “il,” “im,” “in,” “ir,” “mal,” “mis,” “non,” and “un.” (There are larger ones, too: “ante,” “anti,” “counter,” “contra,” and others.) Conventions for using them have developed over the years through common usage, rather than through a set of rules.

These little bits of negativity can be bewildering, especially to people learning English as a second language. We all know the difference between “misinformation” and “disinformation,” but often the distinction between negative pairs is more subtle.

“Irreligious” suggests a hostility to religion, while “nonreligious” means a lack of religion. “Amoral” means denying that there are moral distinctions, or not caring about right or wrong; “unmoral” and “nonmoral” mean unrelated to morality. And “illiterate” means unable to read and write, while “nonliterate” means without a written language.

Sometimes, however, there’s no difference (“defrocked” and “unfrocked” pop to mind), and that’s the case with “apolitical” and “unpolitical.”

The prefix “a” means not or without, and “un” means not or the opposite of. Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary (11th ed) defines “apolitical” as having no interest or involvement in political affairs, having an aversion to politics or political affairs, or having no political significance. M-W defines “unpolitical” as meaning “apolitical.”

In short, only the dictionary can tell you whether two negatives with the same stem but different prefixes mean the same thing or not.

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Q: The first grown-up I heard refer to his father as “my daddy” was Lyndon Johnson (I was new to America) and I took it to be a Texan thing until I noticed that it was common in the Southern states and in books by Southern writers – who could forget Big Daddy? For some years now, I’ve noticed that women who would not dream of calling their mothers “mommies” speak of their fathers as “daddies.” Comment, please?

A: The term “daddy” isn’t a Texan thing or a Southern thing or even an American thing. It’s an English thing that was around well before the days of Shakespeare.

The first published reference in the Oxford English Dictionary is from the Chester Mystery Plays, a cycle of biblical plays from the 15th and 16th centuries, and perhaps even earlier.

In The Death of Abel (circa 1500), the Cain character says, “As my daddye hath taughte yt me, / I will fulfill his lore.” And here’s a 1529 citation from the poet John Skelton: “Now God save these dadyes / And all ther yong babyes.”

The Chester plays, named for the town in Cheshire where they were performed, were banned as “Popery” by the Church of England during the Elizabethan era but they were revived in modern times.

I haven’t heard many grown-up women refer to their fathers as “daddies,” but perhaps those who do feel more free to act girlish with dads than with moms.

When I think of women and daddies, though, I think of Mary Martin singing that her heart belongs to her da-da-da, da-da-da, da-daddyah.

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Q: Your Aug. 14 and Sept. 4 posts about “house” and “home” brought on lively discussions of the subject chez nous. This in turn brought to mind an idiom my father used when I was young to complain about my appetite: “You’ll eat us out of house and home!” Now that I have a son of my own, I’m tempted to resurrect the saying, but I would love to know why the idiom-makers used “house” as well as “home”?

A: Why both words instead of just one or the other? I’d call it an example of poetic emphasis, but the Oxford English Dictionary uses a more scholarly term: alliterative strengthening.

Whatever you call it, you have to admit that a simple complaint like “You’re eating me out of house” or “You’re eating me out of home” just doesn’t carry the cumulative weight of “You’re eating me out of house and home.”

The message is that the teenage son or the visiting relatives or the guests that stay forever are eating so much that they threaten to ruin the host and use up all his worldly resources.

The OED calls the phrase “house and home” an alliterative strengthening of “home.” But I guess one might also describe it as a strengthening of “house.”

Shakespeare uses the phrase in Henry IV, Part II (1597), when Mistress Quickly complains about Falstaff: “He hath eaten me out of house and home; he hath put all my substance into that fat belly of his.”

But the phrase (or ones very like it) had been in use long before it found its way into Shakespeare. Here are some earlier examples cited in the OED.

Circa 1200: “Wif and children, hus and ham.”

1297: “He caste out of house & hom of men a gret route.”

1387: “Men of ye lond were i-dryve out of hir hous and hir home.”

1527: “The prayers of them that … eat the poor out of house and harbour.”

1576: “Hunted out of house and home.”

I hope I haven’t bored you out of house and home.

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Q: If one says “Your thoughts are welcomed,” why does one respond to “Thank you” with “You’re welcome,” not “You’re welcomed”?

A: In the sentences “Your thoughts are welcomed” and “You’re welcome,” the word “welcome” is being used in two different ways, as a verb in the first one and as an adjective in the second.

As a verb, “welcome” means to greet cordially or accept with pleasure. You might ask your doctor, for instance, “Do you welcome new patients,” and she might reply, “Yes, I welcome them” or “Yes, new patients are welcomed.”

Similarly, when you say, “Your thoughts are welcomed,” you’re using “welcome” as a verb (a past participle in this case).

On the other hand, in sentences like “I felt welcome” or “He’s welcome to visit” or “The rain was welcome” or “She gave welcome advice,” the word is an adjective meaning received gladly or giving pleasure.

It’s this adjectival sense that we use when we say “You’re welcome” in reply to “Thank you.”

Dictionaries don’t usually define the adjective “welcome” in this idiomatic usage. The Oxford English Dictionary, for example, describes “You’re welcome” simply as “a polite formula used in response to an expression of thanks.”

In case you missed it, a recent item on The Grammarphobia Blog discussed the history of “You’re welcome.”

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Q: How do you punctuate a sentence that ends with a question asked about a question? Example: Was it Tina who cried, “What next?” Is a second question mark required for the sentence itself? Does it go outside the final quotation marks?

A: If a sentence ends with a question within a question, you don’t need two question marks.

As for where the question mark goes – right after the final quotation marks or just inside – that depends on which question the writer wishes to emphasize.

In your example, I’d punctuate it, as you do, like this: Was it Tina who cried, “What next?” This is a close call, and some might prefer to do it the other way: Was it Tina who cried, “What next”?

The book Words Into Type (3d ed.), by Skillin, Gay, and others, gives these two examples, which I’ve simplified somewhat.

(1) Has it ever occurred to you that she might retort, “Dangerous for whom”?

(2) How many of you have heard the question, “Which is the more important, heredity or environment?”

You can see that the writer has chosen to emphasize the overall question in #1, and the interior question in #2.

You can apply the same principle to sentences that mix exclamations and questions. Which do you go with, the exclamation point or the question mark? I’ll invent examples of both:

(1) Did I just hear “Abandon ship!” (The exclamation is emphasized.)

(2) Why in heaven’s name did you shout, “Wake up”? (The question is emphasized.)

This is a matter of judgment, and forces the writer to stop and think a bit. But don’t use both marks.

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Q: Re your house/home post, I searched Google on the same subject, and had almost 19 million responses for “single family home” vs. only 2.5 million or so for “single family house.” One reason may be the influence of realtors (I don’t use the capital R and trademark symbol they demand) who prefer anything but “house” – “home,” “property,” “product,” “unit,” etc. But there’s also something else going on. I searched for the two words as the number of bedrooms increased, and found a clear preference for “house” over “home” when the size (and, thus, price) rose. Fascinating! I guess when you’ve got money, you don’t need to avoid a down-to-earth word and use one with airs. My attempt at scientific analysis!

A: This is fascinating stuff.

I think your conclusion is right. People with money aren’t hesitant to refer to their dwellings as houses – there may even be some reverse snobbery here.

Think of those humongous castles and mansions in Newport, RI, that their owners insist on calling cottages!

Understatement or reverse hyperbole becomes a form of snobbery: “We have a little place in the country,” said Commodore Vanderbilt.

On the other hand, someone who’s less secure financially (and perhaps less secure in other ways) avoids the no-nonsense word “house” and prefers the more affected term beloved of people who sell houses – excuse me, realtors.

It’s like the English-speaking social-climber who calls his table napkin a serviette.

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Q: From the “Makes Me Wanna Holler” file . . . the rampant misuse of the word “acronym” for “abbreviation.” The latest example? The official report about the collapse of 7 World Trade Center on 9/11 has a list of “acronyms and abbreviations” in which most of the former belong with the latter. Should we launch a campaign, have bumper stickers printed?

A: I like the subject line of your email. In fact, I like it so much that I’m borrowing it for the title of this blog item about the misuse of the word “acronym.”

Now, on to the subject at hand. Bumper stickers wouldn’t hurt, but I’m not sure they would do much good either. More and more people are using the word “acronym” loosely to refer to abbreviations.

Is this legit? Not exactly. An acronym is a kind of abbreviation, but not all abbreviations are acronyms. The Oxford English Dictionary defines an acronym as a word formed from the initial letters of other words.

Examples: “radar” (“radio detection and ranging”), “laser” (“light amplification by the stimulated emission of radiation”), “NATO” (“North Atlantic Treaty Organization”).

The key word in that definition is “word.” An acronym is an actual spoken word, while an abbreviation like “FBI,” “LA,” or “Fla.” is a shortened form of a word or phrase.

The American-Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (4th ed.) and Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary (10th ed.) have definitions similar to the one in the OED.

But here’s breaking news (at least for me): The latest edition of Merriam-Webster’s (the 11th) has added this meaning: “an abbreviation (as FBI) formed from initial letters.”

Although M-W notes that this new sense of “acronym” is less important than the more established one, I wouldn’t be surprised if it grows in importance in future editions of the dictionary.

The term “acronym,” formed from Greek words for tip and name, is relatively new. The first published reference in the OED is from a 1943 issue of the journal American Notes and Queries: “Words made up of initial letters or syllables of other words … called by the name acronym.”

I’d hate to lose this original meaning of the word. It’s clear, precise, and says something that no other word does. English is a democracy, however, and the majority rules. I have only one vote, but I cast it for calling an acronym an acronym.

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Q: Is it just me, or is the phrase “in order to” always worthless, with a simple “to” sufficing?

A: Not so fast. Although the phrase “in order to” is often a wordy way of saying “to,” it sometimes helps clarify a sentence where “to” alone can be ambiguous.

Merriam-Webster’s Dictionary of English Usage gives this example from a 1958 letter by James Thurber: “I had to borrow $2,500 from Elliot Nugent, and damn near left The New Yorker for Paramount Pictures in order to live.”

The full phrase makes it clear that Thurber meant he nearly went to work for Paramount to make enough money to live, not simply to live, say, in Beverly Hills.

Bryan Garner, in Garner’s Modern American Usage, says “in order to” is most often needed with an infinitive “when another infinitive is nearby in the sentence.”

Like you, many usage authorities have condemned ”in order to” as verbose, but the phrase has a long, respectable history.

In fact, the first published reference for it used before a verb is in the 1609 Douay-Rheims translation of the Old Testament, according to the Oxford English Dictionary:

“These are they that speak to Pharao, king of Egypt, in order to bring out the children of Israel from Egypt.”

A more recent reference, of course, can be found in the Preamble to the United States Constitution:

“We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.”

The OED also has citations, dating back to 1526, for “in order to” used with nouns and noun phrases to mean “with regard to,” “to bring about,” or “for the purpose of.”

This usage is now obsolete, but here’s a 16th-century example of the phrase used to mean “for the purpose of”: “The ryches of the worlde hath no goodness: but in order to man.”

Back to your question: “in order to” is definitely legitimate to clarify an ambiguous sentence. But even when clarity is not an issue, you should let your ear decide whether to use a simple verb or the whole enchilada. If you have a tin ear, however, keep it short.

I’ve had several blog items in the past about redundant (and not so redundant) expressions. Here’s the latest entry, which includes links to the others.

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Q: Which is correct: “Give it to whomever needs it” or “Give it to whoever needs it”? In other words, is “whomever” the object of the preposition “to,” or is it the subject of the verb “needs”? Or does it matter?

A: To answer your last question first, yes it does matter, especially in formal writing when your English should be at its best. (I’ll get to speech and informal writing later.)

The most important point to remember in this “who” vs. ”whom” business is that “who” (or “whoever”) does something to “whom” (or “whomever”). In other words, “who” is a subject like “he,” and “whom” is an object like “him.”

Although a preposition (a positioning word like “to”) is often followed by “whom” or “whomever,” that’s not always the case.

Sometimes a preposition is followed by a clause that begins with “who” or “whoever.” (A clause is a group of words with its own subject and verb.)

Here’s an example from my grammar book Woe Is I: “After the crap game, Nathan was confused about who owed him money.”

As for your first two questions, “whoever” is the subject of a clause, so the correct sentence is “Give it to whoever needs it.”

Again, this is for when you want your English to be at its best. In conversation and informal writing, “who” (or “whoever”) is gaining acceptance at the beginning of a sentence or a clause.

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Q: Please help. Endless frustration – unable to find where “knick,” the English slang term for prison, originated. Thanks so much.

A: Oops, it’s “nick,” not “knick.” That’s why you’re having so much trouble.

The Oxford English Dictionary says the use of the noun “nick” in the sense of a prison, especially one at a police station, is of Australian origin. The first published reference is from The Sydney Slang Dictionary (1882), which defines “the nick” as a “gaol.”

But that’s just the beginning of the story. The verb “nick” has been used since the 16th century in the sense of to trick, cheat, or defraud. The first reference in the OED is from a 1576 work by the English dramatist George Whetstone: “I neuer nickt the poorest of his pay, / But if hee lackt, hee had before his day.”

And the verb has been used since the 17th century to mean to catch unawares or apprehend. The earliest citation for this usage is from The Prophetess, a play from around 1640 by John Fletcher and Philip Massinger: “We must be sometimes wittie, to nick a knave.”

Since the early 19th century, the verb “nick” has also meant to steal or pilfer. Here’s an example from an 1826 collection of English and Scottish poems: “Some there ha’e gotten their pouches picket, / Their siller an’ their watches nickit.”

Last but not least, “Old Nick” (later “Nick”) has been a name for the Devil since the mid-17th century. The OED says there’s no convincing explanation of how “Nick” came to be associated with deviltry.

One theory, according to the dictionary, is that the name “Nick” comes from Machiavelli’s first name, Niccolò. Another theory is that “Nick” is a shortened form of “iniquity.”

Whatever the origin of this usage, it’s not surprising that a word with such shady connections should come to mean a place where shady characters are held by the police.

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Q: I have questions about “cannot” and “can not.” Is there a difference? If so, then how is each to be used? If not, which is the preferred usage?

A: The short answer is that you’ll almost always be right with one word and wrong with two.

The Oxford English Dictionary defines “cannot” as “the ordinary modern way of writing can not.”

There are only three situations in which it would be correct to separate the “can” and the “not”:

(1) when you want to emphasize “not”: “Maybe you can spend $500 for an opera ticket, but I most certainly can not.” (This would be better written as “… but I most certainly canNOT.”)

(2) when “not” is part of another expression (like “not only … but also”): “She can not only hit high C, but also break a glass while doing it.”

(3) when expressing an ability NOT to do something: “The true opera fanatic can not fall asleep even after six hours of Wagner.” (This is a rarely used construction. The idea would be better expressed as  “can stay awake.”)

Otherwise, the common convention in standard English is to use “can’t” in casual speech or writing, and “cannot” in formal writing.

Interestingly, this isn’t a particularly new usage. There are only five examples of “can not” in Shakespeare, according to RhymeZone’s Shakespeare search tool, but hundreds upon hundreds of “cannot” examples, like this one from King Claudius in Hamlet: “You cannot speak of reason to the Dane.”

In fact, “cannot” apparently showed up in English around 1400, according to the OED, while “can not” didn’t make its first appearance until 1451. And “cannot” appears far more often in the dictionary’s citations.

In Old English, the negative of the verb “can” was ne can, as in this excerpt, circa 1000, from the Gospel of Matthew: Ne can ic eow (“I cannot know you”).

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Q: During the Olympics, the father of a Canadian field hockey player said he’d accept any “credos” for being his son’s first coach. Obviously, he inadvertently melded “credit” and “kudos.” Is there a special term for this kind of conflation?

A: Yes, it’s called a portmanteau or portmanteau word (from the French-derived word for a large suitcase with two hinged compartments). Humpty Dumpty,
a k a Lewis Carroll, coined the term in Through the Looking-Glass and What Alice Found There (1871).

The first published reference in the Oxford English Dictionary is from a conversation in which Alice asks Humpty to explain “slithy” and other words in Carroll’s nonsense poem Jabberwocky. Here’s Humpty’s reply:

Well, “slithy” means “lithe and slimy.” “Lithe” is the same as “active.” You see it’s like a portmanteau – there are two meanings packed up into one word.

A few common portmanteau words that have made it into dictionaries are “brunch” (from “breakfast” + “lunch”), “motel” (“motor” + “hotel”), and “smog” (“smoke” + “fog”).

As for “credos,” it’s already in dictionaries, unblended, as the plural of “credo,” or creed. It comes from the Latin credo (“I believe”), the first word of the Apostles’ and Nicene Creeds.

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Q: What do you think about using “that” or “which” or “this” to refer to a general concept in a previous sentence or clause if there doesn’t seem to be any ambiguity? For example: “She learned to drive in England, which made it confusing when she came to the United States.”

A: I have no problem with this usage, and neither does Merriam-Webster’s Dictionary of English Usage. To summarize: “The use of pronominal this (and that, which, and it as well) to refer broadly to a preceding idea, topic, sentence, or paragraph … is considered quite respectable” (p. 903).

In fact, this usage is not only quite respectable now, but it has been since Anglo-Saxon days, according to the Oxford English Dictionary.

The OED has published references going back to around the year 893 for the pronoun “this” used in reference “to a fact, act, or occurrence, or a statement or question, mentioned or implied in the preceding context.”

You’d probably find it hard to read the Old English citations in the dictionary’s entry for “this” used as a demonstrative pronoun (a pronoun that points out something).

But here’s one from Lindley Murray’s influential English Grammar (1825): “Bodies which have no taste, and no power affecting the skin, may, notwithstanding this, act upon organs which are more delicate.”

As for “that,” the OED has published references for the usage from around 855. Here’s one from Shakespeare (Hamlet, Act III, scene 1) that I’m sure you’re familiar with: “To be, or not to be: that is the question.”

Finally, we come to the use of “which” to refer to a previous circumstance or situation. Although this usage isn’t quite as firmly established as the other two, the OED has citations going back to 1390, with examples from Shakespeare, Dickens, and Henry James.

Here’s a citation in Dickens’s Sketches by Boz (1836): “The two Miss Crumptons proceeded to the Adelphi at the appointed time next day, dressed, of course, in their best style, and looking as amiable as they possibly could – which, by-the-bye, is not saying much for them.”

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She’ll be on the Leonard Lopate Show around 1:20 P.M. Eastern time to discuss the English language and to take questions from callers.

Q: I once had a boss who insisted that “while” should be used only to indicate things that happen concurrently. Her favorite example of proper usage was “I looked on while the dog peed on the floor.” I didn’t argue, but I wondered if “while” was really incorrect when used in place of “although.”

A: The word “while” has been used since the 12th century to mean “during the time that” – the way your former boss insisted on using it.

But “while” has also been used since the 16th century to mean “although” or “whereas.” The Oxford English Dictionary defines this sense as meaning “at the same time that (implying opposition or contrast).”

According to the OED, this usage first appeared in print in Shakespeare’s Love’s Labour’s Lost (1588), where Biron says to Ferdinand: “As, painfully to pore upon a book / To seek the light of truth; while truth the while / Doth falsely blind the eyesight of his look.”

The first “while” in the example above means although or whereas, and the second means at the same time. Since “while” can have different meanings, you have to be careful that you’re not using it ambiguously. Here’s a caveat from my grammar book Woe Is I:

“If you use while in place of although, be sure there’s no chance it could be misunderstood to mean ‘during the time that.’ You could leave the impression that unlikely things were happening at the same time, as in: While Dopey sleeps late, he enjoys vigorous exercise. Only if Dopey is a sleepwalker!”

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Q: I was taught to use “so” rather than “as” at the beginning of a negative comparison like the one in this sentence: “She’s not so tall as her sister.” Is this rule to be abandoned? Please tell me that it has not gone the way of “None of them is here,” meaning “Not one of them is here.”

A: It’s perfectly acceptable to use either “as … as” or “so … as” in negative constructions, according to modern usage guides. Merriam-Webster’s Dictionary of English Usage, for example, says a writer “can choose the one that sounds better in any given instance.”

This isn’t a new thing, either. Writers have been using “as … as” as well as “so … as” in negative statements since the 18th century. Merriam-Webster’s says the usage can be found in the writings of Swift, Johnson, Boswell, and others.

In 1785, a grammarian named J. Mennye decreed that only “so … as” could be used in negative expressions. Although the idea caught on with language authorities, writers continued to use whichever construction sounded best to them. In fact, some writers used both of them.

In 1795, the historian Henry Adams used “so … as” in a negative comparison of 13th-century cathedrals and 15th-century chateaus. But he used “as … as” negatively a year later: “The Church never was as rotten as the stock-exchange now is.”

It wasn’t until well into the first half of the 20th century that usage guides began to accept “as … as” in negative expressions, according to Merriam-Webster’s.

Today, that’s the view of the leading usage guides, including Garner’s Modern American Usage, The New Fowler’s Modern English Usage, and Merriam-Webster’s.

Interestingly, both “as” and “so” are derived from the same Old English word, alswa, which was used in comparisons eight or more centuries ago pretty much the way we use “as” these days: alswa brihht alswa gold (as bright as gold).

As for “none,” many people have been mistakenly taught that it always means “not one.” Not so! I discuss this misconception on the Grammar Myths page of Grammarphobia.com.

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Q: I believe language is always changing, and the rules of English are changing too. But is it OK now to use the verb “suspect” in place of “expect”?

A: Yes and no. It all depends on how the word is used.

The verb “suspect” can mean (1) to distrust, (2) to imagine to be true, or (3) to believe guilty without proof.

The verb “expect” can (among other things) mean (1) to anticipate, (2) to consider probable or true, (3) to suppose, or (4) to be pregnant.

If the words are being used in sense 2, then “suspect” and “expect” are pretty much interchangeable: “I suspect [or expect] that the etching is not a genuine Rembrandt.”

It strikes me that “suspect,” when used in sense 2, suggests something negative. But neither The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (4th ed.) nor Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary (11th ed.) seems to agree with me.

The Oxford English Dictionary, though, makes note of this negative association. It says the verb “suspect” has been used to mean “expect” since the early 16th century, usually in the sense of anticipating something dreadful.

In a 1509 allegorical poem cited by the OED, for example, a knight prepares to do battle against a fierce giant: “Makynge me redy, for I did suspecte / That the great gyaunte unto me wolde hast.”

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Q: English is my second language and I really love it, but I can’t understand some things. For example, I don’t see the point of this song lyric: “You’re everything but mine.” Does it mean “You’re all mine” or “You’re everything but not mine”? I checked my grammar notes and I couldn’t find an explanation of this usage of the conjunction “but.” I need help..

A: I can see why you’re confused. “But” is a tricky little word that can be either a conjunction or a preposition. As a conjunction, it expresses opposition or contradiction. As a preposition, it means, among other things, except.

In that lyric from the Backstreet Boys’ song “Everything But Mine,” it can be a conjunction or a preposition, depending on how you look at the sentence.

If it’s a conjunction, the Backstreet Boys are saying, “You’re everything, but you’re not mine.” (The words “you’re not” are understood though not actually present.)

If it’s a preposition, the group is saying, “You’re everything except mine.” (In other words, “You’re everything with the exception of being mine.)

By the way, the word “but” has been both a conjunction and a preposition for a thousand years or more. Which came first? The preposition.

I hope this helps!

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[Note: An updated post about “jury-rigged,” “jerry-rigged,” and “jerry-built” appeared on the blog on Dec. 13, 2019.]

Q: Help me, Rhonda! I am so tired of coming across the term “jerry-rigged.” Writers great and small, learned and not so learned, constantly get this wrong. The term is either “jury-rigged,” referring to a makeshift emergency repair, or “jerry-built,” meaning thrown together with whatever’s handy. These terms are not the same.

A: I don’t think Rhonda will be of much help on this one.

The term “jerry-rigged” has already made it into both The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (4th ed.) and Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary (11th ed.) – without any warning labels.

American Heritage says  the verb “jerry-rig” is an alteration of “jury-rig” influenced by “jerry-build.” Merriam-Webster’s says the participial adjective “jerry-rigged” is probably a blend of “jury-rigged” and “jerry-built.” Thus language changes.

In fact, this “new” jury-rigged (or jerry-built) phrase isn’t all that new. It’s been with us since 1896, according to our searches of old newspaper databases, and means built in a crude or improvised manner.

Of the three expressions, “jury-rigged” is by far the oldest, with roots going back to the early 17th century, when a “jury-mast” was a temporary mast put up to replace one that was broken or carried away, according to the Oxford English Dictionary.

The earliest published reference in the OED for “jury-rigged” is in a 1788 travel book: “The ships to be jury rigged: that is, to have smaller masts, yards, and rigging, than would be required for actual service.” (Merriam-Webster’s has an earlier example from 1782 on its website.)

The writer used the expression as a passive verb.  To “jury-rig” now means to improvise or do something in a makeshift way.

The language sleuth Hugh Rawson, in his book Devious Derivations, lists eight of the more imaginative theories about the origin of “jerry-built,” including suggestions that “jerry” refers to the biblical walls of Jericho, the prophet Jeremiah, or German soldiers.

I’m not ready to use “jerry-rigged” myself, but with 56,000 hits on Google, it’s holding its own with “jerry-built” (79,000) and “jury-rigged” (123,000).

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Q: Would the adjective be “feverous” of “feverish” in these lines from a poem I’m writing: “tree branches wave arms / cooling the feverous spell”? The meaning is hot, as in the weather.

A: I’d stick with “feverous” if I were you. It’s perfectly legitimate for a poet to use an unusual, off-beat, or archaic adjective in a passage like that one.

Although “feverous” isn’t common in current usage, it was once used routinely and interchangeably with “feverish.” Both “feverous” and “feverish” first appeared in print (in fact, in the same book) in 1398, according to the Oxford English Dictionary.

The OED defines “feverous” as “ill of fever; affected by fever” or “apt to cause a fever.” Shakespeare used it in Measure for Measure (1603), where Isabella says to Claudio: “I quake, lest thou a feavorous life shouldst entertaine.”

The latest citations in the OED are all from the 19th century. Here’s Tennyson, in a line from a sickbed scene in his poem “Enoch Arden” (1864): “After a night of feverous wakefulness.”

“Feverish” was used the same way as “feavorous” for the first few hundred years, but in the 1630s “feaverish” gained a figurative meaning: “excited, fitful, restless, now hot now cold.”

It may be that this added dimension is responsible for its eventual domination over “feverous,” which is now rarely used. (“Feverous” doesn’t appear at all in The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, 4th ed. It’s listed in Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary, 11th ed., simply as meaning “feverish.”)

So if you’d like to give your poem an archaic flavor and restrict the meaning to “hot,” then “feverous” would be appropriate. “Feverous” merely means hot, though “feverish” has that added meaning of restless and fitful. (The author of the poem is Merilee Kaufman.)

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Q: My daughter is now a Shakespeare professor. She credits me for her love of language, which gives me nakhes. You know that Yiddishism, I assume?

A: Yes, but I’ve usually seen it spelled naches. I love Leo Rosten’s advice on how to pronounce it: like a Scot would pronounce “Loch Ness” (more or less).

It means, as you know, proud pleasure, particularly that special joy a parent gets from the achievements of a child.

The linguist James A. Matisoff describes naches (he spelled is nakhes like you) as “one of the richest of all life’s treasures.” He says it’s “a peculiarly Jewish concept that is as hard to render in English as Chinese xiào (which usually gets translated as ‘filial piety’).”

Matisoff, in his book Blessings, Curses, Hopes, and Fears: Psycho-Ostensive Expressions in Yiddish, discusses the kind of childhood accomplishments that can give a parent pleasure:

“As far as nakhes-providing potential goes, anything may be an ‘accomplishment’ (growing one’s permanent teeth, becoming bar-mitsve, marrying a Jewish spouse, playing the violin for company, etc.).”

A Shakespeare professor, that’s an accomplishment. Mazel tov!

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Q: I’m usually a pretty good writer at school, but for some reason I always use “worse” when I should use “worst” and vice versa. I’m not sure why I do that, but do you know any rules or tricks that would make it easier for me to remember?

A: The words “bad” … “worse” … “worst” are parallel to their opposites: “good” … “better”… “best.” It might help to think of them this way.

Another way is to remember that “worse” (like “better”) is what’s known as a “comparative,” a term used to compare things. It’s the comparative form of “bad.” So, one thing can be “worse” than another (or a group of other things).

But “worst” (like “best”) is what’s known as a “superlative” term. It’s the superlative form of “bad.” It measures one thing against all others and finds it the “worst” of the lot.

I hope this helps!

Before I leave this subject, I’d like to discuss an idiomatic expression seen in many guises, including “if worse comes to worse,” “if worse comes to worst,” and “if worst comes to worst.”

The expression began life in the 16th century as “if the worst come to the worst,” and it meant roughly “if the worst thing were to happen in the worst way.”

The earliest published reference in the Oxford English Dictionary is from 1597, but here’s a later, more interesting one from a 1667 Dryden comedy: “Why, if the worst come to the worst, he leaves you an honest woman.”

The Mavens’ Word of the Day, a Random House website, has examples of the “worst/worst” version from the works of Fielding, Charlotte Brontë, Mark Twain, and H.G. Wells.

The earliest citation in the OED for the “worse/worst” expression is from Defoe’s 1719 novel Robinson Crusoe: “If worse came to the worst, I could but die.”

Merriam-Webster’s Dictionary of English Usage speculates that the “worse/worst” variant is the result of a “desire to make the phrase more logical.” But since when do idiomatic phrases have to be logical?

Nowadays, the two most common versions are “if worse comes to worse” and “if worst comes to worst.” A distant third, we find after a bit of googling, is “if worse comes to worst.”

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Q: As a musician, I’m truly bugged when I hear sophisticated music hosts on NPR pronounce “prelude” as PREL-yude. The correct pronunciation should be PRAY-lood. The “yude” version is the fingernails on the blackboard for me!

A: I’m very sorry to hear that NPR music hosts are using the pretentious (to my ear) pronunciation of “prelude” as PREL-yude. I’m not surprised, though, since dictionaries accept that pronunciation. EEK!

In fact, the first pronunciations in both The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (4th ed.) and Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary (11th ed.) are “yude” versions.

Well, I don’t care what the dictionaries say. Anybody who says PREL-yude went to an elocution school for twits.

The English word “prelude,” which was borrowed directly from the French prélude in the 16th century, refers to a musical or other introduction. It ultimately comes from the Latin praeludere (to play before): this combines the prefix prae (before) and ludere (to play).

According to my old unabridged Webster’s New International Dictionary (2nd ed.) from 1954, the second syllable was originally pronounced “lood” (yes, including the letter l). The pronunciation PREL-yude is a case of sloppy syllabification, if you ask me.

In case you’re interested, the Oxford English Dictionary‘s first published reference for the word “prelude” is in a 1548 English translation of Erasmus’s writings on the Gospel of Mark: “They shall only be preludes of the ende [that] is to come.”

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