An ESL speaker has two questions about the following construction: …I was startled to hear a local radio announcer refer to a contest for artists to submit designs to paint “murals” on storm drains. Question 1 Can you, please, explain to me why the construction calls for the plural form of the verb “refer” rather … Read more
A reader writes: I keep seeing this: “lacked considerably behind” when what is meant is “lagged considerably behind.” When I went looking, I also found many examples of lacking where the context calls for lagging. Here are a few: Incorrect: Bad WPO ranking on most pages [are] lacking behind the top US healthcare sites Correct: … Read more
A reader asks to know the difference between jury-rigged and jerry-rigged. Of the two, the older term is jury-rigged, a nautical term dating from the days of sail. Because they were often damaged in storms, sailing ships carried a spare mast called the jury-mast. Apart from scholarly speculation, the etymology of jury in this context … Read more
A plaintive email from a reader has prompted this post on these two misused and abused rhyming verbs: “A new civil trial…is poised to wreck havoc on the 100-year-old institution’s reputation.” Shouldn’t that be wreak? And shouldn’t “My interest was peaked” be “My interest was piqued”? I see that everywhere it seems. Though peaked might … Read more
A reader asks if there’s a difference between the adverbs anywhere and any place. According to The Chicago Manual of Style, the word anywhere: is preferred when referring to an indefinite location (my keys could be anywhere). But any place (two words) is narrower when you mean “any location” (they couldn’t find any place to … Read more
The rule that plural nouns ending in s form the possessive by adding only an apostrophe is well understood. For example: the babies’ beds the writers’ laptops the witnesses’ testimony The rule that nouns singular in meaning but ending in s also form the possessive by adding an apostrophe is perhaps not so well understood. … Read more
A reader laments the confusion between these two words: Here in the United States anyway, people are constantly using the word “podium” (what you stand on) to refer to the “lectern” (what you stand behind). The reverse, not so much. Confusing these two words erodes the richness of the language. We’re on the verge of … Read more
A reader wonders about the expression “to have a ways to go”: I thought this was just a California quirk and a recent one at that, but I found it used by Dashiel Hammet in one of his stories, so it has been used for nearly a century. He was of course a California writer, … Read more
Before computing added new meanings to the word hack, the meaning I associated most commonly with it was “a writer who churns out unimaginative writing for hire.” This use of the word hack derives from the horse rental industry. Hack is the shortened form of hackney, a word that entered English from French haquenée, “a … Read more
I heard someone on the radio refer to a particular group of people as being “a law into themselves.” The only version of this idiom that I’m familiar with is “a law unto themselves.” The expression derives from Romans 2:14. Numerous English translations of the Bible render the phrase as “a law unto themselves,” but … Read more
An editor points out the expendability of the word different: I often come across unnecessary words my writers insist on using. My current pet peeve is the word “different” when talking about multiple locations. Is there any instance when “different” would be necessary when talking about a specific number of multiples? The editor is thinking of … Read more
When the medical examiner on a television drama announced that a death had been ruled a homicide, I used to think homicide was the same as murder. I now know that the words are not synonymous. Homicide is the killing of a human being by another human being. The word derives from the Latin compound … Read more