Here's the December 2024 column:

 The War on Words

A monthly column in which we attempt, however futilely, to defend the English language against misuse and abuse

By Bob Yearick

Where Are the Editors?

• In a Jeff Neiburg story in The Philadelphia Inquirer, there was this two-fer subhead: “Who’s stock rose and who’s stock fell after the Eagles’ win over the Jaguars?” In both instances, it should be whose – the possessive. Who’s is a contraction for who is.

• And the WDEL website delivered this two-fer, according to Dr. Neil Kaye: “‘It exasperates the problems that we have with providing water and sewage services,’ Councilman Suchanec said when explaining his no vote on the car wash, adding that the extra sewage water would lead to extra costs for the city when its sent to New Castle County.” Problems are exacerbated, which exasperates people. And its is the possessive. Needed here: it’s – the contraction for it is. 

• A reader spotted a principals/principles problem in Sarah Mueller's article on the WHYY website: “For five years, Snyder-Hall headed the nonprofit organization devoted to principals including government accountability and transparency.” Those are principles; they are not heads of schools.

• The News-Journal recently published an obituary that described the male decedent as “a proud alumnae of Salesianum.” That is impossible in three ways: Sallies is an all-boys school and alumnae is the plural for female graduates. A male grad is an alumnus. 

• Reader Joan Burke spotted this murky sentence in “Outdoor Delaware” on the DNREC website: “McAvoy noted that rare plants and insects can frequently be found by Atlantic white cedars.” Substituting near or the somewhat old-fashioned hard by for by in the sentence would help dispel the implication that rare plants and insects are frequently discovered by white cedars. 

Department of Redundancies Dept.

• Reader Rick Straitman submits this Axios headline: “Harris calls Trump to concede election loss as Biden congratulates both candidates.” Conceding implies losing.

• This chyron appeared on NBC during the presidential campaign: “Voters focus in on the economy.” It’s not enough for them to focus; they must focus in. Incidentally, although it's usually used generically, chyron (pronounced KIE-ron) actually comes from the name of the corporation whose software enables television producers to add those crawling words, phrases, and images to their broadcasts. 

• Leah Reis-Dennis, Audacy’s vice president of podcast content strategy and business development, said this to The Inky: “I do think we have a big opportunity now, in this kind of cultural zeitgeist moment around women in sports. . .” Zeitgeist: the general intellectual, moral, and cultural climate of an era. 

• Matt Hayes, in USA TODAY: “Colorado . . . beat Baylor in overtime with the help of a prayer of a Hail Mary at the end of regulation.” A Hail Mary is, by definition, a prayer.

Literally of the Month

According to reader John McDermott, The Inky reported that Villanova basketball coach Kyle Neptune said point guard Jhamir Brickus can read ball screens “literally perfectly.” 

Fun fact: Dictating the past tense of to lead – led – into your iPhone will result in the misspelled lead – something many newspapers can relate to.

Term of the Month

Stalking horse

This metaphor is often used to describe situations where someone or something is used as a front for another person’s true intentions. For example, in politics, one candidate may be put forward as a stalking horse to test public opinion before another, stronger candidate enters the race. In some instances, the person who is the stalking horse may not know he or she is playing that role.

Buy The War on Words book at the Hockessin BookShelf, at Huxley & Hiro Booksellers on Market Street, or on Amazon. 

NEED A SPEAKER FOR YOUR GROUP? Contact me at ryearick@comcast.net for a fun and informative discussion on grammar. 

Random Thoughts

Delaware Today: Check out the current issue. Great cover story by Editor-in-Chief Maria Hess on MasterChef Jennifer Behm. The EIC has an entertaining style that keeps your attention till the end. Also, see Mark Nardone's piece on Jim Martin, who finds housing for recovering alcoholics and drug addicts. And check the letters to the editor. A familiar name mentioned there.

WDEL 1150 AM: Al Mascitti is the smartest person in the room. He's on weekddays from 9:07 to noon. He's liberal (hey, I said he was smart, right?), and tres ascerbic, but if you want some straight talk that is as objective as possible, try to tune in. I know it's tough if you're working, but . . .

Another paison, Mike Missannelli, is owed a debt of gratitude by all of us. Why? Because he hastened the retirement of Howard Eskin -- Beelzebub, El Diablo, He Who's Name Cannot Be Spoken. Mikey Miss is on 97.5 The Fanatic from 2 to 6 p.m. weekdays, and he beat "King" Eskin in the ratings among the most desirable demographic (you youngsters out there). He loves Philly teams, but he's fair and incisive. Oh, did I mention that he's a Penn State grad? Played baseball for the Nits.

Loaning money; whatever happened to lending money?

Penn State uniforms, contrasted to other crazy designs

The War on Words

 

I love the Language-Change Index in Garner’s Modern American Usage. The purpose of the index is to measure how widely accepted various linguistic innovations have become. Generally, acceptance of these “innovations” is exceedingly slow, which is fine with me, a true prescriptivist.

 

There are five stages to the acceptance of a new meaning for a word. Bryan Garner yesterday published examples of the five stages. They are listed below, with my comments appended.  

 

Stage 1 ("rejected"): A new form emerges as an innovation (or a dialectal form persists) among a small minority of the language community, perhaps displacing a traditional usage (e.g.: *"lended" for "lent"). “Lended”? Really? C’mon, people, only in deepest Appalachia is this uttered.

Stage 2 ("widely shunned"): The form spreads to a significant fraction of the language community but remains unacceptable in standard usage (e.g.: *"real trooper" for "real trouper"). Have seen this. It’s not uncommon. Hoping it will remain at Stage 2.

Stage 3 ("widespread but . . ."): The form becomes commonplace even among many well-educated people but is still avoided in careful usage (e.g.: "usage" misused for "use"). Sorry, folks, but I have been guilty of this myself a few times, but it is an affectation.

Stage 4 ("ubiquitous but . . ."): The form becomes virtually universal but is opposed on cogent grounds by a few linguistic stalwarts (die-hard snoots) (e.g.: *"is comprised of" for "comprises"). I am a stickler about this, but you do see it in some respected publications. Remember, the whole comprises the parts. So, “The team comprises 24 distinct personalities.”

Stage 5 ("fully accepted"): The form is universally accepted (not counting pseudo-snoot eccentrics) (e.g.: "daylight-savings time" for "daylight-saving time"). I made a point of this in an early column, pointing out that the phrase had nothing to do with money – “savings” – so it is daylight-saving time. And, prescriptivist that I am, I’m sticking to that. And, incidentally, I resent the “pseudo-snoot eccentric” label.

 

And another thing . . .

 

            Today a reader sent a note calling out the Wilmington News Journal (again). In the local section, she spotted this: “Sleet eluded to potential difficulties if government . . .” This is the sign of a writer who reads very little, or who reads very little edited material. To the ear, “alluded” (the proper word here) sounds like “eluded” (meaning, of course, escaped), and the under-read not surprisingly might spell it that way. The authors, according to my reader, were Esteban Parra and Sean O’Sullivan. My money’s on the latter as the culprit, but an editor should have caught it. Amazing.

 

Got a comment or suggestion? Drop me a note at ryearick@comcast.net.

USEAGE/USAGE

Got a comment from a reader about my misspelling usage as useage. Can only say mea culpa. Thought I ran spellcheck on that post.
      Incidentally, my website is now up and running, so I'll be doing most of my posts there. See thewaronwords.com.

ANNOYING PEOPLE

TOP THREE
       Continuing the theme of lists, here are my picks for the most annoying people:
1. Howard Eskin. For those not in the larger Philadelphia area, he is (was) a sports talk radio host who recently was forced off his afternoon drive show because he was losing the ratings war to a rival. Eskin is the most egotistical, abrasive, crude radio personality I have ever heard.
2. Donald Trump. Another egotist who unfortunately did not run for president, as he threatened to do. I say unfortunately because he would have been eviscerated.
3. Ann Coulter. The conservative talker and columnist who, among other things, claimed that 9/11 widows were trying to profit from their husbands' sacrifice. Describes herself as "a mean-spirited, bigoted conservative." I couldn't agree more. Oh, and she dresses like a hooker.
     Wanna add to my list?

Even More Movies

As promised, here are more favorites, these from Joe M., in no particular order. These include one that has yet to be released (although the European version came out early this year). Again, those I agree with and were not on my list are boldfaced.



1) The Sound of Music

2) Silence of the Lambs

3) Bridge Over the River Kwai

4) Blues Brothers

5) Raiders of the Lost Ark

6) Jaws

7) Witness

8) Steel Magnolias

9) The Magnificent Seven

10) Forrest Gump

11) Godfather

12) Lawrence of Arabia

13) Airplane

14) Dances with Wolves

15) Rocky

16) Lonesome Dove

17) Gone with the Wind

18) Blazing Saddles

19) Pretty Woman

20) Stalag 17

21) Animal House

22) Alien

23) The Great Escape

24) The Shawshank Redemption

25) ET

26) The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (soon to be released)

Movies, Continued

A Matter of Opinion

My list of movies has prompted a couple of responses, all via email since people continue to find it difficult to get into the blog to comment. Son Steven in particular has an extensive list, some of which I agree with (indicated by boldface) and should have included on my list:

1.     Pulp Fiction

2. Rocky (if only the fight scenes had been more realistic. Have never seen a man take such a beating and get back up -- and with such a display of spastic, over-acting energy!)

3. Star Wars or Empire Strikes Back

4. The Hustler

5. Road to Perdition

6. Forrest Gump

7. Scarface

8. Goodfellas

9. Casablanca (how did I overlook this?)

10. The Departed

11. Reservoir Dogs

12. The Green Mile (I know, a lot of Tom Hanks)

13. Full Metal Jacket

14. Independence Day

15. Ocean’s Eleven (the new version) and, I would add, Ocean's 12

16. No Country for Old Men -- definitely; and a great book

17. The Wizard of Oz

18. Kill Bill (Vol. 1 & 2)

19. Million Dollar Baby

20. Westside Story

 

Only two comedies in your list? How about some great comedies:

21. Office Space

22. Clerks

23. Airplane!

24. Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery

25. Vacation or Christmas Vacation

Steven's beloved spouse, DJ, adds A STAR IS BORN – Barbara Streisand & Kris Kristofferson version, and THE LION KING, and suggests we need a few chick flicks. OK, how about Crazy, Stupid Love?

And I'd like to add another I overlooked: Babel, from about four or five years ago.

A friend promises to send his list later tonight.

Language
Can't do a posting without a language reference. Over at Spark, a Wilmington News Journal publication, the apostrophe fairy was loose, leaving random droppings. One of them wound up at the end of noggin, a synonym for head, as in "keep your noggin' warm . . ." Guess they think the actual word is "nogging." Once again, they would be wrong.