How valid can a rule be if nobody knows or cares about it anymore?<\/p>\n
That all depends on what the definition of \u201cnobody\u201d is. A lot of people I\u2019ve been around seem to feel \u201cnobody\u201d applies to just about everybody 15-plus years younger or older than they are. Generational outcasts\u2014the nerds, wonks, and misfits\u2014also get labeled nobodies, although some of them grow up to be the next Steve Jobs, Bill Gates, and Mark Zuckerberg.<\/p>\n
In many circles, alas, nobody is more of a nobody than a grammar geek\u2014those verbal neat freaks with all their precious little rules. But if those of us who rail against diseased English shut up and went away, we like to believe the world would soon miss us. Amid the rampant demagoguery and disinformation, our guiding principle is sound: clarity and precision are worth the bother.<\/p>\n
Here is a short list of increasingly ignored fine distinctions:<\/p>\n
Transpire\u00a0<\/strong> The errant celebrity issued a statement through his attorney that he was \u201csorry and saddened over what transpired.\u201d Make it \u201csorry and saddened over what happened<\/em>.\u201d Put a big shot together with his lawyer and brace yourself for pompous verbiage. This usage of transpire<\/em>, though common, is a lethal combination: pretentious and incorrect. The word doesn\u2019t mean occur<\/em> or happen<\/em>. Something that transpires<\/em> is revealed or becomes known over time. It\u2019s not simply what happened so much as what it all means in the bigger picture. The Oxford online dictionary gives this example: \u201cIt transpired that millions of dollars of debt had been hidden in a complex web of transactions.\u201d<\/p>\n Condone vs. endorse\u00a0<\/strong> \u201cI do not endorse or otherwise condone this,\u201d intoned some anonymous official. Isn\u2019t \u201ccondone\u201d redundant in that sentence? Not at all\u2014there\u2019s a substantial difference: When you endorse<\/em> something, you\u2019re all for it; you\u2019re proud to recommend it. To condone <\/em>is to pardon, overlook, disregard. When you condone, there\u2019s not much enthusiasm or pride involved. Someone who condones is being tolerant, not enthusiastic.<\/p>\n Persnickety\u00a0<\/strong> It\u2019s a colloquial term for \u201ctoo particular or precise.\u201d (Some would say it describes people who maintain that convince<\/em> and persuade<\/em> aren\u2019t synonyms.) How\u2019s this for world-class persnickety: there are nitpickers who reject the word in favor of pernickety<\/em>, which preceded persnickety<\/em> by about a century.<\/p>\n Substitute vs. replace\u00a0<\/strong> \u201cThe chef substituted chocolate with carob in the brownie recipe.\u201d Make that \u201creplaced<\/em> chocolate with carob\u201d or \u201csubstituted carob for<\/em> chocolate.\u201d Don\u2019t confuse the two or you\u2019ll end up with shaky English to go with those ghastly carob brownies.<\/p>\n \u2014Tom Stern<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" How valid can a rule be if nobody knows or cares about it anymore? That all depends on what the definition of \u201cnobody\u201d is. A lot of people I\u2019ve been around seem to feel \u201cnobody\u201d applies to just about everybody 15-plus years younger or older than they are. Generational outcasts\u2014the nerds, wonks, and misfits\u2014also get […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[10,12,51],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2386","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-definitions","category-effective-writing","category-vocabulary"],"acf":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.grammarbook.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2386"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.grammarbook.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.grammarbook.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.grammarbook.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.grammarbook.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2386"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.grammarbook.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2386\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.grammarbook.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2386"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.grammarbook.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2386"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.grammarbook.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2386"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}