Alright Is All Right by Me

Fighting about all right and alright? Kiss and make up. I’m here to help.

A huffy and angry Warriner in English Composition and Grammar (1988) warns, “There is no such word as alright.”

Harrumph. So there. It doesn’t exist.

Yeah, but, everyone’s writing it that way.

Let’s check another source, this one from 1998. My rock Gardener (who has never once thanked me for all the accolades I throw in his direction) proclaims: “Alright for all right has never been accepted as standard in AmE. Still, the one-word spelling may be coming into acceptance in BrE.”

Oh, dear. The master might lose his adoring student (that’s me) over this matter. So, off I run to the Oxford English Dictionary and, sure enough, the Brits are not at all put off by alright. However, they do direct the seeker as follows: “Adjective, adverb & noun. See all right.”

Oxford adds, “The spelling alright is often considered erroneous, but cf. analogous already, although, etc.”

And so I do.

I think it’s all right to allow alright to fly free. I know this is the right decision, because MS Word’s grammar check doesn’t put a cautionary red line under the word. Mind you, you're hearing this from a prescriptivist. (MS Word doesn't approve the word prescriptivist.)