Literally Malapropary

John Gardner’s Dictionary of Modern Usage lists a series of “vogue words” (pg.682) that include expressions such as bottom line and lifestyle and worst-case scenario” In fact, he could have extended the list to include a few hundred additional lexical trendyisms. I mean if we dialogue in any given environment, we’d all interface in a meaningful way, right? It’s a no-brainer, a win-win situation whose parameters would resonate with a synergy that would definitely impact our cutting-edge society in a constructive way.

Darn! He didn’t include literally on the list. Oh, well. I’ll just fill that one in here. And, now, fresh from the medium of television, some literally unliteral lexical malapropisms:

When I heard the news, it literally blew my mind. (And yet she continues to sit up and speak.)

It’s a literal can of worms. (In Washington? Okay, maybe it is.)

Looking out over the desert, it’s a literal ocean of sand. (Well, I guess this could pass as a metaphor; but, I say an ocean should remain an ocean and a desert should remain a desert.)

The crowd was silent, literally crying, “Foul!” (Some trick.)

He’s so awesome, I was like literally dying. (And then what happened?)

“There’s a pool of blood under the tarp literally covering the body.” (Those tarps are always so literal.)

The audience literally walked out of the auditorium. (How would you suggest that they walk out?)

Why don't I avoid regular television programming? (Literally speaking, of course.)

I Sanction That: Or Do I?

A friend of mine resents the confounding ambiguity of the word “sanction.”

“Well, just avoid using the word,” I suggest. No, that’s not reasonable. He wants to find the guilty party who started this mess.

So, I promise to do a little research on the matter. All the word-history websites offer the same explanation, verbatim, and without references, so I won’t repeat it here. In my own words, this is the sad little story.

Let’s start with our lexical stepmother and a very kind one at that—Latin. “Sanction” comes from the Latin sancio (sacire sanxi sanctum), meaning “to consecrate or make hallow by a religious act” (Cassell’s Latin Dictionary). According to The Free Dictionary online, the first use of “sanction” appears in the 1500s, but try as I might, I couldn’t find the actual quotation. However, it was used in reference to “law,” or “decree.”

Evidently, during the 100 years or so that followed, the word did a little twisting and turning and came to refer to “the penalty enacted to cause one to obey a law or decree” (cf the Free Dictionary, which gives no references, so who knows how true this is).

Since we get most of our lexicon—that is, our classy lexicon, our big words—directly from French rather than indirectly from Latin, I went hunting on the Web for current French usage and discovered a conference titled “Sanctionner sans punir” (to sanction without punishment), which means the French use “sanction” to mean “to prohibit. An article in a French journal is titled “Il faut sanctionner le négationnisme.” Again, the word is used to mean “prohibit.”

I skimmed numerous French-language blogs in which "sanction" was synonymous with "prohibit" and was about to close the book on the matter when ambiguity showed its tragicomic face in a reference to Robespierre, which translates as follows: “Robespierre never sanctioned the French Revolution.”

Well, did he or didn’t he? I need a good historian to answer that one. As one of its leaders, he certainly wasn’t against it, but since he first profited by it and then lost his head to it, I don’t know whether he neglected to prohibit it or neglected to give it his okay. Alas. So the French have the same problem. So do the Italians with “sanzione.” Sere can we lay the blame?

Well, we all know what happens when lawyers get their claws into language. They spin it and twirl it and create all sorts of knots that leave the rest of us in a state of confusion too much to bear. So, we give up and let the lawyers have their way with us and with our language. My theory is that sanction, originally a clear little noun to mean a law sanctified by the church or some religious order, became clouded after it was turned into a verb by all those fancy sycophants who hang around government buildings and make their living playing with language in order to protect their guilty clients from evil truth—lawyers. And, since we can’t beat them at this game, my advice stands: simply refuse to use the word.

The touch of irony here is that my friend has no problem using the expression “you guys” when he’s talking to groups of men and women. I always have to ask him if he’s talking to the women as well as to the men. And he thinks I go too far and should “get a life,” a remark I consider unsanctionable.

Diction, My Dear. Diction.

I still haven’t figured out how to shrug and walk away when I’m surprised by little linguistic thuds dropped by people who should know better. It’s okay if regular folks commit grammatical and lexical sins. In fact, I like the way their lexical and grammatical diversions stretch the language, make it more alive, more touchable, more powerful even.

But when newscasters say things like, “he paid the ultimate sacrifice” (one sacrifices; one doesn’t pay a sacrifice) or “there’s [sic] 300 people outside the studio,” I can’t help but squirm. I mean, it’s bad enough that they can’t stop calling one another “guys.” When I hear teachers slip up on Grammar 101 in front of their students with remarks such as “He wants to see you and I [sic] in the office” or “I feel badly [sic],” it’s all I can do not to correct them. My friend Peter can say “I feel badly,” because he knows better, and he likes to work at sounding not quite as brilliant as he is. Other people can say it, too. But not teachers. Not newscasters. And, not even talk show hosts.

Most annoying of all are the writers—and not just the immature bloggers who are trying to sound all grown up and trendy—who smudge their copy with words such as “totally” and “awesome” and “f---ing.” I couldn’t bring myself to write that last word.

It’s easy writing. And, like a fill-in-the-numbers painting, it’s boring.

There, I feel all vented.

Train Wrecks among the Pop Stars

The phrase of the week among newscasters is “train wreck.” I counted eleven “train wrecks” in one six-minute segment of a news program yesterday. I think it started with the alleged crazy astronaut in diapers and then, of course, quickly switched to Anna Nicole, who was soon upstaged by the Brittney buzz cut. In between, we were treated to numerous references to other pop stars in and out of jail (and rehab) for drunken driving or drug-induced ticks—all of whom earned the adjectival “train wreck” or “train wreck waiting to happen.”

Can’t they stop? No, not the train wrecks. I really don’t care about them, although I’m beginning to wonder if “train wrecks” only reference females. I’m referring to the newscasters who spend weeks or months stomping the same horrible phrases into linguistic dust.

The Daily Show recently highlighted the use of “embolden” among politicians. I think someone taught Bush the big word and told him to start using it. I’m sure he practiced pronouncing it for many minutes before trying it in front of the news camera. Pleased with this new word, he used it over and over and over and over until all his cronies picked it up and “ran with it.”

I’ve got to stop listening to the news.

Ineffective/Ineffectual: Fraternal Twins

This morning, I heard a weathercaster on the CBS morning news say that the salt used to melt the ice in the streets was ineffectual. What? Didn’t he mean ineffective? Since most newscasters trip over their tongues trying to sound correct, I ran to my trusty Garner and the OED, just to be sure.

If something is ineffective, it means it has a low degree of success. So, the salt dumped on city streets by the NYC Dept. of Sanitation did melt some ice, but it didn’t melt it completely. It was only somewhat effective, because it didn’t produce the desired result, which was a100-percent ice melt.

Ineffectual is not the same as ineffective. “Ineffectual usually describes a person . . . ,” writes Garner. If our weathercaster had wanted to say mean things about the salt-truck drivers, he could have said they were ineffectual spreaders of salt, but I’m sure that’s not what he meant. Here’s the example in the OED: “”We spent a year . . . in a science class taken by an absurd and ineffectual master.”

Bryan A. Garner comes through once again. You should buy his book.

Active vs. Passive

Could you please give me an example of a passive-voice and an active-voice sentence?

Active: (This means the subject of the sentence does the action.)

The cook burned the dinner.

Passive: (This means an action is performed on the subject. In other words, the subject is passive.)

The dinner was ruined by the cook.

Bad Soup Badly Done

Do I feel bad or badly? Most people say they feel badly. I even heard Oprah say she felt badly. But I thought that wasn't correct.

It's okay to say you feel badly if, let's say, your fingers are all numb from the cold and you try without success to feel a relief map or read Braille. Then you can say you, or your numb fingers, feel badly, and you'd be correct.

In fact, "bad" is an adjective that modifies nouns and pronouns. It should be used with linking verbs such as feel, taste, all forms of be, smell, look. When it's used with linking verbs, it functions as a predicate adjective.

The soup tastes bad.

It smells bad, too.

I feel bad for you.

"Badly" is an adverb and modifies verbs.

The soup was badly made.

The bad smell comes from badly cooked soup.

It was very badly done, indeed.

Well DON'T HYPHENATE Meaning Advice

I've been wondering about hyphens for compound adjectives that aren't really compound adjectives. I think there are so many rules that it's too much to figure it out. So, I'll just give some examples that bother me, and maybe you can tell me what's up.

Healthy looking hair: I say no hyphen. What do you say?

Well meaning friend: I say no hyphen. What do you say?

I'm with you. But, there are rules of grammar and writing, there are house styles, and there are clashes between the two. Advertising firms are in love with the hyphen, God only knows why. But, then, advertisers are in the habit of turning many a grammar rule or beautifully written phrase into a gnarly mess and passing it off as hyper-correct.

My rule of thumb is to hyphenate adjectival compounds if the lack of a hyphen would cause confusion OR sometimes (and this is a killer) if I believe the reader expects there to be a hyphen and would be distracted by its absence.

But, here are two guidelines you might consider:

• Don't hyphenate adjectival compounds that contain an adverb ending in –ly.
• Don't hyphenate adjectival compounds when the first adjective is obviously not modifying the noun.

For example: "Healthy looking hair" should not be hyphenated because "healthy" isn't modifying "hair"; it's modifying "looking," which isn't even a descriptive adjective.

For the same reason, when you write "a well meaning friend," you don't need a hyphen, because no one will think you mean a friend who isn't ill.

These are the guidelines I follow, and I believe The Chicago Manual of Style has my back. However, there are many who would disagree with me. So, unless you're bound by the style choices of a particular company, choose the style that suits your sensibilities, and then stick to it.

Talk w/ Me, Not t/ Me?

Is there a rule for putting a space after "w/" when it represents the word "with"?

There's a space after the slash just as there's a space after every word. (But, why would you abbreviate a tiny little word like "with"?)
Is there a rule? I'd be hard pressed to find a specific rule in any of my style books, so logic wins over style.
T/ 4 rit/

De Facto: That's the Way It Is

What do they mean when they say "de facto segregation"?

De facto is the Latin term for "in fact" or "actually." So, de facto segregation is segregation that exists. De facto is the opposite of de jure (sometimes written de iure), which means by right or by law.

In this country, we have de jure integration (integration by law), but the truth is we're more likely to encounter areas that practice de facto segregation (segregation in actuality).