You know you’re of a certain age if you remember when correct English was spoken and written by almost everyone you knew or heard on radio and TV. I sometimes wonder if I’m the only surviving American who notices or cares.
It seems that in this age, people tend to think if it’s said on TV it must be correct. Au contraire. As the age of news readers, and those who write their copy, approaches adolescence, the quality of grammar and syntax, not to mention pronunciation, declines.
Among my pet peeves is the misuse of pronouns, which may come from the unnecessary complexity of newer elementary school text books. This seems to have occurred around the time they ditched English in favor of Language Arts. Was this another attempt to avoid offending non-native English speakers?
Children get bogged down in labeling pronouns as either reflexive, relative, direct or indirect. It was much easier to learn the difference between subject and object. “He and I” or “Me and him.” You probably won’t find “Me and Him” as the subject, but you may well hear “He and I” as the object. “It was given to John and I.”
When I was in school, we remembered which was correct by asking: Who is doing what to whom?
Pronunciation is another matter entirely. Mispronunciation has a direct correlation to who occupies the White House and who speaks for those in power. I may be wrong on this, but it seems proper pronunciation goes out when Southerners move in. It was during the Carter presidency that “important” became emporDUNT, “resources” morphed into reZORces. And, of course, this administration changes “nuclear” into nucYOUlar, Iraq into EYErack, and so on.
And was it an effort to distance ourselves from France that led to phonetic pronunciation of envoy and enclave? Let’s hope it doesn’t go so far as to Anglicize rendezvous, depot, détente. Remember, Freedom Fries never really caught on outside the Senate cafeteria.
On the other side, a misguided attempt to make the language fancier has produced artificial and unwieldy phrases to replace a simple word: In a timely manner for soon. Or worse yet, the ubiquitous adverbs, shortly and hopefully.
Children no longer play, they “interact” or, even more ridiculous, they “recreate.” Recreation is a legitimate noun but it makes a lousy verb. Besides, it’s spelled the same as RE-create, which means reinventing something, like Intelligent Design maybe.
And advertising was largely responsible for changing adjectives to nouns, producing that most unfortunate word, uniqueness. It was bad enough that ad copywriters felt compelled to brand every product unique, when that word can only mean one of a kind. Let’s face it, there are precious few things in this world that are unique. So how can we say anything is more unique? And while we’re on advertising, state-of-the-art actually means average or that which is in common use. Who knew?
Does anyone remember the difference between “farther” and “further”? Even some newer dictionaries claim the two are interchangeable. Well, “farther” means more distant. “Further” is a verb meaning “to promote.” “Affect” is a verb and “effect” is a noun. The “effect” of that law will “affect” safety. Prudential will “insure” your house if you “ensure” the premiums are paid. Of course, Ensure is also a fortified drink.
And who started using “reticent” in place of “reluctant?” Reticent means taciturn or habitually silent, not unwilling. Probably the same folks who think “liable” may be substituted for “likely” when “liable” should only denote legal responsibility not predictability. And if you think less is more, please remember to use “fewer” to modify plural nouns, Fewer Big Macs, less fat.
Some words have been driven nearly to extinction by misuse of similar words known only to those of older generations. A young editor once changed my use of the word stanch (a verb meaning to stem the flow of, say, blood or red ink) to staunch (an adjective meaning solid or strong). Readers should have been perplexed but those under 50 probably weren’t.
Even in crossword puzzles we find incorrect synonyms. The clue “recumbent” often requires “prone” as the answer though they are antonyms. Both refer to a horizontal position, but “recumbent” is face up and “prone” is definitely face down. Will Shortz should know better. Wonder how old he is.