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Our study of American English grammar and style sometimes gathers bits too small to feature yet worthy to gather for group exploration. In 2018, we discussed such medleys twice:
Exploring Some English Miscellany
More Mulling Over Miscellany
This year we've continued tracking items of note that we receive from our readers. Let's look at several that further our mission to communicate with precision and eloquence.
Gonna
A contraction of the verb phrase "going to," gonna is widely viewed as slang used mainly in informal speech.
While dictionaries including Merriam-Webster recognize gonna as a word, we believe it should be avoided in formal writing unless we are quoting or otherwise representing such usage.
| | Examples |
| | "I'm gonna think about it for a while," the teenager said. |
| | Da coach thinks we're gonna win, so maybe we should think we're gonna win too. |
Caption vs. Cutline
When we're referring to descriptive text beneath a picture or another image, we often call it the caption. Less commonly, we might also see or hear the word cutline.
Today, caption and cutline are often used interchangeably. However, particularly in the publishing industry, the words have a distinction. A caption is like a title. A cutline is the text below a picture or an image that explains or identifies what the reader is looking at. It will typically include information such as the who, what, when, where, why, and how.
| | Example |
| | [CAPTION] Local Teen Throws Record-Breaking Pitch |
| | [PHOTO] Pitcher reaching into his wind-up on the mound during a game |
| | [CUTLINE] Smallville High senior Clark Kent, shown here in Tuesday's game against Gotham City, reached 107 miles per hour with a fastball according to a radar gun onsite. The speed is the highest ever recorded for a high school pitcher. |
Tour
This entry pertains more to speaking than writing. One reader pointed out that tour can sometimes be heard as "tore" instead of the more conventional "toor," which is also the pronunciation in French, the word's source language. This variation can likewise produce offshoots such as "tore-ism" for tourism and "tore-ist" for tourist.
Some exploration of the subject reveals the variance may originate from usage in different American regions. In keeping with GrammarBook's focus on formal, contemporary English, we prefer "toor" as the proper pronunciation.
Kill
One GrammarBook reader questioned whether, in writing precisely, something other than a living being or creature could kill a living being or creature. In particular the reader was focusing on news content similar to the following:
| | What remained of the hurricane continued drifting inland on Tuesday, carrying more rain after killing three people and swamping the coast with flooding measured in feet. |
The reader wondered whether an acting agent must be living in order to kill. If we interpret kill mainly as murder, can a hurricane perform the deed, or would it be more concise to write a person died because of the storm?
In other words, did the storm itself come down and slay three people directly, or did it bring about their demise by creating hazardous conditions?
Our response is that definitions of kill comprise more than the personal act of murder. Dictionaries include entries such as "to deprive of life; to cause the death of" and "to destroy; extinguish." In this context, a non-living entity such as a hurricane can indeed kill.
Every Day vs. Everyday
The confusion that might attend every day and everyday is the same that can follow pairs such as any time and anytime. The key is distinguishing their parts of speech.
Every day is a noun phrase acting as an adverb meaning "each day": We try to go to the fitness center almost every day.
Everyday is an adjective meaning "common, typical, ordinary" as well as "daily." Less frequently, the word might also serve as a noun in informal writing or speech to mean "the routine or ordinary day or occasion."
| | Examples |
| | Do you include flossing in your everyday hygiene? |
| | What kind of breakfast might they eat for everyday? |
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Happy Holidays!
All of us at GrammarBook.com wish all of you and your families a very happy holiday season.
We will take a two-week break before resuming our weekly e-newsletters on January 8, 2020, with a 2019 Year-in-Review Quiz. Once again, we sincerely hope you have learned from and enjoyed our grammar tips this past year. We have certainly enjoyed bring them to you.
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The Blue Book of Grammar and Punctuation
by Jane Straus, Lester Kaufman, and Tom Stern |
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Offer expires December 31, 2020.
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Wordplay
Some Fun Thoughts
Which letter is silent in the word scent, the s or the c?
Why is the English letter W called double U—shouldn't it be called
double V?
If you replace W with T in "What, Where, When," you get the answer to each
of them.
The word swims upside down is still swims.
Since 2/22/22 falls on a Tuesday, let's just call it "2's day," okay?
(with appreciation to Phil Proctor)
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English In A Snap:
68 One-Minute English Usage Videos FREE |
Learn all about who and whom, affect and effect, subjects and verbs, adjectives and adverbs, commas, semicolons, quotation marks, and much more by just sitting back and enjoying these easy-to-follow lessons. Tell your colleagues (and boss), children, teachers, and friends. Click here to watch.
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