There is a morale to this antidote

Midweek Mélange

Not to be confused: Interment (Photo by Carlos Felipe Ramírez Mesa, Unsplash) and internment. (Photo by Larry Farr, Unsplash)

It has been some time since I have waxed properly crabby about language use, so I thought I would reach into the archive and revisit an early post about words which are far too often misused and confused. Most subscribers will not have read this; to my very early subscribers, I hope you will not mind another look at this list.

We all know that language evolves, and that’s fine: it is a living entity. We might have different levels of ease with letting go of old friends and getting on board with new ones (I’ll admit, it took me a while to begrudgingly accept texted).

I’m referring to more than simple transgressions or typos. These are things we see and hear on an all-too-regular basis which have bona fide potential for harm through miscommunication, and are not just the personal grievances of finger-wagging persnickety grammar police who want to feel superior.

I cringe not only when I see and hear them, but also for the poor souls who have shown their unfortunate lack of time spent with books. It is this distance from the written word that renders them doubly ignorant: of their own lack of knowledge, and of their obliviousness to that condition. For these, I feel only empathy and compassion, along with the hope that they will become aware, learn, and grow.

However, those in positions of leadership, public office, media, and education who fail to meet even basic standards of literacy betray those they serve, dumb down our society, and embarrass themselves as well as their organizations—which often means the rest of us. Both of my foreign exchange students, one from Denmark and one from Thailand (which has a non-Roman alphabet to boot), had far better English skills by the age of fifteen—in their second languages—than the majority of American adults.

It is time to raise the bar.

When you encounter the kinds of egregious errors below—in what is, after all, a middle school level of fluency—I encourage you to email, write, text, or call those in the above types of roles and politely, respectfully, point out their errors, giving them the correct word, definition, and spelling.

This is not “grammar police” behavior (and technically it’s usage). It’s not arguing over a comma, or picking at the placement of a preposition or tsk-tsking at a split infinitive, all of which are often open to interpretation anyway. No, being in a position of authority and directing the “dispersal of funds” only brings into question why such a person has any control over funds at all.

The juvenile behavior and moronic statements I hear and read from far too many…ahem…representatives, make me certain that the language of legislation—remember they are writing our laws—is so far above their level of comprehension that it scares me stupid. Respectfully correcting mistakes means holding them to only a minimum degree of competence.

Frankly, those in positions of leadership and power need to be held to even higher standards by virtue of their influence on children, the public, and new English learners of all ages, as well as those they represent, lead, and educate. At a bare minimum, however, they should be held to the very basic standards of literacy.

Meanwhile, here are my bêtes noires:

accept / except

adieu / ado

adverse / averse

advice / advise

anecdote / antidote

appraise / apprise

ask / axe

assure / ensure / insure

bale / bail - contributed by

Don Mackey

bated / baited

bazaar / bizarre

bear / bare

break / brake - contributed by

Kent Peterson

Calvary / cavalry

core / corps / corpse

council / counsel

county / country

defuse / diffuse

defiantly / definitely

desert / dessert

diseased / deceased

devise / device

disburse / disperse

discrete / discreet

due / do

elicit / illicit

exasperated / exacerbated

excerpt / expert / exert

forward / foreword

hanged / hung

home / hone

incidents / incidence

install / instill

interment / internment

lay / lie - contributed by

Mary R

medal / metal / mettle

moot / mute

moral / morale

passed / past

peak / peek / pique

perk / perq

persecute / prosecute

personal / personnel

perspective / prospective

podium / lectern

pole / poll

pore / pour

precede / proceed

precedence / precedents / presidents

premier / premiere

principal / principle

prescribe / proscribe

quiet / quite

rack / wrack

rational / rationale

reign / rein / rain

role / roll

sense / scents / since

site / sight / cite

suit / suite

stationary / stationery

succeed / secede

tact / tack

tenet / tenant

than / then

throne / thrown

versus / verses

whether / weather / wether

woman / women

wretch / retch

yoke / yolk

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What are your favorite frequently-confused examples? I am curious…but not curios. See you Friday for fun with Minced Metaphors!

Once again, thank you for popping in to the Verbihund Café!