Blah, Blah, Blah...
/Egregious errors in everyday language
Psst. Over here. Listen: I don’t want to say it out loud... Do you hear it too? And is it driving you nuts like it’s driving me nuts? And what do you suppose is causing it?
I’m talking about the ridiculous – and more and more prevalent – errors of usage, pronunciation and word choice in our written and spoken American English today. I have a theory about why it’s happening, and I’ll share that at the end. And then, please, will you share your thoughts about why this is happening?
Here – let me show you what I mean. These are what I consider the top ten most annoying mispronunciations, incorrect word choices, and linguistic bombs I see and hear more and more every week, and they’re driving me out of my mind. I’ll limit myself to the top ten most egregious errors of the moment, in descending order, from annoying (#10) to absolutely mind-numbing (#1). If you make it all the way to the end, there’s a bonus for you!
#10 Do they even hear what they’re saying? This one just blows my mind, because it’s so blessed obvious: “... but then the lightbulb went off and he knew...” Folks, when the lightbulb goes off, you’re in the dark. When you find the answer, you’re in the light! The lightbulb goes on! Surely you’ve got it now! Bombs go off. Firecrackers go off. Rockets go off. And, yes, lights do go off – but that’s not when they shed light or make things clear or end the confusion. That’s when the lightbulb goes on! Seriously? I have to tell you this?
#9 Who made this up? “Have a good restofyourday.”? What on earth is that? The first time I heard it, I thought it was one oddball speaking poorly – and now you hear it daily, over and over, and it is absolutely meaningless. What the heck is a restofyourday? And it’s so easily avoided! Easy alternatives: Have a good day. Enjoy the rest of your day. Would that be so hard?
#8 Understandable, but a regrettable loss of nuance: When a word is lost from our vocabulary, forcing oneword to carry the water for two, we lose nuance, and that makes me very sad. Ten years ago we still had the word “might” in our language; it signified potential or possibility. Today, everything is “may,” which used to mean permission, but now means permission and potential and possibility and everything in between. No more nuance. Easy alternatives suggested:
You may cross the street, but you might get hit by that truck.
You might want to wear all black, but you may add some color if you wish.
May I ride your bike? Might I be too big for it?
I posted two articles about this sad loss of nuance back in 2016: “Might you have Lost this Word?” and “Wait! He Might be a Good President.”
#7 Now getting out of hand is this inexplicable emphasis: Remember the election? Were you part of the electorate? Yeah? No problem pronouncing those words, right? You don’t call it the E lect ION, do you? And you don’t talk about the e lect OR ate, right? It’s the e LECT ion and the e LECT or ate, because we e LECTpeople. So where did you (and just about every person on TV) get it in your head that we have an e lect OR al college? Because we don’t – never have had. Simple correction: It’s the e LECT or al college, emphasis on “lect,” not on “or.” Every one of those words is made from the word “elect,” which comes from the Latin “electus,” meaning to pick or choose. You have no problem saying “election” or “elective,” but some squirrel-brained celebrity got it in his or her head that the electoral college is the electoral college, and the pronunciation pandemic was thereby launched. It’s the e LECT or al college, just like it was when we learned about it in grade school. It hasn’t changed. And I wrote about this in 2016 in the Speakeasy: “Electoral College.”
#6 Maybe this is simply a fearful choice: Some people clearly can’t bring themselves to say “fewer,” can they? I suspect they think it might not be a word, so they always choose “less” as in: less problems, less people in the crowd, less groceries in the cart. All wrong! They are fewer problems, fewer people, and fewergroceries. Oh, yes, fewer problems cause less heartache, and fewer people make less noise, and fewergroceries cost less money – all true. Brave correction: The rule is so very simple: If you can count them, you have fewer. If you can measure it, you have less. I know it’s confusing because, as the number grows, you have more of them, and as the amount grows you have more of it – yes, things can get scary. Just remember: you count fewer, you measure less. Fewer ducks eat less grass, and less dessert adds up to fewer calories. I wrote “Words for Counting and Measuring” and “Less or Fewer” in 2016.
#5 Perhaps just a silly slip-up: Got any trophies in your house? Is each one sitting on its base? Is it sitting offits base? Nope. That would be called “broken.” We set things on a base, so things are never “based off” anything. Same with services that are based in: You never say “the company is based out of Green Bay.” (Well, you do, but you shouldn’t.) Something can be spun off, or it can take off, but it is not based off of or based out of. Logical correction: Your decision is based on the data, not based off the data. Your strategy is based on staff input, not based off staff input. Your company is based in Green Bay, even if they provide services all over northeast Wisconsin. Just because the vans drive out of Green Bay does not mean it’s based out of that city. Never! Based on. Based in.
#4 Understandable error, but still an incorrect refusal to differentiate: Let’s be crystal clear about this: FEMA is an acronym, isn’t it? And when a soldier goes AWOL, that’s an acronym, isn’t it? But you want me to believe that USSR is an acronym too, don’t you? And LGBTQ and OMG and SPCA – all acronyms in your book? NO! There is a very simple difference between acronyms and abbreviations. Why don’t people know this anymore? Reasonable correction: An acronym is a pronounceable abbreviation. It’s an abbreviation that forms an actual word. “AWOL” means absent without leave. It’s an abbreviation, but it can actually be said as a word – that’s what makes it an acronym. That little “nym” means something: It means “name.” If the abbreviation forms a “name,” you’ve got an acronym. All acronyms are abbreviations; all abbreviations are not necessarily acronyms. “PIN” means personal identification number, but it can be said as a word or a name: It’s an acronym. “LOL” means laugh out loud, but it is not a pronounceable word or name: It’s just an abbreviation. I wrote about this way back in 2016: “Acronym or Abbreviation.”
#3 Now out of control: “Too big of a mistake” – Lord, help us, because I just don’t know how I’m going to explain this. Just in the past few years, one hears over and over again: It’s too big of a problem or That’s too expensive of a car or We had too big of a crowd. And they’re all wrong, wrong, wrong – but how to explain to people who cannot diagram a sentence? The “of” is unnecessary and grammatically incorrect and, well, to me, appalling. Simple correction – but, again, hard to explain if you don’t know how to diagram a sentence. It’s too big a problem. It is a problem, a big problem. How big? Too big. No “of” in the sentence. That’s too expensive a car. It is a car. What kind of car? An expensive car. How expensive? Too expensive. No “of” in the sentence. We had too big a crowd. What did we have? We had a crowd. What kind of a crowd? A big one. How big? Too big. No “of” in the sentence. Here are a few more examples:
Correct: You’re making too big a deal about it
Wrong: You’re making too big of a deal about it.
Correct: It’s too confusing a problem to solve.
Wrong: It’s too confusing of a problem to solve
(I’d be happy to meet with you personally and diagram these sentences for you. The diagram never lies.)
#2 It’s killing me, and it’s pretentious overkill: Who started the insane overuse of the word “utilize” in place of the proper form, “use”? Do people think “use” is too little? Too plain and humble? Do they think they sound smarter or more professional when they “utilize” something that should simply be “used”? Easy correction: In 90% of cases, we simply “use” something. The word “utilize” is reserved for uses that are meant to turn a profit, or for applications for which the item was not created, or because you have no other choice: What you want to use is not available, so you’ll have to utilize something else. Way back in 2016 I published “Why the $10 Word, Folks?” and I heartily recommend the article today. Just in 2024 I returned to it and wrote “Utilize This!” This overkill is ridiculous, and it diminishes the nuance of having two totally different words at our disposal.
#1 Oh, the very worst: pretentious pronunciation of the smallest word in our language: “a.” These days it’s hard to find a regular TV personality who doesn’t willfully mispronounce this word as “ay” over and over again. It’s as if they have been convinced that “ay” is the “formal” or “professional” version. It’s not! It’s wrong – every bloomin’ time! Easy correction: Just pronounce it “uh,” which is correct. It is never, ever to be pronounced any other way – never “ay.” I published an article about this nearly ten years ago: “The Word is ‘Uh, not ‘Ay.’” No other article in the Speakeasy has been read more frequently; sadly, most readers of that article are from foreign countries. I wish my countrymen would read it!
So, there we go. I have a few others that bug me daily, but those are my top ten. How about you? Do the same lousy words and expressions stick in your craw, or do you have a different one to scream about? Have at it!
But let’s also consider why our language is quickly going to hell in a handbasket. I think it’s just too much talking. These days anybody and her brother might end up on TV or YouTube or somewhere else in a video. How many of those talking heads have had a lick of training in the correct usage – in written and/or spoken form – of American English? In the olden days of Walter Cronkite and Dan Rather, the talking heads were professionally trained and few in number. Now anybody with a mouth can have at it, and our poor language has been, in my opinion, reduced to cheap, linguistic fast-food-for-the-masses.
What do you think is the reason our language is coming apart at the seams? Share your thoughts, please.
BONUS: “Referendum” or “Referenda”?
It’s hard, isn’t it? You hear it used both ways, and both are correct – when used in the right context. Truthfully, it’s not all that difficult if you know just a few secrets about this word, which comes to us from Latin. (And, yes, while you were all learning Spanish and French and German in high school, this nerd was taking four years of Latin – which helped me tremendously as an English major!)
Singular Noun: One Referendum
“Well, we’re just going to have to go to referendum on that.”
“My school district had a referendum on the ballot.”
“We’ll let the voters decide by referendum.”
Plural Noun: Two or More Referenda
“All six school districts in our area had referenda on the ballot.”
“After all the referenda we’ve had in past years, will the voters support this?”
“We actually had three referenda on our local ballot this time.”
Adjective: Referendum
“If we want the money, we’ll have to propose some referendum items.”
“How many referendum issues do you think the voters will tolerate?”
“Schools just face one referendum battle after another.”
Of course, each of these could have been stated as nouns, alternatively:
“... we’ll have to propose some referenda.”
“How many referenda do you think...”
“... schools face one referendum after another.”
Does that make sense? It’s one referendum or several referenda. But, when the word “referendum” is modifying “item/s” or “issue/s” or “battle/s,” the adjective is still singular: referendum. What I would never recommend is “referendums,” but that mistake is understandable in translating a Latin word into American English. It’s tough, but the easy rule of thumb is: One referendum – two referenda.