Month: May 2008

“The police car was hidden in the medium.”

Common English Blunders, Devolution toward Simpler, Nouns

I heard this on a radio program yesterday morning.

Problem:
The speaker used the wrong noun to indicate where the police car was hidden.

Explanation:
The DJs on KRBE radio yesterday morning were discussing speeding tickets and how traffic officers like to hide their vehicles to catch speeders.

One of them said something to the effect that “the police car was hidden in the medium.”

At first I wondered whether I had mis-heard what was said, but then the other two DJs started to say “medium” with no hint of sarcasm.

It became sadly clear that the three DJs did not know the correct noun — “median” — for that portion of a street that runs down the middle of it.

I believe that the use of “medium” in place of “median” is consistent with my “Devolution toward Simpler” linguistic hypothesis. It is simpler to say the “um” in “medium” than to say the “an” in “median” for two reasons: the vowel (“u” vs. “a”), and the final consonant (“m” vs. “n”). Try saying each noun, and you’ll feel what I mean.

Solution:
“The police car was hidden in the median.”

“Disconcerning”

Adjectives, Common English Blunders, Devolution toward Simpler, Verbs

My wife heard this yesterday.

Problem:
“Disconcerning” is a nonsense word.

Explanation:
Nearly everyone who says “disconcerning” actually is trying to say an adjective whose meaning is causing an emotional disturbance.

“Disconcerting” (notice the ‘t’ before the ‘ing’) — not “disconcerning” — is the adjectival form of the verb “disconcert”.

I believe that the use of “disconcerning” is consistent with my “Devolution toward Simpler” linguistic hypothesis. It’s simpler to say “disconcerning” than to say “disconcerting” (which requires the speaker to emphasize the ‘t’).

For fun, I searched Google for each of the following words and got about the indicated numbers of matches:

  • disconcerning — 22,600 matches
  • disconcerting — 2,260,000 matches

This tells me that Web authors have written the word correctly vs. incorrectly by a ratio of 100:1, which is very encouraging.

Solution:
“Disconcerting”

“… a cause larger than yourselves.”

Common English Blunders, Pronouns

I heard this in a high-school commencement speech by President Bush over the weekend.

Problem:
The President used the wrong pronoun here.

Explanation:
This was part of a sentence that went along the lines of “I want you to spend your lives devoted to a cause larger than yourselves.”

The pronoun “yourselves” is a plural, second-person pronoun.

It should be used in one of two ways:

  • reflexively: “You can do it yourselves.”
  • for emphasis: “a group petition that you yourselves submitted”

Its use in the President’s speech followed neither of these patterns.

Instead, “a cause larger than yourselves” follows the pattern of “an X larger than Y” — for which “Y” is neither reflexive nor inserted for emphasis.

Solution:
“… a cause larger than you.”