The
Grammar
Logs
# 298

QUESTION
Please, for the record, tell me irregardless is not a word.
SOURCE OF QUESTION & DATE OF RESPONSE
Lanham, Maryland Thu, Mar 11, 1999
GRAMMAR'S RESPONSE
Sorry, but irregardless is a word. In spite of its widespread use, it's not a highly regarded word, and most good writers would tell you it's a silly, nonsensical word, one that ought to be avoided entirely, at any level of discourse.

QUESTION
When a company name including "Inc." is used in a sentence, is a comma necessary before AND after "Inc." or is the comma only needed before "Inc."? Ex. Cochran Travel, Inc. would like to invite you to..... or Cochran Travel, Inc., would like to invite you to...

Thank you so much for your help in this matter!

SOURCE OF QUESTION & DATE OF RESPONSE
Birmingham, Alabama Thu, Mar 11, 1999
GRAMMAR'S RESPONSE
First of all, I would encourage you to not use the Inc. at all. Is it really necessary? If it is, then it's going to depend on how Cochran Travel writes it. Do they put a comma before Inc.? (You don't have to.) If they do, then it's appropriate for you to put a comma before it (the Inc, I mean) and you'll also have to put a comma after it. But I would just drop it altogether.

QUESTION
What is the rule regarding the use of "types of"... for example:
  • "There are two types of car" or,
  • "There are two types of cars".
Is "car" pluralized for agreement, or left singular to acknowledge the one category?
SOURCE OF QUESTION & DATE OF RESPONSE
London, Ontario Thu, Mar 11, 1999
GRAMMAR'S RESPONSE
You are talking about something plural anyway: you have cars of this type and cars of that type. But they are "types of car." (Somehow, I don't think we'd even ask this question with "automobile.")

QUESTION
What is the proper usage of later vs. latter in a sentence?
SOURCE OF QUESTION & DATE OF RESPONSE
Redmond, Washington Fri, Mar 12, 1999
GRAMMAR'S RESPONSE
"Later" is an adverb, used to modify a verb: something happens later (than something else). "Latter" is an adjective, used to modify a noun: the "latter" event. Or it's a noun: "Of these two events, the latter is more upsetting."

Authority for this note: WWWebster Dictionary, the World Wide Web edition of Merriam-Webster's Collegiate® Dictionary, Tenth Edition. Used with permission.


QUESTION
Can the word "itch" be used as a verb having the same meaning as scratch? For example, can one say, "I am itching my rash?" Webster's Dictionary does not seem to indicate this as a proper use of the word, but Roget's Thesaurus does.

Please spread the light of proper English usage to the dim intellectual field of Oklahoma!

SOURCE OF QUESTION & DATE OF RESPONSE
Stillwater, Oklahoma Fri, Mar 12, 1999
GRAMMAR'S RESPONSE
Watch what you say about Oklahoma! That's where I grew up! No, you can't itch your rash; you can only scratch it (or not) because it itches. According to Merriam-Webster's, your arm itches and the rash itches your arm, and that's conundrum enough.

QUESTION
I have been given two sentences which are perplexing me as to the proper verb usage.
  1. "Remember well that with life there ARE/IS beauty, riches, and power."
  2. "There ARE/IS the love in my heart, the grace as the expression of my love, and the transmission as a means to pass this grace on to the brother."
SOURCE OF QUESTION & DATE OF RESPONSE
Oklahoma City, Oklahoma Fri, Mar 12, 1999
GRAMMAR'S RESPONSE
This is what you get for using the expletive construction "there is" and "there are." With this construction, the subject always follows the verb, but there remains the question, is "beauty, riches, and power" one thing or three? It sounds like three separate things to me, so I'm going with "are." I think the same thing happens in the next sentence. By the way, is "the transmission as a means to pass this grace on to the brother" one thing? I would try to find some happier bit of phrasing: "transmission" sounds like something that breaks down in my car.

QUESTION
HAS or HAVE??? The items are plural, but because the group of items is singular I wrote the following sentence as it appears.
Maturing trees, as well as, the addition of new tees, sand bunkers and bushes around a few greens, has made the course more difficult in recent years.
I'd appreciate your expert opinion. Thank you.
SOURCE OF QUESTION & DATE OF RESPONSE
Eagleville, Pennsylvania Fri, Mar 12, 1999
GRAMMAR'S RESPONSE
You want "have" as your sentence's verb because the subject of this sentence is "maturing trees," which is plural -- regardless of what modifiers follow it in the "as well as" phrase. (Incidentally, I wouldn't put a comma after "as well as.")

QUESTION
I was wondering does this sentance break any grammar rules?
"Some choose quickly and others regretfully and slower."
Is the use of slower a grammar violation?? Does it have to be an adverb or can it be a adjective??
SOURCE OF QUESTION & DATE OF RESPONSE
Atlanta, Indiana Fri, Mar 12, 1999
GRAMMAR'S RESPONSE
Why would we want to break the parallelism of this sentence and go from adverbs to an adjective? What's wrong with "slowly"? You might want to tack on "regretfully" and give it a bit more of an end focus for a sentence like this:
"Some choose quickly, others slowly -- and regretfully."
QUESTION
My husband works with a gentleman who uses English as a second language (he is from Guyana, I think). This man has used the contraction "I'm" inappropriately in writing. Example, "He is not going to the show, but I'm." We know that that is wrong, but are not sure how to explain it to him.
SOURCE OF QUESTION & DATE OF RESPONSE
Sioux City, Iowa Fri, Mar 12, 1999
GRAMMAR'S RESPONSE
I'm not sure I know the reason for this, either, but I suspect it simply isn't appropriate to cause a weak contraction (an auxiliary without its main verb) to support the end weight and focus of a sentence like that -- not without a complete verb, as in "He's arriving, but I'm leaving." Your friend is actually leaving us at sentence end with a mere auxiliary, and it won't hold up.

QUESTION
What is the proper way to write 'the nineteenth century'?
  • 'Nineteenth Century'?
  • 'Nineteenth century'?
  • 'nineteenth Century'?
  • Nineteenth-Century?
...what is the rule here?
SOURCE OF QUESTION & DATE OF RESPONSE
Charlottesville, Virginia Sun, Mar 14, 1999
GRAMMAR'S RESPONSE
There's probably no reason to capitalize the words unless they're part of a course name or other title. If they appear in the regular flow of text, there's no reason for a hyphen: "She wrote in the early nineteenth century." If, however, they are used as a compound modifier, use a hyphen:
  • "She is the most interesting figure in nineteenth-century literataure." or
  • "She is a mid-nineteenth-century author."

Authority: Chicago Manual of Style 14th ed. U of Chicago P: Chicago. 1993. See chapter 6.


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