The Grammar Logs
#551

I told a friend that betted was not a word, then I found it in the dictionary. Is it proper to say, " I betted you on the game." I thought, " I bet you on the game," was proper. If betted is proper, I need a good comeback line. HELP!

According to Garner, "bet" (as the past tense of bet) is much preferred and far more frequent than "betted." "Betted," he says, is heard sometimes in England, hardly ever in the U.S., fortunately.

From The Oxford Dictionary of American Usage and Styleby Bryan Garner. Copyright 1995 by Bryan A. Garner. Published by Oxford University Press, Inc., www.oup-usa.org, and used with the gracious consent of Oxford University Press.

Is it appropriate to use 'their' for a non-person subject? For example, can I say,

"We take the servicing of our cars as seriously as THEIR manufacturing."

You can use "they" to refer to cars, so you can certainly use their, the possessive form, also. The sentence has other problems, however, that you ought to contemplate. First, it sounds like the cars are doing the manufacturing, and it's still our manufacturing of the cars that we take seriously. Second, the comparison is a bit ambiguous and someone might think you're comparing the servicing of the cars to how seriously the manufacturing takes the servicing of the cars (which doesn't make any sense, but I hope you see the problem*). I would recommend a rewrite, suggesting that you take great pride in the manufacture of your automobiles and that you take equal pride in servicing those automobiles after you sell them.

*This is often a problem with as . . . as constructions: "I like spaghetti as much as my father."

Are prepositional phrases always used as adverbs when they talk about infinitives no matter how the infinitive is used?

Another example came up today:

In other words, the house, in addition to being a house, stands for something beyond itself.

How is the infinitive "to being " used? What does the prep. phrase "in addition" modify? Is it an adj pr an adv?

Thank you very much.

"To being" is not an infinitive. "Being a house" is a participial phrase modifying "the house." It is preceded, however, by a phrase, "in addition to" (which means the same thing as the adverb "besides"). An infinitive is always the root form of the verb (there is never an "-ing" ending attached to it); it is usually (but not always) accompanied by the particle "to."

This is a suggestion: As an editor, I frequently come across the use of the phrases "the up side" and "the down side" (I change them to something like "advantage" or "drawback"). I haven't found these phrases in any style or usage guides, including this one, but I assume they are pretty colloquial...perhaps not "wrong", but but not for formal writing. Your thoughts?

Wonderful site, thank you.

The electronic version of Merriam-Webster's 10th contains "upside" and "downside" (no breaks in those words) and says they mean positive and negative aspects, respectively. I would suggest that they confer meaning about potential value. Sports commentators often speak of a player's "upside" (meaning that the player has great potential and will, someday, become a great player and make millions in the professional ranks); why they don't say the player has great potential is a mystery. You're undoubtedly right to "translate" upside and downside to something more recognizable and leave these words to the casual, bleary realms of sports and fiscal forecasters.

I'm working on writing a letter and at the bottom of the letter, after my signature, I would like to add the sentence "Please see attached."

Would this best be included in the body of the letter? I had in mind a "P.S." type of heading. I do not think this professional and was wondering is there anything else that may be used.

Will you please advise?

The Gregg Reference Manual recommends typing the word Enclosure at the left margin, on the line below the reference initials, whatever comes last. You can use any number or words or phrases, such as "Enclosure," "1 Enclosure," "Check enclosed," etc. You can use Attachment or Att. when the material is actually attached, rather than just enclosed. If you're doing a lot of business writing, though, get hold of a copy of the Gregg Reference Manual and have it close at hand. It will quickly pay for itself.

Authority: The Gregg Reference Manual by William A. Sabin. 9th Edition. McGraw-Hill: New York. 2001. Used with the consent of Glencoe/McGraw-Hill.

Today I am faced with editing accreditation narrative for our techinical institute. The nursing instructors insist on referring to the students' "passage" of various examinations. Can you live with "passage" in that context? I find it difficult to do so!

Example: "Passage of the NCLEX assures the Arkansas State Board of Nursing that the licensure candidate is prepared for safe public practice."

Thank you.

The Shorter Oxford's first definition of "passage" is the "act of passing," but they clearly have in mind something that requires motion from one place to another, and none of their examples suggests that the word can be used as a substitute for passing, in the academic sense. (This is also true, by the way, of Merriam-Webster's 10th.) You might ask the nursing instructors if they have in mind the eighth definition of "passage," which is "the act of defecation." That might solve the problem and get us back to "passing," which is what you want here (and a meaning that is listed in the Shorter Oxford).

Authority for this note: Shorter Oxford English Dictionary. Fifth Edition. Oxford University Press, New York. 2002.

Can adverbs be used to modify prepositions or prepositional phrases? Specifically, can intensifiers modify them? The example I am working with is:

"Then he will have reason for boasting in regard to himself alone, and not in regard to another." (not)

Some other examples in question:

• "She was standing almost at the top." (almost)
• "I don't think there is anything quite like Toblerone." (quite)

Let's deal with the easy ones first: yes, "almost" and "quite" (downtoners) can modify prepositional phrases. In both cases, it's a relatively simple matter of an adverb modifying a prepositional phrase — an adverbial prepositional phrase in "She was standing almost at the top" and an adjectival prepositional phrase in "I don't think there is anything quite like Toblerone."

The role of "not" in your first sentence is bit more problematic. It's probably not wise to classify "not" or its contracted form "n't" simply as an adverb. It has a tendency to modify things other than just the verb or any one thing in the sentence; its role, after all, is to turn the sentence (which you can parse, first, without the "not") into something negative. Sometimes it will clearly modify the verb, as in "He couldn't do any beter" (and you can then call it an adverb). But when it doesn't clearly modify the verb, it's better simply to call it a "negative particle" and not to assign it a modifying role. "Some words," says Sidney Greenbaum, "do not fit well into any of the classes" (he would include the existential "there" [as in "There is a certain amount of …"] in that short list along with "not" and a handful of others).

Authority: The Oxford English Grammar by Sidney Greenbaum. Oxford University Press. New York: 1996. p. 93 and 55.

What is the correct use of the word "advocate" as a verb? Can someone "advocate for" something ("We are going to advocate for a new stadium in San Diego") or is the correct use simply to "advocate" something ("He advocated the use of toothpaste every morning")-- or both?

In The Careful Writer, Theodore Bernstein says that the verb "to advocate" takes the preposition for. So you're in good company (if that's what you're looking for) if you use the verb that way. However, other writing manuals insist that "to advocate" means "to suggest" and you shouldn't use "for" with "advocate" any more than you would use it with "suggest." "Arguing, pressing, pushing," etc., can all take "for," but "advocate" cannot (or should not), according to Lovinger, and I agree with him on this.

Authority: The Penguin Dictionary of American English Usage and Style by Paul W. Lovinger. Published by Penguin Reference (New York: 2000).

Authority: The Careful Writer by Theodore Bernstein. The Free Press: New York. 1998.

How to you punctuate the following sentence?

XXXX shall incorporate a self-destruct mode that, in conjunction with a combination of procedures and actions, shall completely destroy system software, classified components, electronics, ordnance, as well as incapacitate the vehicle, and otherwise prevent use in the event of imminent capture by enemy forces.

I've been in a self-destruct mode for some time now, so I know something about this. The linking of "incapacitate the vehicle" with the use of "as well as" is weak. Shouldn't that be "and" — "… and incapacitate the vehicle to prevent its use by enemy forces"? Perhaps the phrase "in the event of imminent capture" should go at the very beginning of the sentence?

Some fish travel head first through the pipe. Others go tail-first following an instinct to face into the current.

Question: How should "head first" or "tail first" be written? — head first, head-first, headfirst? — tail first, tail-first, tailfirst?

I was surprised to find "tailfirst" (one word, no hyphen) in my Merriam- Webster's. If you use that first, I don't think your readers will have any problem with reading "tailfirst" as a similar construction (although neither "tailfirst" or "tail-first" is in the dictionary). However, "tail-first," with the hyphen, yields over six thousand hits on Google.com, but only a hundred hits show up for "tailfirst." So I would write this with the non-broken "headfirst" and the hyphenated "tail-first" (in spite of the apparent inconsistency).

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