The Grammar Logs
#581

President Bush is coming to Bangkok, Thailand to attend the Asia Pacific Economic Conference (APEC) on Oct. 20-21, 2003. The Thai government has set up a big billboard welcoming the APEC delegates, including President Bush and his entourage. On the billborad is this expression "Be My Guest."

I wonder whether "Be My Guest" is appropriate in welcoming guests? From what I understood, it connotes a negative meaning. Please help.

I don't know how that phrase "Be my guest" came to have a negative undertone to it, but it sometimes does. It depends on the context. If I say "I understand you will be visiting Connecticut soon. I want you to be my guest," there is absolutely nothing negative about that. However, if you are about to undertake an unpleasant task — dusting all the books on my bookshelves, say — I might very well say "Hey! Be my guest!" That means I won't stop you from doing this unpleasant thing. You're welcome to it. I think that's what you have in mind, and it is, indeed, commonplace enough so that that tone might carry over into the billboard you're describing. It probably would not be understood that way by your guests. A phrase like "Welcome, Guests" (or words to that effect) would be totally void of ambiguity, though.

Someone asked me what tense the following sentence is in:

As a child, he really loved to to read. Every Saturday he'd go to his local library and borror six or seven books. By the next weekend, he'd have read them all and was ready to start some new ones.

The person wanted to know the tense of "he'd have read", but there is more going on that just tense. Can you help me?

This is still the past tense, but the "would" is a modal auxiliary used to create the sense of an habitual activity. Something he "would do" is something that he did often; it was characteristic of him. See the section on modal auxiliaries for more details on "would."

Please tell me what is the correct verb to use in the following sentence and why:

Neither of his children (go, goes) to school.

In informal writing, you will often see a plural verb used with "neither," especially in interrrogative sentences: "Are neither of these correct?" Actual agreement, though, calls for the singular. In your sentence, we can infer that two children are involved and we're talking about both of them, but one at a time, as in "Neither [one of them] goes to school"

My question concerns the conjunctive adverb "too." I tend to use this in the beginning of a sentence as a substitute for "also" or "in addition." For me it's kind of quick, small and maybe informal. Interestingly, my co-workers don't like this usage. They've never heard of "too" used this way. I note that your section on conjunctive adverbs does include "too"; however, I don't find it in my "Hardbrace College Handbook", 10th ed. I'm sure I've seen "too" used in my computer science journals. So, what is the view on "too"? Can you point me to other supporting documentation?

Fowler simply notes the fact that "too" as an initial conjunction was commonplace for centuries, then it disappeared for a while, and made a comeback in the twentieth century. Garner disapproves, saying that "also" should always be used in that initial position. Gilman says that it's acceptable, but notes that some people think it's an incorrect idiom simply because it is quite rare (in comparison to also, in addition, besides, etc.).

Authority: The New Fowler's Modern English Usage edited by R.W. Burchfield. Clarendon Press: Oxford, England. 1996. Used with the permission of Oxford University Press.

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.

By permission, From Merriam-Webster's Dictionary of English Usage © 1994 by Merriam-Webster, Inc. (www.Merriam-Webster.com).

This occured in my 6thgrade English class: Any idea, since the prefix "re" connotes happening again, it's recurring, and not, reoccuring? If this question occured again...it wouldn't reoccur!

"Reoccur" simply means "to happen again. "Recur" will usually mean that it's happening again as part of a pattern. (The dictionaries are not very helpful in making this distinction, and many authorities just disapprove of "reoccur" — but it has its uses.)

By permission, From Merriam-Webster's Dictionary of English Usage © 1994 by Merriam-Webster, Inc. (www.Merriam-Webster.com).

Is it correct to use the word "enthused" as an adjective? i had always thought enthusiastic was correct and "enthused" was improper usage. thank you.

Every authority I own objects strenuously to "enthused" as a verb or as a modifier. It is "avoided by writers and speakers who care about their language," according to Garner.

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.

I don't know whether I wrote this sentence correctly: "He admires HOW Odger can win the people's sympathy." I think "how" is inappropriate in this sentence, right? If it is so, please tell me the right way to edit it. Thanks.

It's hard to say, exactly, what goes wrong here, but I agree that it needs rewriting. We can say something like "I like how Odger can win the people's sympathy," so I don't think it's a matter of our making this clause ("how Odge can win") the object of the sentence. But it clearly would be better if we gave "admire" a real thing (not a clause) as object, as in "He admires Odger's ability to win the people's sympathy."

As a copy editor, I normally change the word "reduced" to something like "dropped to" when it's used like this: "The profits reduced to 50%". I feel that, being a transitive verb, the word reduce needs a doer to act upon it. Am I right?

My instincts told me that you were right about the word "reduce," but unfortunately, I looked it up, and we were both wrong. My dictionaries allow for the use of "reduce" as an intransitive verb. In fact, the Shorter OED gives a sentence very much like yours: "The number of white farmers may have reduced to fifty percent." Still, in my opinion, your readers are well served by the change you make. I would reserve the intransitive use of "reduce" to chemical and culinary processes: "allow the gravy to boil and reduce …"

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

Question

Why do we use are/were after 'his Mathematics' and 'her politics'? Is it a commonly accepted structure and what is the rationale behind? Is is grammatical if we use 'is/was' after 'his Mathematics'? If using a plural verb is correct, what should we use after 'her English'? Should we use 'is' or 'are'? Thank you very much.

Source of Question, Date of Response

Hong Kong Tue, Aug 5, 2003

Grammar's Response

"Mathematics" is invariably a singular word in sentence construction. (Originally, it was a plural word, but we never [or rarely] use it that way nowadays.) "Politics" is almost always a singular word — "Politics is a dirty business"," but it can be used as a plural: "His politics are suspect." When it's used as a plural, it signifies a set of political attitudes. "English" is invariably singular.

Question

In the sentence — "The format will be similar to prior years." Should there be an apostrophe before the s in years, after the s, or not at all and why or why not? Thank you.

Source of Question, Date of Response

Chicago, Illinois Tue, Aug 5, 2003

Grammar's Response

Your instincts are right about this sentence: something is wrong. It's trying to compare a format to "years (the plural noun)," which doesn't make sense. We could say "The format will be similar to the format used in prior years" or "The format will be similar to the prior year's" (a singular format of a singular year) or "The format will be similar to prior years' " (meaning the format of more than one year). The clearest way of saying this, though, is "The format will be similar to the format used in [or "of"] prior years."

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