21st Century Grammar Handbook (31 page)

Use the
plural
if possible: Change
“A
policeman should be helpful and wear his uniform with pride” to “Police officers should be helpful and wear their uniforms with pride.” If the plural won’t work, try to find another way to say the same thing without using any pronoun or
gender-marked
word: “The stage makes heavy demands on each performer.” Note how this example uses the gender-neutral term “performer.” The example could be extended to a
pronoun
usage: “The stage makes heavy demands on performers, requiring each to contribute everything possible.” Here
“each”
replaces the restrictive “him.” The less preferable “his/her” construction can also be used: “Every carpenter should bring his or her own tools.”
“One”
is also a useful word to facilitate such choices: “One needs to give one’s all to the stage.”

Other devices focus less on
noun
forms and more on
verb
constructs to avoid possibly biased language. The
passive voice
can eliminate an
object
of a sentence that would otherwise have to be gender marked: “Uniforms should be worn with pride, and helpfulness should be made top priority.” Of course, the inherent weaknesses of the passive voice are evident in such examples. Still, the potential for sexist bias has been eliminated.

Imperative
and
reflexive
constructions also can help: “Wear your uniform with pride and be helpful.” But this commanding tone may not always be appropriate. One might try: “Officers should be helpful at all times and should wear their uniforms with pride.” Here a genderneutral
word (“officers”) in the plural is combined with the reflexive “themselves” to avoid talking about “policemen,” “policewomen,” “policepersons,” or any less-than-general pronoun.

The same care should be applied to the use of
titles
or honorifics: “Drs. Smith and Jones” might include one man and one woman, and the woman might be offended if she is Jones and is subsumed in Smith’s title. Better to say “Dr. Smith and Dr. Jones.” Similarly, it is inappropriate to address “Mr. Jones and his wife” the woman who married Mr. Jones deserves her own honorific, be it
Ms.
or Mrs. (Ms. rather than Mrs. is generally preferred).

When works or achievements are attributed to more than one person, it is important to take care that all titles are equivalent and fully stated so that recognition is equally distributed. WRONG: “An article was published by Dr. Jones and Milly Smith.” Unless you know Milly Smith, and she has specifically requested that she be referred to in precisely this way, write: “An article was published by Dr. Jones and Ms. Smith.” Unless you can supply Dr. Jones with a first name or initial, don’t do so for Ms. Smith either.

Shake, shook, shaken.
An
irregular verb
in its main,
past tense,
and past
participle
forms.

Shaken.
See
shake.

Shall, will.
The two forms of the
future tense
of
be.
Modern American usage rarely requires “shall” unless a polite inquiry or invitation is being made: “Shall we have a drink?” “Shall” is more common in
British English
than in American writing, and appears almost exclusively with
ftrst-person
constructions.

She, her, hers.
The
third-person
singular
personal pronoun
“she” has an
objective case
form of ‘her’ and a
possessive
case form of “hers.” See
case.

She’d.
This
contraction
of “she had” and “she would” is not normally used in
standard English
writing.

She/he, her/him.
Rewrite this awkward concession to
gender
equality into more easily digested forms like “she and he” or they. See
sexist language.

She’s.
This
contraction
of “she is” or “she was” is not normally used in
standard English
writing.

Shine, shone, shone.
An
irregular verb
meaning to put light on or give off light, in its main,
past tense,
and past
participle
forms, the verb meaning to polish has a regular
conjugation:
“shine, shined, shined.”

Shone.
See
shine.

Shook.
See
shake.

Shoot, shot, shot.
An
irregular verb
in its main,
past tense,
and past
participle
forms.

Shot.
See
shoot.

Should.
See
auxiliary
and
verb.

Show, showed, showed (shown).
An
irregular verb
in its main,
past tense,
and past
participle
forms.

Showed.
See
show.

Shown.
See
show.

Shrunk.
See
shrink.

Shrink, shrank, shrunk.
An
irregular verb
in its main,
past tense,
and past
participle
forms.

Similarly.
See
conjunctive adverb.

Simile.
Comparisons
of things to other things often enliven writing by adding an unexpected dimension to words: “Like a dropped football, the stock market bounced up, down, and every which way.” When such direct comparisons use the words “like” or “as,” they are called “similes.”

This stylistic device should be used with caution since many of the obvious comparisons have already been thought of by other writers, and have appeared so often in writing
that they have become trite, or clichéd: “The champagne flowed like water.” See also
metaphor, style, cliché.

Since.
A
preposition
governing the
objective case:
“No one has done as well since her.” Also a
subordinating conjunction
of time and causality.

Sing, sang, sung.
An
irregular verb
in its main,
past tense,
and past
participle
forms.

Sink, sank, sunk.
An
irregular verb
in its main,
past tense,
and past
participle
forms.

sit, sat, sat.
An
irregular verb
in its main,
past tense,
and past
participle
forms. See
set.

Situation.
The word “situation” is badly overused today. Too many times writers and speakers say things like “a recession situation,” “a snow situation,” or something similar. It is much clearer and more direct to take “situation” out of these
phrases,
where it functions as a kind of “ummm” or “you know,” filling space or time while the writer or speaker thinks up something else to say.

Slang.
Words that do not conform to current standards of acceptability are often called “slang.” There are slangs associated with the military, teenagers, scientists, computer enthusiasts, yuppies, preppies, and so on.

Since the words that some people find to be slang are usually those they don’t understand, and since by nature
slang is the language of an in-group rather than the population at large, using slang means limiting your
audience
to those who understand or accept it. And since one purpose of grammatically correct,
standard English
is to make statements that are as widely and effectively understandable as possible, using slang is usually incorrect.

Of course, a few slang words eventually pass into the vocabularies of virtually all English speakers, while others gain at least momentary and broad acceptance. And it may be that a specific audience will be attuned to some slang and tolerant of it in any circumstance. Moreover, the very unacceptability and limitedness of slang can make it an attention-getter that you can use for
emphasis,
or you can use it for
rhetorical,
humorous, or other effect.

The point is to make sure that any words or
phrases
that could hinder communication or even offend an audience or part of it are chosen consciously and with recognition that a risk of incomprehension or rejection is being run. In this regard, slang should be treated with the same care as
colloquial
words,
expletives, dialect,
jargon, foreign terms, and other language that might not be understood or approved. Be cautious, sure of your audience, and willing to be misunderstood. Or don’t use slang.

The line between the various categories of words or phrases with special or limited use or currency blurs and is of little consequence outside the
grammar
classroom. The point is that all these vocabularies have purpose and pitfalls that must be attended to in writing, checking, revising, and rewriting. See
revision
and
editing.

Slavic languages.
See
Russian.

Sleep, slept, slept.
An
irregular verb
in its main,
past tense,
and past
participle
forms.

Slept
. See
sleep.

Smell.
See
linking verbs.

So, so that.
These are
subordinating conjunctions.
“So” is also an
interjection:
“So, Schwartz, how is O’Keefe?”

Some.
The
indefinite
pronoun “some” can be either singular or
plural,
depending on the
number
of its
antecedent:
“The child spilled salt, some of which is still on the tabletop.” “The parent swept up the grains off the floor, but some of them are still visible.” See
pronoun.

Some body, somebody.
“Somebody” is a singular
indefinite
pronoun that means one person or another. “Some body” is a
compound word
that refers to some physical presence or other: “The zookeeper saw some body beneath the feeding lions but couldn’t tell what the prey had been.” See
pronoun.

Somebody.
See
somebody.

Some one, someone.
“Someone” is a singular
indefinite
pronoun. “Some one” is a compound
adjective
that intensifies meaning: “Select some one career, and then get on with it.” See
intensifier
and
pronoun.

Someone.
See
some one.

Some thing, something.
“Something” is a singular
indefinite
pronoun. The
compound word
“some thing” means one thing or another. See
pronoun.

Something.
See
some thing.

Some time, sometime, sometimes.
“Sometime” is an
indefinite
adverb that means at one time or another (“I’ll call you sometime.”). “Some time” is a
compound word
meaning an indistinct amount of time (“I spent some time in Paris.”). “Sometimes” is another indefinite
adverb,
this time meaning at various times: “Sometimes I feel so blue.”

Sometime.
See
some time.

Sometimes.
See
some time.

Sort, sort of.
A singular
noun,
“sort” should agree with singular
adjectives
and
pronouns,
though in bad
usage
it often doesn’t. WRONG: “These sort of books are boring.” BETTER: “This sort of book is boring.” The second example is only “better” and not “right” because “sort,” like
“kind,”
is a flabby word that is best avoided. RIGHT: “I find this book boring” or “Books like this are boring.” “Sort of” as an
adverb
is even more imprecise and should not be used: “It is sort of boring.” Either it is boring, very boring, or not very boring—say what you mean and don’t hedge.

Sort of.
See
sort.

So that.
See
so.

Sound.
See
linking verb.

Spanish.
When using Spanish words in writing* or when referring to Spanish-named people, places, or things, take care to include all relevant
accents:
“Señor Rodriguez.”

Speak, spoke, spoken.
An
irregular verb
in its main,
past tense,
and past
participle
forms.

Spelling.
English is not an easy language to spell. There are many words that sound alike but are spelled differently, many combinations of letters that can be pronounced different ways (“ough” in “through,” “bough,” “slough,” etc.), and many other oddities that cannot be summarized in simple lists or
rules.

The only way to be sure of correct spelling is to check a
dictionary,
whether a book or contained in a
computer
program. In either case, be wary of words that are spelled correctly but altogether incorrectly used: “They’re are in miss take on thus sun tints, butt eye canned fined id.” All these words are in the dictionary and won’t be caught by a computer spell checker, but there is indeed an error or two in the sentence.

Spend, spent, spent.
An
irregular verb
in its main,
past tense,
and past
participle
forms.

Spent.
See
spend.