Category Archives: usage features

On who/whom in popular culture

Posted on February 29, 2024 by Ingrid Tieken

Just out, I wrote earlier today, New Horizons in Prescriptivism Research, and in it there is an article I wrote on the exploitation of who/whom as a usage problem in popular culture: television series, films, popular novels. And here is … Continue reading →

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Singular ‘they’ in Dutch?

Posted on January 22, 2024 by Ingrid Tieken

“Will everyone put down their phone?” is quite common in English today. It has been around as a construction since at least the 14th century, developed into quite a controversial feature in the language, but as our Usage poll #10 … Continue reading →

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“Inputted” on the increase?

Posted on January 10, 2024 by Ingrid Tieken

On reading a PhD thesis from the University of Sheffield on the phonology of West Cornwall English (excellent data collection, detailed and very meticulous methodology description) I encountered the word inputted, which set me thinking. The context was very clearly … Continue reading →

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Tryna into the OED?

Posted on July 14, 2023 by Ingrid Tieken

Rereading Salinger’s The Catcher in the Rye (1951) this summer reminded me of one of the last BA theses I supervised before I retired nearly three years ago. The student writing the thesis was analysing twitter messages, and told me … Continue reading →

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Even Breaking Bad

Posted on February 2, 2023 by Ingrid Tieken

We finally decided to watch this series, the best series ever, according to some people we know. Netflix of course. It happened after we finished watching all of Better Call Saul, its prequel, which got a very favourable review in … Continue reading →

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Ian McEwan’s metalinguistic comments

Posted on January 2, 2023 by Ingrid Tieken

During the final month of 2022 I read two of Ian McEwan’s novels, an earlier one, Saturday (2005), and his most recent Lessons (2022). Ever since reading his short story “Mother tongue” (2001) I’ve been keeping track of his metalinguistic … Continue reading →

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Verbal hygiene at Mr Kipling’s

Posted on August 18, 2022 by Ingrid Tieken

I love Mr Kipling’s little Bramley apple pies, advertised as “exceedingly good cakes”. So far so grammatically good, and good they are. But when buying them this summer during our holidays in England, we also spotted Mr Kipling’s exceedingly good … Continue reading →

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A very timely piece on Dutch “literally”

Posted on January 24, 2022 by Ingrid Tieken

Thank you, Ewoud Sanders, for choosing to write on Dutch literally just this weekend. A very welcome piece for my comparative paper on the English, Dutch and German usage guide traditions later this week. We’ve written on this topic (from … Continue reading →

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Is different from really correct?

Posted on January 4, 2022 by Ingrid Tieken

The reference is to the title of an article from 1 January 2022 on the Guardian online, by subeditor Susan McDonald. With an amazing 4194 comments in three days, the opportunity to add another one is now unfortunately closed. I … Continue reading →

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A very unlikely British phrase

Posted on December 29, 2021 by Ingrid Tieken

Watching the final episode of the BBC mini-series A Very British Scandal last night I was struck by the Duke of Argyll saying “This battle between you and I …”. It would have been highly unlikely for a man of … Continue reading →

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