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Tag Archives: usage guides
Just out (surprise)
Today, we found out that our article “Prescriptive attitudes to English” is published, that it has been out for two months already. Thanks, Carmen, for tweeting about it, or I wouldn’t have known. Still, I’m really pleased, and expect Carmen … Continue reading
Continuing the usage game
On our blog, we often report on current developments in the usage debate, bits and pieces of our research findings and also new publications of usage guides. Being a true book addict, I would like to share two of the … Continue reading
Posted in news, usage features, usage guide
Tagged letter to the editor, May I quote you on that?, usage debate, usage guides
2 Comments
New in English Today: A Fuss about the Octopus
The March issue of English Today includes the latest feature article from our project in which I discuss the options English has to refer to more than one ‘octopus’ as well as a usage rhyme written on this specific topic. Four … Continue reading
Posted in announcement, news, usage features, usage guide
Tagged acceptability, English Today, plural of 'octopus', usage guides, usage problem, usage rhymes
1 Comment
The first American usage guide
In the post today: my copy of Seth T. Hurd’s Grammatical Corrector, the first American usage guide, published in 1847, and found on ebay. It is in better condition than the ebay picture suggested: it has a green cover, and a … Continue reading
An 18th-century Garner?
Within this project, we take Robert Baker’s Reflections on the English Language (1770) to be the first English usage guide. But was it? In the introduction to the Merriam Webster Dictionary of English Usage (1989: 8a) we are able to read … Continue reading
The Alphabet of Errors: L, M & N
Have you told people a 1000 times not to use lie for lay? Are those people, after all your well-meant though prescriptive advice, still lost as to when to use the one and when the other? Do they forget your … Continue reading
Posted in usage features
Tagged can/may, double negation, errors, HUGE, lie/lay, rhyme, Richardson, school, The English Journal, usage guides, usage problem
1 Comment
Cambridge English Usage (Guides) Symposium
Don’t miss it! On 26 and 27 June, we are organising a symposium at the English Faculty of the University of Cambridge on Usage Guides and Usage Problems. The registration fee is £30 only. Don’t wait too long to register, since space is … Continue reading
