Living language: know your words and phrases

One of many in an occasional series examining words, usage, grammar, punctuation, slang, and other aspects of this living thing we call English.

Despite the fact that English is a living, breathing, evolving language, Americans are getting horribly sloppy about some basic words and phrases that, in truth, take very little effort to master. Here are a few that have caught my ear recently.

‡ By definition only means sole, alone, singular. “One of the” implies a single member of a group. It is, therefore, impossible to be “one of the only.” You can be “one of” a few, or you can be “the only.” I used to accuse myself of overreacting to the misuse of this phrase, until I saw it in print in The Washington Post.

‡ Less and fewer are both comparatives: they make a comparison between to states of being. Each word has a specific rule that governs its use.

Less is used for amounts that can not be counted as individual items. It is used with what are referred to as “mass nouns.” Money, time, and pie are all mass nouns. “Jim has less pie than Mike” is perfectly grammatically correct.

Fewer is used to make comparisons that involve items that can be counted as singular units. Generally, these come as plural nouns: cars, books, oranges, shoes, slices, lovers; these are all “count nouns.” “Jim has fewer slices of pie than Mike” is, also, perfectly grammatically correct.

The principle reason why you hear and read things like “less calories” is that advertising copywriters like short words.

‡ Approaching the start of our fourth year of war in Iraq, we’re hearing a lot about individuals who are no longer on active duty in the service. It may just be my DC location but we hear from a lot of Marines who are no longer on active duty.

The only proper way to refer to these individuals is as former-Marines. The Corps mentality is that the only ex-Marine is a Marine who has in some way disgraced the uniform and has been dishonorably discharged. Arcane, I know, but that doesn’t keep it from bugging the crap out of me.

And that is our linguistic pedantry for the day.

References:

Grammar Practice: Choosing between less and fewer, Arizona State University students in English Education (pdf)