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Title of Grammarphobia: "Grammarphobia: Grammar, etymology, linguistics, usage"
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Q: Why did grammatical gender ever develop in the first place, and to what purpose? English lost it centuries ago, apparently to no ill effect.
A: Grammatical gender, a system for categorizing nouns into classes, is believed to have first appeared in speech in ancient times, before the existence of written ...
Q: Do you think “you and I” should be “you and me” in the first part of Genesis 31:44 (English Standard Version): “Come now, let us make a covenant, you and I. And let it be a witness between you and me”? The verse is similar in the King James Version.
A: Many English translations of the Bible use “let us” with “you a...
Q: In the class-conscious Sussex, England, of the 1950s, my mother would label certain people at the village Women’s Institute “not quite quite.” What is the history of this usage? And does “not quite quite” suggest even less gentility than “not quite”?
A: As far as we can tell, the use of “not quite” to mean socially...
Q: When I hear football sportscasters state that Team 1 has “matriculated” the football down the field, I (perhaps smugly) question whether the sportscasters have ever matriculated themselves.
A: Standard dictionaries define “matriculate” as to enroll or be enrolled at a college or university, but at least one of...
Q: My daughter and I were watching a DVD of the 1942 Disney film Bambi when I thought of this question: Is the verb “fawn” (to show affection or flatter) related to the noun “fawn” (a young deer)?
A: No, the words aren’t related. The verb comes from the Old English fægnian or fægenian (...
