The world of proofreading is not immune to the sugar-cookie siren song of the holidays, and at this time of year (yes, I really do this) I like to take a moment to re-read a favorite essay about punctuation.
Posted by Gregory Stepanich Dec 21, 2010 5:00:00 AM
The world of proofreading is not immune to the sugar-cookie siren song of the holidays, and at this time of year (yes, I really do this) I like to take a moment to re-read a favorite essay about punctuation.
Topics: punctuation
Posted by Gregory Stepanich Dec 15, 2009 4:00:00 AM
Up until at least the 1993 edition, the Associated Press Stylebook called for the word teenager to be spelled teen-ager -- with a hyphen. I'm sure this was one of the most ignored rules in AP history, but it's interesting to note that some authorities were still hanging onto this compound as a two-word structure long past the 1950s, when teen culture made its first big impact and made both the hyphen and Beethoven roll over.
Topics: hyphenation, compound words, two-word structure, word usage
Posted by Gregory Stepanich Oct 20, 2009 4:00:00 AM
This is a nifty little neologism, and here is Rosenthal's piece (link to: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/27/magazine/27FOB-onlanguage-t.html?_r=1), which offers numerous useful examples. Among them: enervated, which means "weakened," not "energized," and fortuitous, which means "by chance," not "fortunately." Rosenthal cites seven others: fulsome, noisome, enormity, disinterested, penultimate, presently and restive.
Topics: misused words, word meaning
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