54 followers 0 articles/week
The Many Meanings of “Groom” and “Grooming”

A formerly useful and innocuous set of words–groom, groomed, and grooming—has become a trope used primarily to stir anxiety and dread in parents. People who use words professionally may want to give some thought to taming some of the hysteria that has come to reside around these words. The noun groom Until recently, the noun groom denoted a person...

Wed Jan 25, 2023 19:38
“Meaningless Buzzwords”?

I read that a political commentator, whom I will not name, asserts that five particular terms are “meaningless buzzwords.” Labeling these particular words “buzzwords” sent me to my language sources to discover whether my understanding of the word is faulty. Here are definitions from my two main dictionaries. buzzword: noun, Originally and chiefly...

Mon Jan 9, 2023 21:44
Mustn’t Have Done and Couldn’t Have Done

A reader has asked for a post on the difference between “mustn’t have + past participle” and “couldn’t have + past participle.” He gives these examples: a) Ahmed failed the exam. He mustn’t have studied hard. b) Ahmed failed the exam. He couldn’t have studied hard. Before writing to me, the reader queried native English speakers of his acquaintance...

Mon Jan 2, 2023 13:15
To Be a Writer

There’s a saying that “everyone has a book in him.” Since self-publishing has become so easy, quite a few people seem to be trying to expel it. During the month of November, hundreds of thousands of people signed up to write a novel during NaNoWriMo. The annual ritual of National Novel Writing Month began in 1999 with 21 participants, six of whom...

Mon Dec 26, 2022 18:07
GPT-3 Writing Assistant: What is It?

Artificial intelligence is increasingly present in our lives, gaining new applications every day, including in the realm of writing! Generative Pretrained Transformer 3rd Generation, or GPT-3, is by far the most advanced technology of its kind, but, what is exactly GPT-3 and what can it do? If you want to try it out for yourself, check the list of...

Thu Dec 22, 2022 18:04
4 Perennially Misused Words

Some word pairs will probably always continue to be confused. Here are five such, all of which have been mentioned on this site in the past. The examples in this post date from recent months. pore: (verb) to examine closely Confused with pour: (verb) to transfer water or some other substance from a container. [Agents continue] to pour through...

Fri Dec 16, 2022 16:37

Build your own newsfeed

Ready to give it a go?
Start a 14-day trial, no credit card required.

Create account