The american heritage guide to contemporary usage and style 2005

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The AMERICAN HERITAGE» Guide to Contemporary Usage and Style The AMERICAN HERITAGE* Guide to Contemporary Usage and Style HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY Boston ' New York Words included in this book that are known to have current trademark registrations are shown with an initial capital and are also identified as trademarks No investigation has been made of common-law trademark rights in any word, because such investigation is impracticable The inclusion of any word in this book is not, however, an expression of the Publisher's opinion as to whether or not it is subject to proprietary rights Indeed, no word in this book is to be regarded as affecting the validity of any trademark American Heritage® and the eagle logo are registered trademarks of Forbes Inc Their use is pursuant to a license agreement with Forbes Inc Copyright © 2005 by Houghton Mifflin Company All rights reserved No part of this work may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying and recording, or by any information storage or retrieval system without the prior written permission of Houghton Mifflin Company unless such copying is expressly permitted by federal copyright law Address inquiries to Reference Permissions, Houghton Mifflin Company, 222 Berkeley Street, Boston, MA 02116 Visit our website: www.houghtonmifflinbooks.com Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data The American heritage guide to contemporary usage and style, p cm ISBN-13: 978-0-618-60499-9 ISBN-10: 0-618-60499-5 English language—Usage—Dictionaries English language—Style—Dictionaries English language—United States—Usage—Dictionaries English language—United States—Style—Dictionaries I Houghton Mifflin Company PE1464.A46 2005 423M- -dc22 2005016513 Manufactured in the United States of America QUM 10 Contents Editorial and Production Staff vi Usage Panel vii Introduction xii Pronunciation Key xvi The American Heritage Guide to Contemporary Usage and Style Editorial and Production Staff Vice President, Publisher of Dictionaries Margery S Berube Vice President, Executive Editor Joseph P Pickett Senior Editors Steven Kleinedler Susan Spitz Editor Catherine Pratt Associate Editors Erich Michael Groat Uchenna Ikonné Patrick Taylor Vice President, Managing Editor Christopher Leonesio Database Production Supervisor Christopher Granniss Art and Production Supervisor Margaret Anne Miles Editorial Production Assistant Katherine M Getz Administrative Coordinator Kevin McCarthy Assistant Editor Nick Durlacher Intern Tracy Duff Contributing Editor David Pritchard Text Design Catherine Hawkes, Cat & Mouse • -ward 498 backward glance In order to avoid distracting the reader with inconsistencies within a single piece of writing, however, writers should avoid using adverbs in -ward in one instance but the equivalent adverbs in -wards in another instance, if no other circumstance requires that there be some variation The use of both -ward and -wards to form synonymous adverbs goes back even to Old English, where the two suffixes had the forms -weard and -weardes, respectively waterspout See tornado See current Way has long been an intensifying adverb meaning "to a great degree," as in way off base or way over budget This usage is both acceptable and common but has an informal ring Way is also used by many younger speakers as a general intensifier, as in way cool and way depressing This usage remains a hallmark of the casual speech of younger people and is not appropriate for formal contexts way versus ways In American English ways is often used as an equivalent of way in phrases such as a long ways to go This usage is considered nonstandard by most editors, though it appears occasionally in less formal texts Appositive nouns or noun phrases sometimes lead writers and speakers to choose incorrect pronoun forms Thus us is frequently found in constructions such as Us owners will have something to say about the contract, where we is required as the subject of the sentence Less frequently, we is substituted in positions where us should be used, as in For we students, it's a no-win situation In all cases, the function of the pronoun within the sentence should determine its form, whether or not it is followed by a noun or noun phrase See more at pronouns, personal weak verbs A weak verb is one that forms its past tense and past participle by adding a suffix that ends in -d, -ed, or -t, as start, have, and send See more at verbs, principal parts of weaned on The phrase weaned on is sometimes used to mean "raised on," as in Children weaned on junk food will have difficulty switching to a healthy diet While this might appear to well • 499 be a mistake, since wean refers literally to a detachment from a source of nourishment, such as breast milk, the weaning process involves a substitution of some other form of nourishment, as At six months the baby was weaned onto solid foods The extension to figurative usages would seem to follow Thus a sentence like Paul was weaned on Dixieland jazz suggests that Paul's exposure to this form of jazz began almost from the time he stopped nursing, that is, from a very early age The construction thus can be used to good effect, as these examples show: The northerners among the refugees, who fled to South Vietnam immediately after the fall of the French at Dien Bien Phu, in 1954, were weaned on harsh weather and infertile soils and are known for their rigorous work ethic (Lowell Weiss, "Timing is Everything," Atlantic Monthly) Great War soldiers were weaned on Andrew Lang's fairy-tale anthologies and original stories such as George MacDonald's The Princess and the Goblin (John Garth, Tolkien and the Great War) website The development of website as a single uncapitalized word mirrors the development of other technological expressions which have tended to take unhyphenated, uncapitalized forms as they become more familiar Thus email has recently been gaining ground over the forms E-mail and e-mail, especially in texts that are more technologically oriented Similarly, there has been an increasing preference for closed forms like homepage, online, and printout George may look good, but he's not well English speakers have used well as an adjective as well as an adverb since Old English times, and the adjective well continues to enjoy a healthy existence When applied to people, well usually refers to a state of health Like similar adjectives such as ill and faint, well in this use is normally restricted to the predicate, as in the example above Well does see occasional use as an attributive (that is, before a noun) as in Benjamin Franklin's "Poor Dick eats like a well man, and drinks like a sick." It also appears in compound adjectives like well-baby and wellchild, which are widely used by health-care providers and are familiar to most parents Good, on the other hand, has a much wider range of senses that includes "attractive" (as in She looks good) and "competent" (as in For a beginner, he's pretty good) as well as "healthy." feel well / feel good Some people insist that the expression feel good should not be used in reference to health but should be reserved for the description of a person's emotional condition But in practice people don't often follow this distinction, and it should not be assumed that readers will be aware of it See more at bad • welsh 500 Etymologists can find no firm evidence that the verb welsh, meaning "to swindle a person by not paying a debt" or "to fail to fulfill an obligation," is derived from Welsh, the people of Wales However, many Welsh themselves harbor no doubt on this subject and hold the verb to be a pointed slur It makes sense then to avoid this informal term in ordinary discourse; renege or cheat can usually be substituted See subjunctive what as subject of a clause When what is the subject of a clause, it may take a singular or plural verb, depending on the sense What is singular when taken as the equivalent of that which or the thing which: I see what seems to be a dead tree It is plural when taken as the equivalent of those which or the things which: He sometimes makes what seem to he thoughtless mistakes what in a clause that is the subject When a clause that has what as its subject is itself the subject of a sentence or part of a linking verb construction, it may take a singular or plural verb, but determining this is more complicated Most of these what clauses are singular: What they always wanted was a home of their own In fact, wha clauses are usually singular even when the verb is a linking verb, such as he or seem, followed by a plural noun or a series of nouns: What she kept in her drawer was ten silver dollars What truly commands respect is a large air force and a resolute forei policy In some cases, a clause with what as the subject may be treated as either singular or plural, depending on the intended emphasis In What excite him most are money and power, the implication is that money and power are distinct elements; in What excites him most is money and power, the implication is that money and power are a single entity Notice that the verb excite in the above examples is singular or plural according to whether the what clause as a whole requires a singular or plural verb In these cases, the word what agrees with the verb within the what clause as well If the verb in the what clause is necessarily plural, then the whole clause similarly takes a plural verb: What seem to he two dead trees are blocking the road There are also certain sentences that have a main verb followed by a plural noun or noun phrase whose sense requires that the what clause be plural, as in What traditional grammarians called "predicates" are called "verb phrases" by some modern guists and What the Romans established as military outposts were later to become i portant trading centers In these sentences, the plural nouns predicates and outposts give the what clauses their plural meaning Notice that in the second example, the phrase those places (that), clearly a plural noun phrase, could conceivably substitute whenever • 501 for what Those places (that) the Romans established as military outposts were later t become important trading centers See more at subject and verb agreement and which whatever whatever or what ever Both whatever or what ever may be used in sentences such as Whatever [or What ever] made her say that? Critics have occasionally objected to the one-word form, since ever in such sentences is acting as an adverb, separate from the question word what (as in What were you ever thinking?) However, many respected writers have used the one-word spelling The same is true of the forms whenever, whoever, wherever, and however The one-word forms whatever, whenever, and so on must be used when the words introduce a clause, or a noun phrase modified by a clause: I'll leave whenever [not when ever] you leave; Take whatever [not what ever] books you need whatever and commas When a clause beginning with whatever is the subject of a sentence, not use a comma: Whatever you is right Otherwise, a comma is fine: Whatever you do, don't burn the toast whatever should never be used with that When the phrase preceding a restrictive clause is introduced by whichever or whatever, that should not be used in formal writing Thus whatever book that you want to look at is regarded as incorrect Drop the word that in such cases: Whatever book you want to look at will be sent to your office; Whichever book costs less [not that costs less] isfinewith us See more at that In informal style, when is often used after be in definitions: A dilemma is when you don't know which way to turn The construction is useful, but it is widely regarded as incorrect or as unsuitable for formal discourse In formal style, there is no alternative but to rephrase such definitions to avoid is when The trick here is to make the first part of the sentence a full clause: A dilemma is a situation in which you don't know which way to turn You are in a dilemma when you don't know which way to turn When is acceptable, however, when a noun phrase that denotes a point in time is being defined or described: The best time to eat is when one is hungry See hence whenever See whatever • where 502 where and positional prepositions When where is used to refer to a point of origin, the preposition from is required: Where did she come from? When it is used to refer to a point of destination, the preposition to is generally superfluous: Where is she going? rather than Where is she going to? When where is used to refer to the place at which an event or a situation is located, the use of at is widely regarded as regional or colloquial So unless you want to convey the flavor of speech, write Where is the station? not Where is the station at? where as a relative pronoun Where is also used as a relative pronoun, as in Show me an example where government intervention in the market has worked The Usage Panel has mixed feelings about this In our 2001 survey, 60 percent accepted the example just given, but only 44 percent accepted Sometimes the discussion degenerates into a situation where each person accuses the other of being illogical These usages probably derive from the positional use of where in sentences like He went to the house where the money was kept and We hid the present in the closet where we hang coats These positional usages are standard, but in all of these instances, where can be safely and clearly replaced by in which where for that Where is also used as a relative pronoun where that might normally be expected, as in J don't see where they had much choice but to give up The Usage Panel has less fondness for this usage Only 30 percent of the Panel accepted this sentence in our 2001 survey wherever See whatever The verb whet means "to sharpen, as a knife." It is also usedfigurativelyto mean "to make more keen, to stimulate," as in whetting someone's interest or appetite for something It is commonly misspelled as wet, as in this quotation from a book review in an academic journal: "Specifically, the Editors' essay is a most concise and precise summary and evaluation of Samuels's work in all its ramifications It is a piece that w one's appetite for reading Samuels's publications, at least those that one has not rea before." whether See doubt and if which referring to a clause or sentence The relative pronoun which can sometimes refer to a clause or sentence, as opposed to a noun phrase: She ignored him, whilst • 503 which proved to be unwise They swept the council elections, which could never have happened under the old rules Sometimes these which clauses are presented as separate sentences These are technically sentence fragments, and they often pack a rhetorical punch: And it was then, about that time, that I began to find life unsatisfactory as an explanation of itself and was forced to adopt the method of the artist of not explaining but putting the blocks together in some other way that seems more significant to him Which is a rather fancy way of saying I started writing (Tennessee Williams, "The Resemblance Between a Violin Case and a Coffin," Flair) The job was called a Class-A high-rise, and it was a steel building going several stories up and a few down We were pouring decks and nonstructural beams and wrapping columns It was in Beverly Hills, and it was on Rodeo Drive Which sounds good but isn't (Dagoberto Gilb, "Victoria," Washington Post Magazine) I was caught for a week on the Siachen Glacier, in a giant blizzard There is no harsher place on this earth; it belongs to no one Which won't keep people from squabbling over it someday (Andrea Barrett, "Servants of the Map," Salmagundi) While these examples are perfectly acceptable, writers who want to avoid this use of which and adhere to the traditional rules can usually substitute this for it at the start of a new sentence, though often at the loss of some dramatic flair Note that which clauses that modify whole sentences can sometimes create ambiguities The sentence It emerged that Martha made the complaint, which surprised everybody may mean either that the complaint itself was surprising or that it was surprising that Martha made it This ambiguity may be avoided by using other constructions such as It emerged that Martha made the complaint, a revelation that surprised everybody Remember that which is used in this way only when the clause or sentence it refers to precedes it When the clause or sentence follows, writers must use what, particularly in formal style: Still, he has not said he will withdraw, which is more surprising Still, what is more surprising, he has not said he will withdraw See more at sentence fragments, that, and what whichever See whatever The word whilst is a British variant of the word while and has an archaic or poetic feel in American English While using it runs the risk of sounding pretentious, it can sometimes add a literary or ironically formal note to a piece of writing, as in these examples: Then there's the longtime character actor who is happily drinking himself into the poorhouse When he copped a gig in a locally shot flick, he repeatedly held up production whilst he tried to sober up long enough to read his lines (Boston Herald) Excuse me a moment whilst I knock on wood, after characterizing what other motorcyclists as idiotic (Morning Call) • whilst 504 Traditionally, this word is pronounced with a long i as in while See more at amid Although white in its racial sense has never been stigmatized in the same way as other color labels, especially yellow and red, there are many people who would prefer to dispense with all names based on skin color in favor of a more neutral vocabulary of national or geographic origin The terms Euro-American and European American have gained some currency in recent years as an alternative to white, their primary appeal being their equivalence to such now-popular ethnonyms as African American, Asian American, and Native American And since Europe is viewed from America as a region of many different languages and cultures, these terms can serve as a reminder that the group of people usually known as "whites" does not necessarily make up a homogeneous community But Euro-American and European American sound artificial to many people, and the fact remains that black and white are familiar and convenient labels that are not likely to disappear from American English anytime soon Though black is sometimes capitalized when referring to African Americans or their culture, white is almost always spelled lowercase See more at black, Caucasian, and Euro-American who and whom The traditional rules that determine the use of who and whom are relatively simple: who is used for a grammatical subject, where a nominative pronoun such as J or he would be appropriate, and whom is used as the object of a verb or preposition Thus, it is correct to say The actor who played Hamlet was excellent, sinc who stands for the subject of played Hamlet, and Who you think is the best cand date? where who stands for the subject of is the best candidate Who is also required when it would be part of the predicate of a linking verb construction For example, in Shefinallyfound out who her real friends were, who is part of the predicate of the linking verb (its predicate nominative), while her real friends is the subject of the predicate In contrast, traditional grammar requires To whom did you give the letter? since whom is the object of the preposition to, and The man whom the papers criticized did not show up, since whom is the object of the verb criticized These traditional rules apply in the same manner to whoever and whomever The rules were formulated by grammarians in the 18th century who noticed that the two words were often used interchangeably, with whom sometimes being used as a subject, and who as an object In fact, this variation goes back to the 14th century Today, the rules are well established as a part of formal Standard English Nonetheless, whom is uncommon in speech and informal writing because of its inherently formal tone When formality is not required, who generally replaces whom Sentences such as It was better when he knew who to pay attention to and who to ignor sound perfectly natural, despite violating the traditional rules In many contexts, 505 whose • whom sounds forced or pretentiously correct, as in Whom you think John's been dating? In sentences in which whom is a relative pronoun, that can often be used instead: The electrician that the school hired has rewired four rooms so far The players that the coach reprimanded stayed late to work on their conditioning Note that separating the word whomfromthe preposition of which it is the object is stylistically awkward Whom did you give your hooks to? is more naturally expressed as Who did you give your books to? If the preposition and whom (or who) are not placed at the front of the clause, who is usually acceptable, at least in informal contexts: / need to know who lied to who Interestingly, if both the preposition and who/whom are moved to the front of the clause, the form used must be whom, even in many informal contexts: To whom [not to who] should we address these packages? But note that who is correct when it follows a preposition as the subject of the subsequent clause: The reporters differ as to who they think might win the nomination I want to vote for who(ever) can best lead the country in a time of crisis If sentences like these seem awkward, they can be recast with nouns as the objects of the prepositions: The reporters differ as to which candidate they think might win the nomination I want to vote for the candidate who can best lead the country in a time of crisis who in restrictive and nonrestrictive clauses The relative pronoun who may be used in restrictive clauses, in which case it is not preceded by a comma, or in nonrestrictive clauses, in which case a comma is required Thus it is acceptable to say either The scientist who discovers a cure for cancer will be immortalized, where the clause who discovers a cure for cancer indicates which scientist will be immortalized, or The mathematician over there, who solved the four-color theorem, is widely known, where the clause who solved the four-color theorem adds information about a person already identified by the phrase the mathematician over there See more at else and that whoever 35B See whatever and who See that and who whomever See whatever and who inanimate whose The possessive adjective whose (the possessive form of the pronoun who) has been used to refer to inanimate antecedents since the 14th century It appears in the works of many illustrious writers, including literary giants like Shakespeare, Milton, and Wordsworth, and the history of English literature would be much impoverished without it The word serves a useful purpose, since which and that not have possessive forms, and the substitute phrase of which is often awkward and can ruin theflowof a sentence In some cases, little harm is done by making such a substitution, asidefromincreasing syntactic complexity A relatively simple sentence like He pointed to a grove of trees whose trunks were coated with ice (adapted from a • whose 506 story by Rick Bass) is made somewhat stilted but not unspeakable by the avoidance of whose: He pointed to a grove of trees, the trunks of which were coated with ice Bu sentences become more complicated, wrenching in of which can be especially clumsy Consider this revision of a sentence that used whose in its original (penned by Natalie Angier): The revolution in our study of how genes work began with the study of bacte like E coli, the DNA of which is packed very differently from that of the cells of hig organisms Clearly, the original phrasing {whose DNA is packed) is more elegant and easier to read In spite of its grace and handiness, inanimate whose has been criticized by usage commentators since the 18th century The tradition holds that whose should function only as the possessive of who, and be limited in reference to persons Certainly, whose serves this function eminently well, and in the great majority of our citations whose refers to a person, not a thing The notion of whose properly being a form of who (and not which) has considerable bearing on attitudes about the word In our 2002 survey, only 44 percent of the Usage Panel approved of an example in which whose refers to a river: The EPA has decided to dredge the river, whose bottom has been polluted for years The association whose with people undoubtedly influenced the Panel's response to an example that is syntactically similar to the previous one, in which the antecedent is a book, but the subject of the whose clause is a person Some 63 percent of the Panel accepted the sentence The book, whose narrator speaks in the first person, is a mock autobiograph Note that this still leaves almost 40 percent of the Panel in disapproval Because the alternative phrasing to whose can be so awkward, there is often no easy solution to this problem except to recast the entire sentence (and perhaps the one before it) to avoid whose altogether This is one case in which the cure could be worse than the disease whose and who's Remember not to confuse whose with its homophonous contraction who's (for who is) This error is surprisingly common and is easy to commit when writing in a rush See more at possessive constructions See reason why wife / husband / spouse Although it was once always true that a wife was the only female in a marriage and a husband the only male, the advent of same-sex marriage has changed this assumption A married woman can have either a husband or a wife, as can a married man The generic word spouse is always appropriate in contexts in which specifying gender is not important When a member of a couple is defined as being a wife or husband, the other member should be referred to in parallel fashion The traditional phrase man and wife, though still common, is offensive to many people The equitably balanced phrases husband and wife and man and woman are unobjectionable 507 wizen • The suffix -wise has a long history of use to mean "in the manner or direction of," as in clockwise, otherwise, and slantwise, and these usages are fully acceptable The suffix ultimately goes back to the Old English noun wise, "manner of doing something," which was used to form compounds functioning as adverbs of manner Since the 1930s, however, -wise has been used in the vaguer sense of "with relation to," as in This has not been a good year saleswise or Taxwise, it is an unattractive arrangement these examples sound unremarkable, this may be because -wise is used frequently in business writing and in informal speech But in this relational usage, the suffix has never gained respectability in more formal situations and still will strike many readers as inelegant Usually such words as saleswise and taxwise can be quite easily replaced by paraphrases such as This has not been a good year with respect to sales and As far as taxes are concerned, it is an unattractive arrangement The verb wish is sometimes used with an infinitive as a polite substitute for want: Do you wish to sit at a table on the terrace? Anyone who wishes to may leave now This u age is appropriate for formal style, where it is natural to treat the desires of others with exaggerated deference Less frequently, wish is used with a noun phrase as its object, as in Anyone who wishes an aisle seat should see an attendant Both usages may sound stilted in informal style See more at subjunctive When the subject of a sentence is followed by a noun or noun phrase introduced by with rather than and, the verb remains singular: The governor, with his aides, is expected to attend the fair See more at and with regard to / with respect to See in regard to The verb wizen, meaning "to shrivel up or wither," is pronounced with a short i (wïz'an) • woke 508 See wake See girl and man word formation See affixes; compound words; hyphenation; plural nouns; suffixes; and verbs, principal parts of wordiness Using too many words often makes it difficult to understand what is being said The reader must work hard to figure out what is going on, and in many cases may simply decide it is not worth the effort Verbosity also tends to sound overblown, pompous, and evasive In general, wordy writing has three distinguishing characteristics: weak verbs, ponderous nouns, and many prepositional phrases One key to writing clearly and concisely is to use strong active verbs (although avoiding the passive voice as a blanket policy can lead to problems of its own; see more at passive voice and verbs, voice.of) Weak verb forms such as be, seem, and appear can often be replaced with active verbs Wordy writing with weak verbs tends to rely on abstract nouns, often ending in -ment, -tion, and -ence The nouns carry the semantic load and are often embedded in prepositional phrases, as in this sentence: It is essential to acknowledge that one of the drawbacks to the increased utilization of part-time employees is that people who are still engaged full-time by the company are less likely to be committed to the recognition and identification of problems in the production area With active verbs, the deletion of unnecessary words (like it is essential to acknowledge that), and the use of noun modifiers to the grammatical work of the prepositions, this sentence can be compressed by about two thirds: Using more part-time employees often makes full-time employees less willing to report production problems Good writing, of course, has other virtues beside compactness Just because a statement is concise does not make it moving Consider the following passage from a speech by Winston Churchill voicing defiance during one of the most difficult times of World War II It could certainly be made shorter with fewer repetitions, but it would hardly be more inspiring: We shall not flag or fail We shall go on to the end We shallfightin France, we shall fight on the seas and oceans, we shallfightwith growing confidence and growing strength in the air, we shall defend our island, whatever the cost may be, we shall fight on the beaches, we shallfighton the landing grounds, we shallfightin the fields and in the streets, we shallfightin the hills; we shall never surrender See more at redundancy wrangle • 509 See force See auxiliary and primary verbs, rather, shall, should, and subjunctive See rack wrangle/wangle The verbs wrangle and wangle sound similar and are sometimes confused Wrangle means "to quarrel noisily or angrily," as well as "to herd horses or other livestock." Thus people wrangle with one another or with the 1RS or some other agency The verb is also used without an object as a synonym of argue, as in: "It's funny as a crutch," he kept saying, "while we sit here wrangling under schoolmaster Wilson, John Bull's putting his hands on all the world's future supplies of oil just to keep it from bolos." (John Dos Passos, 1919) Wangle generally means "to achieve by contrivance or manipulation," as in He wangled a job for which he had no training and The reporter wangled a copy of the preliminary report from one of the committee members Properly speaking, one does not wangle with someone else On the other hand, most dictionaries accept that one may also wrangle something for oneself (that is, win something by argumentation), so in this sense the two words are synonyms Thus, it is Standard English to wangle or wrangle an invita'tion to a party, but the latter entails putting forth a convincing argument or winning a contentious exchange of opinions, while the former entails practically any means conceivable Both words are sometimes used as synonyms of the verb struggle, in contexts where the word wrestle would seem more appropriate: A memoir of life in a foreign country can be a satisfying set piece The hero, always a tone-deaf boob, will wrangle with a new house and local customs, tussle with the natives, learn a language, taste the indigenous cuisine (New York Times Book Review) Although canoes can carry more, kayaks are basically closed, which means you stay drier, and so does your gear Sea kayaks are also lighter, and thus easier to propel and wrangle in and out of the water (New York Times) Johnny Knoxville and his crew of idiots have actually earned a spot on the silver screen with their outlandish brand of antics Caught in Japan they wreak havoc on a golf course and wangle with live alligators (Independent Weekly) These uses are not listed in dictionaries, however, and are considered nonstandard • wreak 510 wreak/wreck When wreak means "to bring about, cause," it is sometimes confused with wreck, "to cause the destruction of," perhaps because wreaking damage may leave a wreck A storm can only wreak havoc, never wreck havoc The past tense and past participle of wreak is wreaked, not wrought, which is an alternative past tense and past participle of work The expression work havoc is an acceptable way of saying the same thing as wreak havoc Using the past form wrought havoc may cause readers to believe that wrought is being used incorrectly as the past form of wreak wring/ring The verb wring means "to twist, squeeze, or compress, especially so as to extract liquid," and is often followed by the preposition out: We had to wring out the towels after wiping the wet floor The past tense and past participle of wring is wrung, which is sometimes miscast as wringed or wrang, as in this theater review from a Texas newspaper: "Coincidences and eerie flashbacks introduce Genny's rural past, where she wrang the necks of chickens with ominous skill." The sound-alike verb ring means "to surround" and "to move, run, or fly in a spiral or circular course." It is sometimes used erroneously instead of wring, as in this quotation from a California newspaper: "'Of course, I still have moments when I want to ring his neck, and he feels the same way,' Chérie admits (But failure is no longer option for us We are making it work this time.'" See author See wreak The pronunciation (ëks'mas) is the result of a misinterpretation of the abbreviation Xmas, where the X actually represents a Greek chi, the first letter Khrïstos, "Christ." This pronunciation is generally only used jocularly or informally xylem / phloem Both of these words refer to the vascular system that is characteristic of most plants Xylem (from the Greek word xulon meaning "wood") refers to the sturdy tissues that conduct water and minerals upward from the roots to the stem and leaves Phloem (from the Greek word phloios meaning "bark") refers to the softer tissues that conduct nutrients downward from the leaves to other parts of the plant All seed-bearing plants (gymnosperms and angiosperms), along with the ferns, lycophytes, and horsetails (pteridophytes), have xylem and phloem In an attempt to seem quaint or old-fashioned, many store signs such as "Ye Olde Coffee Shoppe" use spellings that are no longer current The word ye in such signs looks identical to the archaic second plural pronoun ye, but it is in fact not the same word Ye in "Ye Olde Coffee Shoppe" is just an older spelling of the definite article the The y in this ye was never pronounced (y) but was rather the result of improvisation by early printers In Old English and early Middle English, the sound {th) was represented by the letter thorn (I>) When printing presses were first set up in England in the 1470s, the type came from Continental Europe, where this letter was not in use The letter y was used instead because in the handwriting of the day the thorn was very similar to y Thus we see such spellings as ye for the, y* or yat for that (which nowadays look very odd) well into the 19th century However, the modern revival of the archaic spelling of the has not been accompanied by a revival of the knowledge of how it was pronounced, with the result that (yë) is the usual pronunciation today yellow Of the color terms used as racial labels, yellow, referring to Asians, is perhaps the least used now and the most clearly offensive Its primary associations in contemporary 511 • yellow 512 English are with the expressions yellow horde and yellow peril, references to the supposed threat posed by Asian peoples who, according to a scenario popular around the turn of the 20th century, were poised to overwhelm the rest of the world, especially whites As with numerous other pejorative labels, yellow is sometimes used ironically or defiantly by Asian Americans today, as in a prominent website featuring Asian cultural links that calls itselfyellowpride.com, but it should of course be avoided by outsiders In formal writing, yet in the sense "up to now" is used with an accompanying verb in the present perfect rather than in the simple past: He hasn't started yet, not He didn't start yet The use of yet with the simple past is common in speech and is often used in informal writing zoology Traditionally, thefirstsyllable of zoology has been pronounced as (zô), rhyming with toe However, most likely due to the familiarity of the word zoo (which is merely a shortened form of zoological garden), the pronunciation of the first syllable as (zôô) is also commonly heard In our 1999 survey, 88 percent of the Usage Panel found the (zô-) pronunciation acceptable, and 60 percent found the (zôô-) pronunciation acceptable, with 68 percent using the (zô-) pronunciation and 32 percent using the (zôô-) pronunciation in their own speech Thus, while both pronunciations are acceptable, the (zô-) pronunciation is more closely associated with the word's scientific background In related words beginning with zoo-, only the pronunciation (zô), not (zôô), should be used: zoogenic (zô'a-jën'ïk), zoon (zô'ôn')- The prefix zoo- comes from Greek zôion, meaning "living being" or "animal." ... The AMERICAN HERITAGE Guide to Contemporary Usage and Style The AMERICAN HERITAGE* Guide to Contemporary Usage and Style HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY Boston ' New York Words... Key xvi The American Heritage Guide to Contemporary Usage and Style Editorial and Production Staff Vice President, Publisher of Dictionaries Margery S Berube Vice President, Executive Editor Joseph... Panelists allow the pronoun their to refer to a singular noun in order to avoid using the masculine his to stand for both men and women In this instance, these Panelists choose to supersede the dictums