Editor's Corner

In years past, I’ve done the 12 Day of Grammar and the 12 Days of English, but I’m not going to go there this year. Today, I’m going to take a moment to sip some sugar-free spiced cider, I’m going to inhale the scent of pine needles, and I’m going to admire the amazing Wonder Woman figurine that somebody left on my desk. (Best Christmas present ever! Thank you, Eric!)

Oh yes, I’m also going to shamelessly guide you to an article about words and the upcoming holiday, written by Meghan Jones—not by me or my sweet little elves. We’re taking a break!

Enjoy!

Why Do We Say “Merry Christmas” but “Happy” Everything Else? by Meghan Jones

The word "merry" isn’t one we use very often during the months of January through November. But as soon as Thanksgiving passes, you’re bound to start hearing and seeing it everywhere—on billboards, on decorations, in songs, and, of course, straight from the mouths of well-wishers. And after it, you’re almost certain to hear the word "Christmas." (Or the words "little Christmas," in the event of a certain holiday standard.) But if you wished someone a "Merry Birthday," or a "Merry Halloween," you’d probably get some weird looks! Likewise, if you wished someone a "Happy Christmas" (unless you live in England, where many people do say "Happy Christmas"). Why is Christmas the only holiday we hope will be "merry"?

Today, we use " merry" for Christmas the way we use "happy" for any other holiday, but the words themselves technically don’t have the exact same meaning. While "happy" suggests a more general emotional state of joy, "merry" can imply that there’s a bit of raucous revelry afoot. And before the 18th century, you could hear both "Merry Christmas" and "Happy Christmas." The most likely reason for this is the fact that, well, "merry" was just a far more popular word back then than it is today. The first written record of someone using "Merry Christmas" comes from a 1534 letter from a bishop to royal minister Thomas Cromwell.

But then, in the 18th century, "merry" started to tip the scales, largely thanks to one man: Charles Dickens. "Merry Christmas" was the phrase of choice in Dickens’ A Christmas Carol, a work that would have a major influence on the modern English-speaking world’s perception of Christmas. It was gaining popularity in carols as well. In addition, the language was changing and "merry" was falling out of fashion as a word on its own. It stuck around, though, in phrases like "the more the merrier" and—you guessed it—the now increasingly popular "Merry Christmas."

But, because of the potentially rabble-rousing connotations of "Merry Christmas," high-class Brits—including the royal family themselves—chose "Happy Christmas" as their default greeting. That’s why you’ll still hear it today in the U.K. This likely also helped cement the popularity of "Merry Christmas" in America—newly independent Americans were determined to specifically not do and say things the British way.

Now, of course, because of the popularity of "Merry Christmas"—and how little we say "merry" in other situations—"merry" now calls to mind a celebration that’s cozy, festive, and filled with gift-giving rather than one that’s overly revelrous and rowdy. And this is the most likely reason it would just sound…odd to use the word for any other holiday.

Happy Holidays!

Kara Church

Technical Editor, Advisory

Symitar Documentation Services

Good morning, folks!

Today’s question is from one of our credit union clients. He asked if I could review the phrase “I feel like chopped liver” or “What am I? Chopped liver?” A coworker said it, and he thought that it meant they were going to go eat chopped liver.

Well, Michael, of course we can review it! According to Know Your Phrase, “What am I? Chopped liver?” is a “rhetorical question used by a person who feels they are being given less attention or consideration than someone else.”

Here are the author’s theories on where the phrase might be from:

The first theory says that liver is not always viewed on the same level as other foods. For example, if a person is cooking a chicken, they’ll oftentimes throw away the giblets, you know, like the liver or gizzard. Or instead of throwing the giblets away, the person will cook them, not for themselves, but for their pets to eat. Hence, since liver is not usually as desirable to eat as other foods, the expression might spring from such an idea.

Another explanation, as Wikipedia explains, is that “chopped liver was traditionally served as a side dish rather than a main course.” So, the idea would be that sometimes, a person might feel like their thoughts or feelings are not being considered as fully as they should, so they feel like they are being treated as if they were a side dish.

I’m not sure what your coworker was getting at, but this is the most common use and meaning of the phrase.

I am definitely NOT chopped liver! Ew.

Kara Church

Technical Editor, Advisory

Symitar Documentation Services

Very recently, the phrase “OK Boomer” has become popular among younger people to “dismiss or mock attitudes stereotypically attributed to the Baby Boomer generation. It is considered by some to be ageist,” according to an article on Wikipedia. The phrase is traced back to 2009, but it didn’t become popular until January of this year, when people started reacting to a video of an older man who said "millennials and Generation Z have the Peter Pan syndrome, they don’t ever want to grow up; they think that the Utopian ideals that they have in their youth are somehow going to translate into adulthood.” The response to the video (“OK Boomer”) became even more popular this past November because of several news stories on the phrase.

Rather than insult each other, let’s look into where some of these generational names came from. The following excerpt is from an article called How Baby Boomers, Generation X, and Millennials Got Their Names, from Mental Floss:

…Who decides what…generations are named, if they get a name at all? Surprisingly, there isn’t one single clearinghouse where these names are chosen. Instead, generations frequently receive multiple names that then battle it out until only one remains—a process that is currently being fought between the likes of iGen, Generation Z, and Post-Millennials….

BABY BOOMERS (1946-1964)

(KC – The children who would come to be known as Baby Boomers were born a few years after the soldiers returned home from World War II and the economy “boomed.”)

Although the children born from 1946 to 1964 get the name Baby Boomers, that phrase wouldn’t appear until near the end of the generation. In January 1963 the Newport News Daily Press warned of a tidal wave of college enrollment coming as the “Baby Boomers” were growing up….

Oddly, an alternate name for people born during this time was Generation X; as London’s The Observer noted in 1964, “Like most generations, ‘Generation X’—as the editors tag today’s under 25s—show a notable lack of faith in the Old Ones.”

GENERATION X (1965-1980)

That comment in The Observer was in reference to a then-recently published book called Generation X by Jane Deverson and Charles Hamblett. A few years later, Joan Broad bought a copy at a garage sale, her son found it, and he fell in love with the name.

That son was Billy Idol, and according to his memoir, Dancing with Myself,“We immediately thought it could be a great name for this new band, since we both felt part of a youth movement bereft of a future, that we were completely misunderstood by and detached from the present social and cultural spectrum.” The band Generation X would begin Billy Idol’s career. [KC – And the song “Your Generation” is one of my all-time favorites!]

But the name Generation X wouldn’t become associated with a wide group of people until 1991. That’s the year Douglas Coupland’s Generation X: Tales for an Accelerated Culture was released….

MILLENNIALS (1981-1996)

What comes after Generation X? Generation Y, obviously. That was the logic behind several newspaper columns that proclaimed the coming of Generation Y in the early ’90s. But as psychologist Jean Twenge explained…the failure of “baby busters” as a term to describe Generation X, “Labels that derive from the previous generation don’t tend to stick.”

Instead, in 1991 authors Neil Howe and William Strauss wrote Generations, which included a discussion about the Millennials. According to Forbes, they felt that as the oldest members of this generation were graduating high school in 2000—and everyone was focusing on the coming date—Millennials seemed a natural fit.

It seems there has always been a generation gap. Like Millennials today, Boomers probably felt that previous generations were out of touch.

No matter which generation you are part of, try to appreciate the differences of those younger or older than you—instead of using their generation’s name as an insult.

Kara Church

Technical Editor, Advisory

Symitar Documentation Services

Last week, Kathy C. sent Kara and me a link to an CNN article titled Apostrophe Protection Society Disbanded. At first, I was surprised to learn that there is an Apostrophe Protection Society. It made me wonder if there is a Quotation Mark Correct Usage Society or a Stop the Blatant Misuse of Capitalization Society. That would be cool! But I had a sneaking suspicion that I’d heard about the Apostrophe Protection Society before. And I definitely remember reading and writing about a group in the UK that advocated banning apostrophes altogether because they’re “too confusing.” I remember that surprising me because, as we’ve pointed out numerous times, there are only two main uses for apostrophes: to show omission and to show possession.

CNN’s article mentioned that the Apostrophe Protection Society was founded in 2001 by a retired British journalist named John Richards. Recently, Richards said that he has disbanded the society because the battle for proper usage has been lost.

Wait a minute! I didn’t know the battle was lost! I’m still fixing apostrophe mistakes in the jobs I work on. I haven’t given up hope! But Richards’s comment intrigued me, so I did a little research, and there is an interesting background to this story. Here’s a passage from an article I wrote in 2015:

In 2009, in England, the Birmingham City Council determined that apostrophes were too confusing, so they banned their use on road signs and place names (like King’s Heath—a suburb of Birmingham). John Richards, founder of the Apostrophe Protection Society, who was understandably outraged, said, “Now children will go around Birmingham and see utter chaos…If you don’t have apostrophes, is there any point in full stops [periods], or semicolons, or question marks? Is there any point in punctuation at all?”

Richards has been championing this cause for a long time, and he is clearly very passionate. My guess is that he is simply fatigued. This has been a long struggle. But I’m not so sure that there is no hope for the embattled apostrophe. Some people, like many of you (and me), care a lot. Some people don’t care at all. Whichever group grows biggest and strongest will win this language battle. That’s the way it works. Our language is always changing. Sometimes we like the change. Sometimes we don’t. But I’d say that the apostrophe battle has not been lost. Not yet, comrades.

And the Apostrophe Protection Society has not completely disappeared. In case you’re interested, there is an Apostrophe Protection Society website, and it was updated as recently as November 2019. They’ve put up a message that says the site will “remain open for some time for refence and interest.” That’s encouraging.

Incidentally, I just performed a search for apostrophes in this article, and I used 19 of them.

I’ll be in sad shape if they’re banned. (Make that 21 apostrophes.)

Donna Bradley Burcher | Senior Technical Editor | Symitar®

8985 Balboa Ave. | San Diego, CA 92123 | Ph. 619.278.0432 | Ext: 765432

About Editor’s Corner

Editor’s Corner keeps your communication skills sharp by providing information on grammar, punctuation, JHA style, and all things English. As editors, we spend our days reading, researching, and revising other people’s writing. We love to spend a few extra minutes to share what we learn with you and keep it fun while we’re doing it.

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Dear Editrix,

Last week, a client pointed out to me that when a word is used as both a noun and a verb that the emphasis will be on the first syllable if it is a noun and on the second syllable if it is a verb. For example, desert. As a noun it is pronounced DEH-zert, and as a verb de-ZERT. The client gave me other examples such as object, permit, and insult. I told her that it did not work with vomit, but perhaps I am just pronouncing it wrong as a verb. 👩 Can you expand on this a little?

Sincerely,

Just wonDERing

Dear WonDERing,

I was not aware of this particular quirk with English. As you found, it doesn’t apply to all verb/noun pairs that are spelled alike, but it does happen with a lot of them. It happens often enough that there is a name for the process where the stress moves to the first syllable of a verb when it is used as a noun or adjective. This process is called “initial-stress derivation,” and it sounds a little like something you might catch if you walk into a patch of poison ivy. According to Wikipedia, you can find this occurring

…in the case of several dozen verb-noun and verb-adjective pairs and is gradually becoming more standardized in some English dialects, but it is not present in all. The list of affected words differs from area to area, and often depends on whether a word is used metaphorically or not. At least 170 verb-noun or verb-adjective pairs exist….

Many of these have first syllables that evolved from Latin prepositions, although again that does not account for all of them.

Here are a few more examples, but for a more complete list, check out the entire article here:

Kara Church

Technical Editor, Advisory

Symitar Documentation Services

Dear Editrix,

I’ve noticed the use of “on premise” instead of “on premises” in company documents and accounting codes. I’ve also seen it on a restaurant’s website advertising “on-premise” catering. I see Google claims that “on premise” has become the accepted tech industry term. Why did this incorrect use become acceptable? I know language evolves, but this is a case of total replacement. If I have to say or write “on premise,” I’ll feel stupid, but if I stick with “on premises,” I might be seen as ignorant of modern technology terms.

What’s the tipping point? At what point does a stickler tip over?

Thanks for any insight!

Emily

Dear Emily,

I don’t really know of the tipping point for sticklers, though I’ve been tipped a few times. I think a lot of these things are just shortcuts that become accepted, but in this case, it is the removal of a single letter and I don’t really see the point. I was about to go on a tirade about this particular term, but then I found an article that’s better than a rant from me. Here is Shirley Siluk’s response, from Collective Content. (Note: It is a British group, so the following article has some differences in punctuation and spelling.)

Not every writer enjoys being a scold about grammar and usage. Here at Collective Content we’re willing to give the occasional pass….

But even non-pedants have sore spots about certain bad writing habits, and here’s ours: describing information technology infrastructure as being ‘on-premise’. And we hear that a lot, given the main area where Collective Content operates is B2B IT.

According to the OED, this would suggest that your IT is on ‘a previous statement or proposition from which another is inferred or follows as a conclusion’. And that, obviously, is doubtful.

No, when people write ‘on-premise’, the term they’re really looking for is ‘on-premises’. As in, the IT equipment is located on the site of a ‘building… occupied by a business or considered in an official context’.

We get it. ‘On-premise’ is shorter, quicker and a bit easier to say than ‘on-premises’. But it’s a usage that’s just a bit too wrong…, even when compared to other bad writing habits. For instance, some of us might snicker when we see business copy using ‘service’ as a verb…. But the verb ‘service’ does have a legitimate alternate definition that means to ‘perform a service or services’. For now, at least, there’s no such alternative for ‘on-premise’.

Beyond being grammatically wrong, saying your IT is ‘on-premise’ is also imprecise from a technology perspective. And that’s not an impression any tech company should want to make. Customers seeking good, secure, up-to-date IT want highly specific things: 99.999 percent uptime, laser-sharp focus on security, low mean-time-to-detect and mean-time-to-respond, and so on.

Even if just a few prospects are put off by something as wrong as ‘on-premise’, you could hurt your chance of winning new business.

The problem is, the use of ‘on-premise’ has become pervasive in some corners of the tech world… to the point it’s becoming standard. Before it’s too late to reverse this trend, could we suggest a few solutions?

First, just try making a point of saying ‘on-premises’. It’s really not that difficult or time consuming – certainly not for an industry that loves using ‘utilise’ instead of ‘use’, or ‘incentivise’ instead of ‘encourage’.

If not, perhaps a shortened form – ‘on-prem’ – might be better? [KC – Yuck. No, it is not better. This is where I disagree. Just add the “s” to the end of the word. We don’t need to make the language that lazy!] It’s a variation that’s also appeared frequently in the tech world, and it avoids the whole ‘premise’ versus ‘premises’ problem entirely.

That’s a premise that works for us, no matter whose premises you’re talking about.

Kara Church

Technical Editor, Advisory

Symitar Documentation Services

Dear Editrix,

I keep noticing lately—and only in the past year or so—people ending a conversation by saying “Have a great rest of your/the day.” Do you think that we consider this proper grammar? Where does this come from? Am I wrong in thinking that this just recently became popular?

I would think that “Have a great day,” as I always heard it, worked just fine, and that “I hope the rest of your day goes well,” or something similar, works better than “Have a great rest of your day,” which almost sounds like “I hope that your rest goes well—the rest that is to happen on your day!”

Sincerely,

Enjoying My Rest

Dear Rest,

I have to agree with you that “have a great rest of your day” is grammatically awkward. “Enjoy the rest of the day,” or “Enjoy the remainder of your day,” are grammatically correct, but “have a great rest of your day” is a bit ambiguous. Are we talking about a nap? Or are we talking about enjoying the remainder of the day?

I couldn’t find any information about when this started becoming popular, but I found a ton of discussion threads about how annoying a lot of people find it. Many called it a “peeve” of theirs. And then the response from others (using less pleasant language) was “Why are you complaining? People are trying to be nice!” I also saw that one person said it’s perfectly fine, but their first language was Portuguese, so I’m going to write that off.

My guess, from the number of people out there complaining online, is that it is being used more frequently. I also found an article by Shopify that listed it as a nice thing to say to show your thanks to customers. Hmmm. I’m with you. I’d stick with “Have a good/great day” or even “Enjoy the rest of the day.”

Enjoying their rest for the day

Kara Church

Technical Editor, Advisory

Symitar Documentation Services

Good morning to those of you who join me in working on this, hopefully quiet, Friday. Well, Thanksgiving is behind us, and we all know what that means: Black Friday is upon us.

I thought I’d share a little bit about the background of Black Friday. According to an article on Vocabulary.com, the earliest mention of “Black Friday” to refer to the day after Thanksgiving occurred in the November 1951 issue of Factory Management and Maintenance—and it was about worker absenteeism, not shopping and huge sales.

But the tradition that made the name “Black Friday” part of our national lexicon, and that linked it to holiday shopping, occurred in the 1960s. According to the Vocabulary.com article, “Retailers would like you to believe that it’s the day when stores turn a profit on the year, thus ‘going into the black.’ But don’t you believe it: the true origins come from traffic-weary police officers in Philadelphia in the early 1960s.” And this event did have to do with the shopping rush. The article states that many Philadelphia police officers were forced to work 12-hour shifts to deal with heavy shopping traffic.

Back in the ’60s there was a push to find a more positive term than “Black Friday.” The term “Big Friday,” was introduced, but it just didn’t fly. “Black Friday” took hold, and the shopping tradition grew more popular and spread across the states.

I heard on the news on my way in to work this morning that just a few years ago, 51% of people in the United States participated in Black Friday shopping. And when the craze was at its worst, in 2008, a Walmart employee was trampled and killed by a shopping mob on Black Friday. This year, only about 30% of us are expected to shop on Black Friday, which still makes it the busiest shopping day of the year—hopefully, the smaller crowds will be better behaved.

In any case, I’m not participating. I’m here, with you, working so that my husband, Mick, can join the fray and buy me something really magnificent. No pressure, Mick. I’m sure whatever you find will be wonderful. It’s not the present that matters, it’s the fact that you risked life and limb to get it for me. That’s true love.

Donna Bradley Burcher | Senior Technical Editor | Symitar®

8985 Balboa Ave. | San Diego, CA 92123 | Ph. 619.278.0432 | Ext: 765432

About Editor’s Corner

Editor’s Corner keeps your communication skills sharp by providing information on grammar, punctuation, JHA style, and all things English. As editors, we spend our days reading, researching, and revising other people’s writing. We love to spend a few extra minutes to share what we learn with you and keep it fun while we’re doing it.

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I recently did an Editor’s Corner refresher on acronyms, and one of you dear readers asked if any of us had ever discussed recursive acronyms. I don’t recall doing anything on those, so it seems like now is a great time to talk about them.

A regular acronym is an abbreviation formed from the initial letters of other words and pronounced as a word, such as NASA (for the National Aeronautics and Space Administration). A recursive acronym is an acronym that uses its own name in the abbreviation. For example, BIRD, which stands for BIRD Internet Routing Daemon. You may ask yourself, “Why would someone do this?” According to an article in Wikipedia, a recursive acronym was invented to explain an “infinite series,” in a book titled Gödel, Escher, Bach: An Eternal Golden Braid.

Still wondering about this whole thing? When I saw that title with “Escher” in it, it suddenly made sense to me. The acronym using its own name in the abbreviation is like a mobius strip or an Escher drawing: it’s tough to find a beginning or an end in it. Maybe some pictures will help, or a few more examples?

A mobius strip:

And for more about M.C. Escher and recursion, here is a brief description from an article about him and some of his art:

“M.C. Escher occupies a unique spot among the most popular artists of the past century. While his contemporaries focused on breaking from traditional art and its emphasis on realism and beauty, Escher found his muse in symmetry and infinity. His attachment to geometric forms made him one of modernism’s most recognizable artists and his work remains as relevant as ever.”

And some additional recursive acronyms from the Wikipedia article:

• ANX — ANX’s Not XNA
• ATI — ATI Technologies Inc.
• CAVE — CAVE Automatic Virtual Environment
• FIJI — FIJI Is Just ImageJ
• GNU — GNU’s Not Unix
• JACK — JACK Audio Connection Kit
• MIATA — MIATA is Always the Answer
• PIP — PIP Installs Packages
• XINU — Xinu Is Not Unix
• ZWEI — ZWEI Was EINE Initially (“eins” and “zwei” are German for “one” and “two” respectively)

Kara Church

Technical Editor, Advisory

Symitar Documentation Services

Good morning! Since many of you enjoy Richard Lederer’s columns when I post them, I have another one to give you from a few weeks ago. This one is all about numbers. (Thanks, Ron, you’re number one!)

The English Language Always Has Your Number

It is not only the mathematician who is fascinated by numbers. Whether we know it or not, we all speak numbers, from zero through 10, and well beyond. It’s as easy as one-two-three.

From time to time, I hear people say, “That didn’t work. I guess we’ll have to go back to ground zero.” Ground zero is a fairly new compound in English. It refers to the point on the Earth’s surface closest to a detonation. The term was first used in 1946 to refer to Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan, the sites of nuclear detonations in World War II. It broadened its meaning to mean any detonation site, and now any site that is a center of activity.

People often confuse ground zero with the more logical phrase “I guess we’ll have to go back to square one.” Here the metaphor is probably rooted in the playground game four-square, which first appeared in the early 1950s. A player starts in square one and tries to move through squares two and three to square four by hitting a ball that is unrerturnable into one of the other squares. The losing player goes back to square one.

Hidden forms of the number two occur in the words between, betwixt, combine, zwieback and twilight, in which tween, twixt, bi, zwie and twi all mean “two.” The root sense of zwieback is “twice baked” and of combine “to join two things.” Twilight is literally the time of two lights, the fading sunset and the emerging light of the stars.

Three Dog Night was a popular rock band in the Sixties, Seventies and Eighties. Their name, however, preceded the band. A three-dog night is a night so cold that it takes three dogs to keep you warm.

You might call a low-down skunk a four-flusher. Four-flusher characterizes a poker player who pretends to hold a flush but in fact holds a worthless hand of only four same-suit cards.

Now let’s take five for the number five. It’s easy to see that the quint in quintet and quintuplets means “five.” Less apparent is the quint in quintessence. The ancient Greeks held that everything in the world was composed of four elements—earth, air, fire and water. To these the philosopher Aristotle added a new element: quinta essentia, “fifth essence.”

To deep six is naval idiom that means “to throw overboard,” with six signifying “six fathoms (36 feet) deep. The original term came from measuring the water depth under a ship using a lead-weighted sounding line. The lines were marked at two, three, five, seven, 10, 13, 15, 17 and 20 fathoms. If the depth was at a mark, the leadsman would call “by the mark” followed by the number; if the depth was between two marks, he would call “by the deep” followed by the estimated number. Six fathoms would be “by the deep six.” By extension, to deep six has come to denote generally “to get rid of someone or something.”

Your sixth sense—the one beyond sight, hearing, touch, taste and smell—may be leading you to seventh heaven, the very height of happiness. The Mesopotamians created the concept of seven heavens, and the phrase has come to mean “a state of supreme joy.”

The best-known expression involving the number eight is behind the eight ball. In Kelly pool, up to 15 players may participate. They draw numbers out of a bottle to determine the order of play. Any player past eight has little chance of winning. Behind the eight ball has been generalized to mean “any difficult, troublesome situation.”

I truly hope that you’re not deep sixed and behind the eight ball but in seventh heaven and on cloud nine. On cloud nine, meaning “in a state of high euphoria,” is a reference to the 10 types of clouds defined in International Cloud Atlas, first published in 1896. Cloud nine is a cumulonimbus cloud that can rise to the lofty height of 6.2 miles, as high as a cloud can be.

Dec is the Latin root for “ten,” as in decade, decimal and decimate. To decimate once described the nasty habit of the Roman commanders of slaying one out of every 10 soldiers, selected by lot, in a mutinous legion. Nowadays decimate means “to destroy a large number of living things,” with no connection to the number 10, as in “the gypsy moth caterpillars decimated the trees in our yard.”

Clearly, the days of our English language have long been numbered, 24-7.

Kara Church

Technical Editor, Advisory

Symitar Documentation Services