Çevrimdışı

GAFF/GAFFE

Gaffe is a French word meaning “embarrassing mistake,” and should not be mixed up with “gaff”: a large hook.


GAMUT/GAUNTLET

To “run a gamut” is to go through the whole scale or spectrum of something. To “run the gauntlet” (also gantlet) is to run between two lines of people who are trying to beat you. And don’t confuse “gamut” with “gambit,” a play in chess, and by extension, a tricky maneuver of any kind.


GANDER/DANDER

When you get really angry you “get your dander up.” The derivation of “dander” in this expression is uncertain, but you can’t replace it with “dandruff” or “gander.” The only way to get a gander up is to awaken a male goose.


GAURD/
RIGHT: GUARD

Too bad the Elizabethan “guard” won out over the earlier, French-derived spelling “garde” but the word was never spelled “gaurd.” The standard spelling is related to Italian and Spanish “guarda,” pronounced “gwarda.”

GENIUS /
RIGHT: BRILLIANT

In standard English “genius” is a noun, but not an adjective. In slang, people often say things like “Telling Mom your English teacher is requiring the class to get HBO was genius!” The standard way to say this is “was brilliant.”


GENDER

Feminists eager to remove references to ***uality from discussions of females and males which don’t involve mating or reproduction revived an older meaning of “gender” which had come to refer in modern times chiefly to language, as a synonym for “***” in phrases such as “Our goal is to achieve gender equality.” Americans, always nervous about ***, eagerly embraced this usage, which is now standard. In some scholarly fields, “***” is used to label biologically determined aspects of maleness and femaleness (reproduction, etc.) while “gender” refers to their socially determined aspects (behavior, attitudes, etc.); but in ordinary speech this distinction is not always maintained. It is disingenuous to pretend that people who use “gender” in the new senses are making an error, just as it is disingenuous to maintain that “Ms.” means “manuscript” (that’s “MS” ). Nevertheless, I must admit I was startled to discover that the tag on my new trousers describes not only their size and color, but their “gender.”

GET ME /
RIGHT:
GET MYSELF

“I gotta get me a new carburetor,” says Joe-Bob. Translated into standard English, this would be “I have to get myself a new carburetor.” Even better: leave out the “myself.”

GHANDI/
RIGHT:
GANDHI

Mohandas K. Gandhi’s name has an H after the D, not after the G. Note that “Mahatma” (“great soul”) is an honorific title, not actually part of his birth name. The proper pronunciation of the first syllable should rhyme more with “gone” than “can.” Among Indians, his name is usually given a respectful suffix and rendered as Gandhiji, but adding Mahatma to that form would be honorific overkill.


GIBE/JIBE/JIVE

“Gibe” is a now rare term meaning “to tease.” “Jibe” means “to agree,” but is usually used negatively, as in “the alibis of the two crooks didn’t jibe.” The latter word is often confused with “jive,” which derives from slang which originally meant to treat in a jazzy manner (“Jivin’ the Blues Away”) but also came to be associated with deception (“Don’t give me any of that jive”).


GIG/JIG

“The jig is up” is an old slang expression meaning “the game is over—we’re caught.” A musician’s job is a gig.


GILD/GUILD

You gild an object by covering it with gold; you can join an organization like the Theatre Guild.



GONE/WENT

This is one of those cases in which a common word has a past participle which is not formed by the simple addition of -ED and which often trip people up. “I should have went to the business meeting, but the game was tied in the ninth” should be “I should have gone. . . .” The same problem crops up with the two forms of the verb “to do.” Say “I should have done my taxes before the IRS called” rather than “I should have did. . . .”


GOOD/WELL

You do something well, but a thing is good. The exception is verbs of sensation in phrases such as “the pie smells good,” or “I feel good.” Despite the arguments of nigglers, this is standard usage. Saying “the pie smells well” would imply that the pastry in question had a nose. Similarly, “I feel well” is also acceptable, especially when discussing health; but it is not the only correct usage.

GOT/GOTTEN

In England, the old word “gotten” dropped out of use except in such stock phrases as “ill-gotten” and “gotten up,” but in the U.S. it is frequently used as the past participle of “get.” sometimes the two are interchangeable, However, “got” implies current possession, as in “I’ve got just five dollars to buy my dinner with.” “Gotten,” in contrast, often implies the process of getting hold of something: “I’ve gotten five dollars for cleaning out Mrs. Quimby’s shed” emphasizing the earning of the money rather than its possession. Phrases that involve some sort of process usually involve “gotten”: “My grades have gotten better since I moved out of the fraternity.” When you have to leave, you’ve got to go. If you say you’ve “gotten to go” you’re implying someone gave you permission to go.



GRATIS/GRATUITOUS

If you do something nice without being paid, you do it “gratis.” Technically, such a deed can also be “gratuitous"; but if you do or say something obnoxious and uncalled for, it’s always “gratuitous,” not “gratis.”


GRISLY/GRIZZLY

“Grisly” means “horrible”; a “grizzly” is a bear. “The grizzly left behind the grisly remains of his victim.” “Grizzled,” means “having gray hairs,” not to be confused with “gristly,” full of gristle.



HANGAR/HANGER

You park your plane in a hangar but hang up your slacks on a hanger.


HANGED/HUNG

Originally these words were pretty much interchangeable, but “hanged” eventually came to be used pretty exclusively to mean “executed by hanging.” Does nervousness about the existence of an indelicate adjectival form of the word prompt people to avoid the correct word in such sentences as “Lady Wrothley saw to it that her ancestors’ portraits were properly hung”? Nevertheless, “hung” is correct except when capital punishment is being imposed or someone commits suicide.

HARDY/HEARTY

These two words overlap somewhat, but usually the word you want is "hearty.” The standard expressions are “a hearty appetite,” “a hearty meal,” a “hearty handshake,” “a hearty welcome,” and “hearty applause." "Hardy” turns up in “hale and hardy,” but should not be substituted for "hearty” in the other expressions. “Party hearty” and “party hardy” are both common renderings of a common youth saying, but the first makes more sense.


HEADING/BOUND

If you’re reporting on traffic conditions, it’s redundant to say "heading northbound on I-5.” it’s either “heading north” or "northbound."


HEAL/HEEL

Heal is what you do when you get better. Your heel is the back part of your foot. Achilles’ heel was the only place the great warrior could be wounded in such a way that the injury wouldn’t heal. Thus any striking weakness can be called an “Achilles’ heel.” To remember the meaning of “heal,” note that it is the beginning of the word “health.”

HEAR/HERE

If you find yourself writing sentences like “I know I left my wallet hear!” you should note that “hear” has the word “ear” buried in it and let that remind you that it refers only to hearing and is always a verb (except when you are giving the British cheer “Hear! Hear!” ). “I left my wallet here” is the correct expression.


HERBS/SPICES

People not seriously into cooking often mix up herbs and spices. Generally, flavorings made up of stems, leaves, and flowers are herbs; and those made of bark, roots, and seeds and dried buds are spices. An exception is saffron, which is made of flower stamens but is a spice. When no distinction is intended, the more generic term is “spice”; you have a spice cabinet, not a spice-and-herb cabinet, and you spice your food, even when you are adding herbs as well. The British pronounce the H in “herb” but Americans follow the French in dropping it.


HERO/PROTAGONIST

In ordinary usage “hero” has two meanings: “leading character in a story” and “brave, admirable person.” In simple tales the two meanings may work together, but in modern literature and film the leading character or “protagonist” (a technical term common in literary criticism) may behave in a very unheroic fashion. Students who express shock that the “hero” of a play or novel behaves despicably reveal their inexperience. In literature classes avoid the word unless you mean to stress a character’s heroic qualities. However, if you are discussing the main character in a traditional opera, where values are often simple, you may get by with referring to the male lead as the "hero"—but is Don Giovanni really a hero?

HEROIN/HEROINE

Heroin is a highly addictive opium derivative; the main female character in a narrative is a heroine.


HIM, HER/HE, SHE

There is a group of personal pronouns to be used as subjects in a sentence, including “he,” “she,” “I,” and “we.” Then there is a separate group of object pronouns, including “him,” “her,” “me,” and “us.” The problem is that the folks who tend to mix up the two sets often don’t find the subject/object distinction clear or helpful, and say things like “Her and me went to the movies."

A simple test is to substitute “us” for “her and me.” Would you say “us went to the movies?” Obviously not. You’d normally say “we went to the movies,” so when “we” is broken into the two persons involved it becomes “she and I went to the movies.”

But you would say “the murder scene scared us,” so it’s correct to say “the murder scene scared her and me.”

If you aren’t involved, use “they” and “them” as test words instead of “we” and “us.” “They won the lottery” becomes “he and she won the lottery,” and “the check was mailed to them” becomes “the check was mailed to him and her.”


HINDI/HINDU

Hindi is a language. Hinduism is a religion, and its believers are called “Hindus.” Not all Hindus speak Hindi, and many Hindi-speakers are not Hindus.


HIPPIE/HIPPY

A long-haired 60s flower child was a “hippie.” “Hippy” is an adjective describing someone with wide hips. The IE is not caused by a Y changing to IE in the plural as in “puppy” and “puppies.” It is rather a dismissive diminutive, invented by older, more sophisticated hipsters looking down on the new kids as mere “hippies.” Confusing these two is definitely unhip.



HISTORIC/HISTORICAL

The meaning of “historic” has been narrowed down to “famous in history.” One should not call a building, site, district, or event “historical.” Sites may be of historical interest if historians are interested in them, but not just because they are old. In America “historic” is grossly overused as a synonym for “older than my father’s day.”


HOLD YOUR PEACE/SAY YOUR PIECE

Some folks imagine that since these expressions are opposites, the last word in each should be the same; but in fact they are unrelated expressions. The first means “maintain your silence,” and the other means literally “speak aloud a piece of writing” but is used to express the idea of making a statement.


HOARD/HORDE

A greedily hoarded treasure is a hoard. A herd of wildebeests or a mob of people is a horde.


HOLE/WHOLE

“Hole” and “whole” have almost opposite meanings. A hole is a lack of something, like the hole in a doughnut (despite the confusing fact that the little nubbins of fried dough are called “doughnut holes”). “Whole” means things like entire, complete, and healthy and is used in expressions like “the whole thing,” “whole milk,” “whole wheat,” and “with a whole heart.”


HYSTERICAL/HILARIOUS

People say of a bit of humor or a comical situation that it was “hysterical”—shorthand for “hysterically funny”—meaning “hilarious.” But when you speak of a man being “hysterical” it means he is having a fit of hysteria, and that may not be funny at all.

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