Saturday morning in our apartment was marked, as all of them ought to be, by Saturday morning cartoons. It may be more accurate to say “cartoon”, singular — only one cartoon was shown, on repeat, because my roommate’s visiting friends had fallen asleep watching it the night before. It was “The Old Man and the Lisa“, the episode of The Simpsons where Mr. Burns loses all his money and is forced to make a living by recycling. Sent to a retirement home, Mr. Burns looks for something to do, such a newspaper to read, only to be met with Grampa Simpson’s explanation of why none are available: “We’re not allowed to read newspapers. They angry up the blood.”
The same restriction ought to be placed on me as well, except I shouldn’t be allowed to read grammar blogs. For you see, as I was busy working on my big yearly paper, I needed to read something to clear my head from all the Dirichlet distributions dancing in my head. Having already hit all of the sites I normally hit for distracting stories and finding nothing new, I foolishly sought out what other grammar bloggers had to say for themselves. Three minutes later, my blood had been so angried that I actually left a corrective comment on one blog — something that I virtually never do. I felt soothed and returned to my paper with a renewed vigor.
The next day I noticed that there was no comment on that post. Odd, I thought, but then again, I’d been up late writing the night before. It was entirely possible that I’d thought better of posting the comment. So I tried another comment, shorter and less confrontational. It too disappeared. And so I have to go to all the bother of debunking this grammar gremlin here instead of settling it there.
The post in question is just the same junk everyone says on the internet to show their linguistic superiority — complaining that the so-called “educated” amongst us are actually uneducated, blaming the ills of modern language usage on “the drone of mass media”, all that jazz. The whole point of the post is that the rabble is destroying the language by replacing adverbs with adjectives. The post drips with disdain for those dips whose slovenly usage is slowly leaching our precious adverbs from our precious language.
Look, I don’t have a lot of patience for this garbage. I’m not going to assert that adverbs definitely aren’t disappearing, but let me point out that the first three examples given to support the claim that our language is falling apart are completely specious. This is the opening paragraph of the post:
My theory—though I cannot call it my own, original theory—is that within the next hundred years or so, all adverbs will cease to exist. I see them slowly disappearing throughout the various levels of education: the un-tenured freshman recalling that her O-Chem professor “talks too fast” (forgetting, for a moment, the equivocation of the verbs talk and speak); the corporate guru pitching his product as “built tough;” all the way up to the double-doctorate responding “I’m good, thanks” when confronted by the everyday salutation “how are you?”
So we have three examples of adverbs being displaced: talks too fast, built tough, and I’m good. There’s just one problem. Adverbs aren’t being displaced in any of these.
Let’s start with “talks too fast”. I’m supposing that the author presumes it’s an error because fast is an adjective and not an adverb. Since fast is modifying the verb talks, an adjective would indeed be inappropriate. But here’s the thing: fast is both an adjective and an adverb. It’s been an adverb since around 1200, according to the Oxford English Dictionary. In fact, the OED notes that the adjectival form of fast came from the adverbial form! I don’t even know what the intended correction of talks too fast would be supposed to be. Talks too fastly? Nope.
Now on to that damnable Ford advertising slogan: “built tough”. Okay, that complaint at least gets the part of speech right; tough is indeed an adjective, and there is no adverbial usage of tough that would be consistent with the intended meaning. But as it turns out, the adjectival form is totally fine there. It’s called a predicative adjective. Compare it to
(1a) I painted the door white.
(1b) The door was painted white.
(2a) The company built the truck tough.
(2b) The truck was built tough.
And note that an adverb doesn’t actually work here. You can’t say the door was painted whitely, and while I think you could say the truck was built toughly, it doesn’t have the right meaning. Toughly in that phrase describes the manner by which the truck was built, while tough in (2) is modifying the truck itself. And since the truck is a noun phrase, it gets modified by an adjective, not an adverb.
I’ll admit that the predicative adjective sounds a little odd — I don’t often use it myself — but it’s been standard English for quite some time. While you may have many objections to the Ford Motor Company, this one just isn’t justified.
The last complaint is saying “I’m good.” On occasion back at college, I caught some guff for this. In my family, we just don’t say well. We’re not well, we’re good. There is a substantial difference to me — well implies mere healthiness, while good implies an overall contentedness. One can be well without being good, and vice versa. But I digress. What’s more important than a brief overview of my family’s social interactions is that well in this situation isn’t an adverb, either. It’s an adjective.
You have to use an adjective in this sentence because there’s only a linking verb. You couldn’t say I’m indignantly; you’d say I’m indignant. The modifier is modifying the subject of the sentence, so it’s got to be an adjective. When you say I’m well, you’re not using adverbial well, because there wouldn’t be anything for the adverb to modify. You’re using adjectival well, which just means “healthy”. It’s a separate question whether you think well is a better adjective than good in this sentence, but the choice has to be between adjectives. Adverbs are strictly ruled out. Strike three.
Okay, so someone on the internet is wrong. Why was I so riled up? Honestly, I wouldn’t have cared about this junk if it weren’t for the last paragraph of the post:
I blame the drone of the mass media, producing poorly thought-out mind-tranquilizers without regard for elevating the comprehension of the masses. But then, I generally hate the entertainment industry and am always quick to point out its culpability in the denigration of our society whenever possible. Meanwhile, if at some point you catch me twitching while listening to you, there’s a good chance you’ve forgotten two very important things: first and foremost, you’ve forgotten your third grade grammar lessons; and second, you’ve forgotten that you’re talking to a grammar snob.
See, that’s why people don’t like self-appointed “grammar snobs”. Not only are they often completely wrong, but they’re insufferably condescending about it. If you’re going to go around telling everyone that they’re idiots, you should probably do a little research to make sure they really are.
17 comments
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June 12, 2009 at 6:35 am
Jan Freeman
Calm that roiling blood, Gabe. This person doesn’t claim to be a grammar blogger; what’s more, he disqualifies himself from the usage-snob club with the post’s title, “Oh, wherefore art thou, adverbs?” One of the first things a true nitpicker learns (in high school English) is that this “wherefore” means “why,” not “where.”
I’ve actually been noticing a fair amount of pushback against stupid usage commentary, as I wrote in last week’s column. http://www.boston.com/bostonglobe/ideas/articles/2009/06/07/thou_shalt_not_worry_about_it/. Maybe it will cheer you up!
May 10, 2009 at 9:51 pm (Uncategorized) (adverbs, grammar)
June 12, 2009 at 9:05 am
matt
why would you want to clear your head of dancing dirichlet distributions? that sounds downright delightful!
June 12, 2009 at 12:18 pm
Bob Hale
Oh, I don’t know. I think “why are you adverbs” is perhaps more appropriate than “where are you, adverbs”.
Albeit unintentionally.
:)
June 12, 2009 at 2:46 pm
goofy
This blogger’s complaint seems to partly stem from the use of flat adverbs – adverbs that don’t end in “ly”. I’ve read other complaints about how adverbs ending in “ly” are supposedly disappearing. But according to MWDEU, they might be increasing. Flat adverbs used to be more common than they are now, for instance Defoe’s “the weather was so violent hot.” I blame the drone of the mass media for the loss of flat adverbs.
June 15, 2009 at 8:48 am
The Ridger
I blame grammar snobs for the disappearance of good, plain English flat adverbs myself. -LY is like -WISE, dammit! Eschew it!
I’ve had success with my students by telling them that linking verbs take adjectives, and that includes omitted ones: Ford’s truck is not built *in a tough manner* but instead *to be tough*. (Since folks like that blogger generally are all “you don’t feel GOOD, you feel WELL!” that often works to confuse them into silence, if nothing else.)
June 15, 2009 at 8:50 am
The Ridger
Plus: “in the denigration of our society whenever possible”
Surely he meant “degradation”?
June 18, 2009 at 10:05 am
sciamanna
Not only does “wherefore” mean “why”, but “thou” is singular and “adverbs” plural. Maybe the blogger is going for some record in error density?
June 18, 2009 at 9:57 pm
Oriana
This person made my BLOOD BOIL, I understand your frustration. To be even more petty and nitpick than the commenters above me, the author also misues semi-colons, hyphens, and capitalization. Who’s forgotten their school lessons now, eh?
June 24, 2009 at 2:19 am
MikeyC
It didn’t make my blood boil, but it did make me fall asleep. ;-)
June 26, 2009 at 2:11 pm
Gabe
Jan: Thanks for the article; it did soothe me substantially, and I really like your argument that the age of peeve is ending. I know that the author wasn’t a grammar blogger per se, but does consider him or herself a grammar snob, is talking about the less/fewer distinction on the blog’s “about” page, and is a grammar bully. I’d’ve held my tongue if only the first two were true, but I have no stomach for bullying — at least not in the area that I study.
Everyone else: Thanks for finding all the other grammatical shortcomings. I now know better than to meet with your awesome ire!
June 27, 2009 at 5:58 pm
mike
FWIW, I left a comment on the blog in question which was, as predicted, immediately deleted. Why does the writer even bother enabling comments, I wonder, if all they really want to do is rant? So: snobbish, ill-informed about grammar, AND thin-skinned. All things considered, not someone I’d care to invite to dinner.
June 29, 2009 at 11:57 am
Gabe
mike: I’m glad to hear I am not the only commenter non grata over there. Brothers in arms we are!
March 31, 2010 at 5:15 pm
Ben
So here’s a question: do you think the reason people are so compelled to say “I’m well” is because of the how in “how are you?” We generally answer “how” with an adverb, right? Does it follow, then, that this usage of “how” is the illogical element in this exchange?
March 31, 2010 at 6:45 pm
Gabe
Ben: No, I don’t think it’s at all illogical. “How” can replace either an adverb or an adjective, depending on the situation. Think of “How is the soup?” or “How does he seem?” They could be answered by things like “The soup is spicy” or “He seems rugged”.
April 1, 2010 at 12:53 pm
MikeyC
Gabe, what do you mean by “replace” in ‘”How” can replace an adverb or an adjective’?
April 3, 2010 at 2:46 am
Gabe
MikeyC: What I meant was that “how” can be used in a question to inquire about an adverb or an adjective. For instance, “How did the soup taste?” can be answered with “The soup tasted delicious,” so “how” is replacing an adjective (delicious) in the question. Similarly, “who” would replace a noun phrase in the question “Who are you eating with?” Does that clarify it? “Replace” isn’t the best word for what I’m talking about, perhaps, but that’s the danger of replying at too late an hour.
April 4, 2010 at 1:37 am
MikeyC
Well clarified, Gabe. Thanks.