Grammar Round-up

I just came across this apparently weekly NY Times column explaining the editors' position on various grammatical issues and rounding up usage errors of the past week.  Definitely worth a read!

Here is the beginning:

The ‘Tweet’ Debate

By PHILIP B. CORBETT

After I distributed the in-house version of After Deadline to my colleagues last week, word leaked out that I had supposedly “banned” use of the word “tweet” to refer to messages posted on Twitter.

I had suggested that outside of ornithological contexts, “tweet” should still be treated as colloquial rather than as standard English. It can be used for special effect, or in places where a colloquial tone is appropriate, but should not be used routinely in straight news articles. I had made this point before; my memo was simply a reminder.

Reaction outside The Times was swift, widespread and often negative. The scorn we encounter from traditionalists for allowing “data” as either singular or plural — previously my benchmark for an incendiary stylebook issue — pales in comparison.

...
[the rest of the article]

Wordplay Winners

We blogged a few months ago about Princeton Prof. Joshua Katz's freshman seminar on wordplay.  An article in the Princeton Alumni Weekly magazine at that time announced a constrained writing contest.  Now the results are in, and we're impressed!  The winning entry, pictured above, took it's constraint cue from the letters in a regulation Scrabble bag.  Impressive effort -- congrats to Justin Werfel, who took top honors.

The best part of wordplay is that it encourages other wordplay.  One of the honorable mentions, Arlen Kassof Hastings, submitted this in response to Werfel's winning entry:

If any of you, dear readers, have what it takes to compose a piece of constrained writing using only the letters (and blanks!) in a regulation Scrabble set, submit it to us and we will surely post the results!