I feel a rant coming on.
In the world rankings for the best education systems, Great Britain comes third. America comes twelfth, so, as a British-educated person, I feel that I may opine a little.
There are two things that may contribute to America's dismal performance... not to mention Noah Webster, who dumbed down the language and thereby obscured the etymological roots of words.
One of those things is the First Amendment as applies to advertising and general standards of literacy in broadcast media. There is no mechanism to prevent poorly educated young advertising employees from drumming bad grammar and vile word choices into our heads.
Another is sloppy scholarship, especially in the field of editing works that purport to be educational. Oooh, harsh.
I have two examples: the confusion between the abstract nouns "Envy" and "Jealousy", and between the comparative adjectives "Less" and "Fewer".
Envy and Jealousy are different sins. Envy is like covetousness. It is the desire to have something that someone else has. Jealousy is like greed. It is the desire to keep good things for oneself.
It would be wrong to say, "I'm jealous of his hair..." unless he is wearing a toupee made of my own hair.
One is jealous of something that belongs (or once belonged) to one, and that one resents someone else enjoying. One
could guard a possession jealously; for instance, one might guard the manicured lawn to one's home, and shout at dog walkers who allow their dogs to squat on it.
It would be grammatically correct to say, "I envy his hair," if my own hair (or lack thereof) does not compare favorably with his.
The simplest, five-word mnemonic for the difference between jealous and envious is:
"A jealous husband; envious Casca."
Othello was a jealous husband. ("Othello", Shakespeare). Casca was described by Anthony as envious. ("Julius Caesar", Shakespeare).
" n Julius Caesar, Antony describes Casca as envious to highlight Casca's underlying jealousy and discontent. This characterization serves to illustrate the personal and political motivations driving Casca's involvement in the conspiracy against Caesar."
Notice how the cheat sheet editors muddy the waters of scholarship by writing that Casca is described as envious because he is jealous?
My reference: "Julius Casear" Act 3-Verse 2- Line 174. "See what a rent envious Casca made..."
A fine discussion of the actual assassination can be seen here:
Another scholar and his editor apparently did not bother to fact check a reference to murder in "Julius Caesar", and asserted that the envious assassin was Cassius. Of course, Cassius may have also been envious, but he is not immortalized for that motivation by Shakespeare.
Casca has a Wiki page. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Publius_Servilius_Casca
By the way, Publius Servilius, Capurnaum, Brachiosaurus... what do they have in common? A diphthong. Americans struggle with dipthongs, which might be a topic for another day.
And so, to comparing and contrasting the comparatives of the day.
Fewer vs. Less—Explanation and Examples | LanguageTool
"Less is More" is an oxymoron, (that link links to an excellent explanation of the etymology of "oxymoron" and its use in poetry to stimulate thought), often associated by the architect and designer Ludwig Mies Van Der Rohe, who abhorred clutter and excess.
Less is like a measure of flour in a baking recipe... uncountable elements, measured by the spoonful, or cupful... or vodka in a martini, or trouble, or time, incentives, or money, (especially fixed value units of currency such as 100 dollars, or effort.
Fewer is like the counting of lemons, or minutes, or seconds, or casualties, or single-denomination dollars, or choices, or alternatives, options, problems, people, customers, demonstrators, members of an audience, ideas, stars in the sky.
'Fewer' and 'Less'
That's it, more or less. Notice it next time an anchor or actor or advertisement gets it wrong. It's probably too late to do anything about it, because the errors will have been scarfed up by AI and will be inserted willy-nilly (will he/ ne will he) into our written consciousness.
PS. The online dictionaries have "willy-nilly" wrong, etymologically speaking, but they are in a majority, so what can one do?
Think about it: "will he" is much closer to "willy" than "will I"... if you speak it. The "n" part of "nilly" is from the French, where "ne" is a negative prefix.
"In French, a negative sentence is formed by using the words "ne", “n’ ”, and "pas" around a verb. "Ne" comes before the verb, and "pas" follows it.
For example, "Je ne parle pas" means "I don't speak". The placement of "ne" and "pas" around the verb is the most basic form of creating a negative statement."
And, thus, I end on a negative note, much as I began.
All the best,
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