The Web of Language

The grammar gripes just keep on coming

debaron@illinois.edu (Dennis Baron) — Sat, 14 Mar 2026 16:15:00 CDT

Grammar Day may be over, but the grammar gripes just keep on coming. This week, articles appeared in two major dailies, the Wall Street Journal and the Daily Telegraph, criticizing the grammar gaffes of the rich, the famous, and the reprehensible.

Let’s start with the reprehensible. Both papers attack Jeffrey Epstein, not for years of pedophilia, not even for financial chicanery, or for his appointment as a teacher at the prestigious Dalton School, despite the fact that he dropped out of college. No, the Journal and the Telegraph go after Epstein’s crimes against spelling and punctuation, which pale in comparison to decades of actual criminal behavior, for which he wound up in jail. Twice. Whether Epstein killed himself in jail or someone offed him, it wasn’t because he didn’t punctuate his emails.

Then there’s (Lord) Peter Mandelson, former MP, cabinet minister, and recently-sacked UK ambassador to the United States, who lost his reputation and his peerage for his mishandling of state secrets and his too-close association with Epstein (though he was no [Prince] Andrew). But what the Journal and the Telegraph find fault with are the Oxford graduate’s uncorrected spelling and punctuation in his text messages.

National Grammar Day 2026

debaron@illinois.edu (Dennis Baron) — Sun, 01 Mar 2026 11:30:00 CST

March 4th is National Grammar Day, the only day of the year that’s a complete sentence: “March forth.”

Except that calling March 4th a complete sentence is grammatically incorrect, which is not a good look for National Grammar Day.

To turn March 4th into a sentence you have to equate the ordinal fourth with the adverbial forth. On any other day, the grammar sticklers might say that’s worse that verbing a noun. But on National Grammar Day, anything goes.

Technically, March 4th isn’t a sentence, it’s a noun. But words that look like nouns can function as other things as well. March 4th is a noun that’s also an adverb of time. In addition, March 4th can be a sentence. So can March 1st.

March 1st is both a noun and a complete sentence. As a sentence, March 1st either tells you to be the first person to march, before anyone else, or it orders you to march first, before doing something else. That works with every other day in March as well: Be the second to march, the third, the fourth, and so on.

National Grammar Day is all about quibbling, so if you really want to quibble, March should really be National Grammar Month. But it’s best to limit our grammar celebration to just one day. Americans are quick to correct other people’s mistakes, but they won’t stand for a whole month of being corrected.

Welcome to the Banned Speech State

debaron@illinois.edu (Dennis Baron) — Tue, 17 Feb 2026 10:45:00 CST

Over the past four years, Florida has passed laws banning speech about diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI), along with “sensitive” or “divisive” topics like race, class, sex, gender, slavery, American history, colonialism, climate change, vaccines, and even grammar.

In fact Florida has banned so many words from its classrooms, libraries, and government offices that it’s becoming known as “the Banned Speech state.”

Trying to keep on the right side of its state’s proliferating speech bans, earlier this month Florida A&M University (abbreviated FAMU) told students in its College of Law that they couldn’t use the word “black” when promoting Black History Month. They’d have to abbreviate it as BHM instead, which is particularly bizarre since the school is a Historically Black College and University (abbreviated HBCU).

National Handwriting Day 2026

debaron@illinois.edu (Dennis Baron) — Sat, 17 Jan 2026 15:30:00 CST

Each year on January 23 we celebrate National Handwriting Day. It’s the birthday of John Hancock, creator of the signature seen round the world. Actually Hancock had two different birthdays because there was some calendar fiddling back then, so he had to carry two IDs, each with that famous signature, in case he got carded.

National Handwriting Day was created by the Writing Instrument Manufacturers Association, a trade group that doesn’t care whether you become the next John Hancock, as long as you buy more pens and pencils. Unfortunately, pens and pencils won’t help you find out about National Handwriting Day. Instead, you have to type “National Handwriting Day” into a search engine and let AI do the rest.

Faith-based grammar

debaron@illinois.edu (Dennis Baron) — Fri, 26 Dec 2025 11:30:00 CST

I got my first God-essay on a final exam over fifty years ago in a course on the history of the English language. I asked students to discuss the historical and social forces behind notions of correctness in standard English. One student, a prospective English teacher, equated correctness in language with intelligent design: "God speaks standard English and you should, too."

Is a sandwich a weapon? And if so, does it enjoy constitutional protection?

debaron@illinois.edu (Dennis Baron) — Tue, 19 Aug 2025 14:00:00 CDT

We as Concerned Legal Lexicographers submit this declaration in an attempt to answer the question, Is a sandwich a weapon?

First, we consider the nature of the sandwich. Both sides in this case have stipulated their acceptance of the Oxford English Dictionary definition of ‘the sandwich’ as, "An article of food for a light meal or snack, composed of two thin slices of bread, usually buttered, with a savoury (originally spec. meat, esp. beef or ham) or other filling. Frequently with specifying word prefixed indicating contents, as [indictable] ham sandwich" [OED online, s.v. sandwich, noun 2].

Having defined “sandwich,” in order to determine whether a sandwich is a weapon, we must also define ‘weapon.’

One of the oldest definitions of a ‘weapon’ appears in the 13th-century English legal treatise of Henry Bracton: "All things by which men may inflict injury are included in the word ‘weapons.’ If one comes unarmed, but during the course of the argument picks up sticks, staves [or] stones, it will be called armed force" [Henrici de Bracton, De legibus & consuetudinibus Angliae Libri, ca. 1230, Vol. 3:20].

Legislating pronouns

debaron@illinois.edu (Dennis Baron) — Tue, 05 Aug 2025 14:15:00 CDT

Lessons about pronouns were once guaranteed to put students to sleep. Now they’re keeping lawmakers awake. Because some pronouns have gender, conservatives want to inspect that gender the same way they want to make sure that prisoners are in the right cell, that athletes are on the right team, or that you are using the correct toilet.

Here’s what your government has been up to. Over the last decade, Tennessee passed a law banning the use of taxpayer funds “to promote the use of gender neutral pronouns.”

South Dakota prohibited state employees from putting pronouns in their bios. Violate that law and you could lose your job.

North Dakota passed an emergency law, a bit gentler than its neighbor to the south, declaring that no school or teacher may either require or prohibit “an individual from using a student’s preferred gender pronoun.” A 2023 Florida law defines sex (in case you were in doubt), flatly stating, “a person’s sex is an immutable biological trait and . . it is false to ascribe to a person a pronoun that does not correspond to such person’s sex.”

The second-oldest neopronoun, coined in 1849: ne, nis, and nim

debaron@illinois.edu (Dennis Baron) — Tue, 29 Jul 2025 12:00:00 CDT

In 1849, the grammarian William Hall coined three new gender-neutral pronouns, ne, nis, and nim, which he derived from the Latin nonnemo, ‘someone, anyone.’ He introduced them in his Encyclopedia of English Grammar, designed for the use of schools, academies, and private learners.

Three things motivated Hall to coin ne, nis, and nim: The use of the generic masculine he was often ambiguous: sometimes he included women and sometimes it meant “only men.” The coordinate he or she was universally condemned as awkward. And singular they was typically ruled ungrammatical.

In 1841, a few years before Hall created ne, nis, and nim, the physician and part-time grammarian Francis Augustus Brewster coined the pronouns E, es, and em, which he called “masculor feminine.” He took this grammatical classification from the Latin medical term masculofemina, literally ‘man-woman’ or ‘hermaphrodite,’ which suggests that E, es, and em may be the first nonbinary pronouns, even the first trans pronouns. In any case, the first English “neopronouns” were coined almost 185 years ago. They aren’t very new at all.

The good grammar scam

debaron@illinois.edu (Dennis Baron) — Tue, 27 May 2025 12:30:00 CDT

In April, the British department store chain Marks & Spencer fell victim to a ransomware attack, partly because the scammers spoke perfect English.

A left-handed person with a right-handed iPhone

debaron@illinois.edu (Dennis Baron) — Sat, 17 May 2025 14:45:00 CDT

Last night I realized that I am a left-handed person in a world of right-handed iPhones.

I’m used to living in a right-handed world. It’s full of right-handed things—scissors, bread knives, clothing, the locks on exterior doors, so many things presume the user is right handed. We lefties just learn to adapt.

But the right-handed iPhone presents a challenge. Like many people, I keep my phone on “silent.” But my new iPhone 16 doesn’t stay on silent. To my surprise, suddenly it rings. So I put it back on silent. That’s fine for a bit, but then it rings again. And last night I figured out why: it’s a right-handed phone and I’m a lefty.

Can you sing the Star Spangled Banner in Spanish?

debaron@illinois.edu (Dennis Baron) — Thu, 03 Apr 2025 12:45:00 CDT

Can you sing the Star Spangled Banner in Spanish? You could in 1919, when the federal government commissioned La Bandera de las Estrellas. John Philip Sousa was on the committee supervising this official translation. His very name symbolized patriotism. But try singing the national anthem in Spanish now, and you’re likely to be told, “Speak English or go back where you came from.”

Taking the Pledge--in any language

debaron@illinois.edu (Dennis Baron) — Thu, 27 Mar 2025 14:15:00 CDT

The Pledge of Allegiance has long been a way both to affirm one’s patriotism and to test those whose patriotism is suspect. After the Civil War, flag salutes offered a way for residents of the defeated Confederacy to publicly re-dedicate their loyalty to the Union. Not surprisingly, these pledges provoked some resentment in the South.

Then, in the early twentieth century, patriotic groups promoted flag salutes to confirm the loyalty of immigrants. Taking the pledge would encourage newcomers to reject their country of origin and prove their attachment to their new American home. That meant pledging in English, not in an immigrant language.

Anti-immigrant feeling is strong again today, and hardly a week goes by without a report of someone being harassed, beaten, or shot for speaking the wrong language in public. And singing the Star Spangled Banner or saying the Pledge of Allegiance in anything but English is a sure way to bring out the trolls.

Don’t Make English Official, Ban It Instead

debaron@illinois.edu (Dennis Baron) — Sat, 01 Mar 2025 13:15:00 CST

Donald Trump has signed an Executive Order making English the official language of the United States.

The president has a low opinion of other languages. Last year he told CPAC, “We have languages coming into our country. . . they have languages that nobody in this country has ever heard of. It’s a very horrible thing.”

Given Trump’s commitment to “America First”—which led him to rename the Gulf of Mexico—it’s surprising that he didn’t rename English as American.

The Word of the Year for 2024

debaron@illinois.edu (Dennis Baron) — Thu, 26 Dec 2024 16:00:00 CST

It’s Word of the Year season, and all the best dictionaries have been announcing their candidate for word of the year—or WOTY as lexicographers call it. Merriam-Webster picked polarization as its 2024 word of the year. The Collins Dictionary picked brat. Oxford Dictionaries opted for brain rot (yes, the word of the year can be a phrase as well as a word). Dictionary dot com chose demure, but that choice comes with an asterisk, because the main thing dictionary dot com did this year was fire all of its lexicographers, which makes it, by definition, not-a-dictionary.

And speaking of lexicographers, what would the great lexicographers of the past pick for the 2024 word of the year? Read on to find out . . .

The search for plural ‘you’

debaron@illinois.edu (Dennis Baron) — Thu, 05 Dec 2024 15:45:00 CST

The cartoonist Roz Chast complains that English lacks a plural you. In a strip that Chast posted on Instagram, she rejects the usual options, you guys, youse, y’all, and yinz, and in the closing panel she writes, “Dear Whom: It has come to my attention that his lack of a plural ‘you’ is VERY VERY VERY annoying.” Her final plea will resonate with many readers: “Somebody needs to fix this because I’m sick of it.”

There’s good news for Ms. Chast and for everyone else complaining about the absence of plural you: you is already plural. The real problem is there’s no singular you.

Policing protest speech, part 2: The government would like a word . . .

debaron@illinois.edu (Dennis Baron) — Sat, 19 Oct 2024 13:45:00 CDT

My last post looked at how colleges around the country responded to the Israel-Hamas demonstrations by resurrecting old free-speech rules and hastily writing new ones for what they are euphemistically calling “expressive speech.”* In this post we’ll see that federal and state governments are using their power to police protest speech on a broader scale.

A couple of years before he shot up a political gathering in Tucson, killing six and wounding nineteen, a domestic terrorist complained that “the government controls your grammar.” The government does not control your grammar. As we learned during the covfefe era, the government can’t even control its own grammar. But if you’re a protestor, the government would like to control your speech. It does so in three ways: holding public hearings to condemn speech; introducing legislation to punish speech; and pursuing complaints about discriminatory speech.

Policing protest speech

debaron@illinois.edu (Dennis Baron) — Mon, 30 Sep 2024 12:45:00 CDT

Colleges around the country responded to last year’s Israel-Hamas demonstrations by resurrecting old free-speech rules and hastily writing new ones for what they are now calling “expressive speech.” The rules start with a defense of free speech, then they list all the restrictions on speech: what can’t be said; where it can’t be said; and when it can’t be said.

Happy National Grammar Day, to those who celebrate*

debaron@illinois.edu (Dennis Baron) — Sun, 03 Mar 2024 12:45:00 CST

* Void where prohibited.

Today is National Grammar Day, celebrated annually on March 4th because it’s a day that’s a complete sentence—“march forth”—if you believe that “fourth” and “forth” are the same word.

National Grammar Day is prohibited in Arizona, Arkansas, Florida, Indiana, Iowa, Kentucky, Missouri, Ohio, Tennessee, and the Canadian province of Saskatchewan. Its status in Montana and Utah remains uncertain, and if conservatives prevail, it could be banned nationally as well.

As you see from the list of states where National Grammar Day is not celebrated, it is not a national holiday. Which means that calling National Grammar Day “national” is grammatically incorrect.

But why be picky on National Grammar Day? It’s a day to reflect on the infinite variety of human languages and their ability to adapt and change with our circumstances and communicative needs.

Unfortunately, on National Grammar Day the grammar police will be out in force, eager to correct other people’s language. But you don’t want to pit grammarians against. libertarians. Because the National Grammar Day slogan is,

"Everybody wants to be correct, but nobody wants to be corrected."

Baron’s Laws of English Usage

debaron@illinois.edu (Dennis Baron) — Fri, 16 Feb 2024 16:00:00 CST

These 15 laws of English usage are all you need to know...

Baron’s First Law, or, the law of Don’t tread on me: Everyone wants to be correct, but nobody wants to be corrected. It’s a free country, no one’s got the right to tell me what to do.

Baron’s Second Law, or, the law of shutting the barn door: When someone complains about a language innovation, it’s already too late to do anything about it.

Baron’s Third Law, or, the law of inevitable self-incrimination: When someone complains about a change in the language, you will find them committing the very sin they rail against.

But wait, there’s more—

The War on Pronouns

debaron@illinois.edu (Dennis Baron) — Tue, 04 Apr 2023 10:45:00 CDT

In March, 2023, Barney Bishop, who chairs the board of Florida’s Tallahassee Classical School, told an interviewer, “We don’t use pronouns.”

The far right has declared war on pronouns, but Bishop’s salvo got buried under the larger story: Tallahassee Classical’s principal was fired for failing to warn parents that an eighth grade class was going to see Michelangelo’s iconic statue of David. Several parents complained about that art history lesson because David is nude—one called the statue pornography.

Trying to downplay the undraped statue incident, Chairman Bishop tried to refocus the story on the charter school’s vaunted classical curriculum: “We teach them phonics. We teach Singapore math. They learn to speak Latin.” Emphasizing the conservative nature of the school, he boasted, “We don’t use pronouns.”

Does the First Amendment mean "You can't make me say your pronouns"?

debaron@illinois.edu (Dennis Baron) — Mon, 13 Jun 2022 10:00:00 CDT

No, but many conservatives think it does.

In April, 2022, a Wisconsin school district opened a federal Title IX sexual harassment investigation into three middle school boys for refusing to use the pronoun they in reference to a nonbinary classmate, a violation of district guidelines. Defending the students, lawyers for the right-leaning Wisconsin Institute for Law & Liberty warned that requiring ‘they/them’ pronouns violates the boys’ First Amendment protection against compelled speech by forcing them to go against their deeply-held belief that both grammar and gender are immutable.

Op-eds ridiculing the Wisconsin “pronoun police” quickly followed, with ominous headlines like “When the Pronoun Police Come for Eighth Graders.” . . .

It’s not just pronouns. Policing language, including grammar, spelling, and pronunciation, has always been a major function of American schools, so if forcing students to use a pronoun is unconstitutional, then so is making them memorize poems, pass vocabulary tests, or write essays in standard English.

Defining "sanitation" to quash the mask mandate

debaron@illinois.edu (Dennis Baron) — Wed, 20 Apr 2022 11:30:00 CDT

On April 18, 2022, Judge Kathryn Kimbell Mizelle, a Trump appointee to the Florida District Court, struck down the Centers for Disease Control’s “mask mandate,” designed to minimize the spread of Covid-19 on US public transportation—planes, trains, subways, buses, taxis—as well as in terminals, stations, or other transportation facilities. Some passengers who learned of the ruling mid-flight promptly doffed their masks while others on those same flights expressed alarm at being put at risk without warning. A few hours after the ruling came down, the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) announced that it would no longer enforce masking, and the Biden administration has yet to appeal the ruling.

Central to Judge Mizelle’s decision were apparently conflicting dictionary definitions of sanitation in the Public Health Services Act (PHSA) of 1944. Although she insisted she chose the only definition that fit the legal context, it's clear Mizelle cherry-picked the definition of sanitation to confirm her opposition to masking, thus putting public health at risk.

A Strict Constructionist Reads “Don’t say Gay”

debaron@illinois.edu (Dennis Baron) — Fri, 08 Apr 2022 11:00:00 CDT

Hoping to strike a blow for heteronormativity, in a party-line vote in March the Florida House and Senate passed a controversial “Don’t say gay” bill. Gov. Ron DeSantis signed it into law on March 28. But as any strict constructionist will tell you, it’s not just a “Don’t say gay” law. HB 1557, “An act relating to parental rights in education,” bars instruction on anything to do with sexual orientation and gender identity. That makes it a “Don’t say straight” law too, because straight is definitely a sexual orientation.

Microsoft Word's Wokeness checker is asleep on the job

debaron@illinois.edu (Dennis Baron) — Sat, 15 Jan 2022 08:00:00 CST

Microsoft has added a diversity checker to its Office 365 spelling and grammar tool. If you check the appropriate boxes in its drop-down menu, Word will scan your writing for age and cultural bias, ethnic slurs, gender bias, gender-neutral pronouns, gender-specific language, racial bias, sexual orientation bias, and socioeconomic bias. The goal is to replace the sensitivity readers that some publishers use to vet manuscripts for conscious or unconscious bias and anything else that might offend an audience. tl;dr: machine edits can't replace humans.

Don’t blame the new French pronoun on Americans

debaron@illinois.edu (Dennis Baron) — Sun, 12 Dec 2021 11:15:00 CST

The French are blaming American “wokisme” for their new nonbinary pronoun, iel, recently recognized by the authoritative dictionary, Le Petit Robert, in its online edition. The French frequently blame Americans for polluting their vocabulary. Although it’s true that interest in both gendered and genderless pronouns has increased in the US as part of the larger discussion of LGBT rights, the first genderless pronoun was actually coined by a Frenchman some 250 years ago.