The 20 most confusing rules in the grammar world

You know to always capitalise proper nouns like names, but the lines get a little blurry with things like titles and locations. When you’re talking about the eastern United States, do you need to capitalize the E in “eastern”? You don’t, because you’re using “eastern” as an adjective. However, in the case of “the East Coast,” you should capitalize the E because the word “east” is part of the noun phrase. Yup, it’s enough to smoke your head for sure! The rules are pretty nuanced when it comes to different types of words.

The English language is rife with abbreviations that just don’t seem to make sense. Why does the abbreviation for “number” have an “O,” for instance? And where did wordsmiths get “lbs” from “pounds”?  But in most cases, there is a linguistic explanation, usually having to do with an earlier spelling or meaning of the word.  For instance, in the case of “Mrs” and its seemingly random “R,” that abbreviation used to be short for the word “mistress,” as in the feminine equivalent of “master,” not “missus.” Over time, the connotations of “mistress” changed, but the spelling of “Mrs” didn’t.

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Speaking of abbreviations, what the heck are these two short for, and why are they so similar? Well, wonder no more. “E.g.” is short for the Latin expression exempli gratia, which means “for example.” So “e.g.” is the expression you should use before providing an example or examples: “I like all of the traditional Christmas foods, e.g., turkey, stuffing and cranberry sauce.” Many people use “i.e.” in this context, though, while “i.e.” means something completely different. “I.e.” stands for id est, or “that is.” Use “i.e.” when you’re trying to explain or clarify something you just said: “I’ll get back to you soon, i.e., before the end of the week.”

Some style guides insist upon it; some don’t. A teeny comma has caused more than its share of debates in the grammar world. What it is, exactly, is the comma that goes before the last item in a sequence. Consider: “At the store, I bought apples, pears, bananas, and blueberries.” Does that comma after “bananas” need to be there or not? Sometimes it is necessary to preserve the meaning of the sentence, as in, “I love my friends, chocolate and rock music.” Chances are, chocolate and rock music are not the friends you were referring to, so a comma after “chocolate” is a grammatical must. But, in the fruit example, it doesn’t change the meaning, so some grammarians argue that the “and” serves the same function as the Oxford comma, and the comma isn’t needed. The Oxford comma is just one of many common spelling and grammar rules no one can agree on.

“Which” and “that” are both relative pronouns, meaning that they begin an independent clause and connect it to a dependent clause. Essentially, they serve the same grammatical purpose, so people use them interchangeably. But…should they? According to the rules, “which” should only be used with a comma, while “that” should be reserved for comma-free clauses that are essential to the meaning of the sentence. Consider: “I liked the cookies that Isabel made better than the store-bought ones,” vs. “We ate the cookies, which Isabel made, in less than five minutes.” But, in truth, this is some deep-cut grammar pedantic-ness, and people don’t really tend to strictly adhere to it.

Seriously, English – why don’t “though” and “through” rhyme?! Why is the O pronounced differently in “comb” and “bomb”? Or “plow” and “slow”? The English alphabet only has 26 letters, but each of those letters may have up to seven different pronunciations. And don’t get us started on the words that you’re supposed to pronounce differently in different cases. For instance, you’re technically supposed to be pronouncing “the” like “thee” when the next word starts with a vowel sound. But if you don’t take that into account every time you say “the” – which is, after all, the most common word in English – we certainly won’t fault you for it!

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Adding confusion to the matter of letters with multiple pronunciations is the fact that sometimes, letters are there, but you don’t pronounce them at all! Why does “island” have an S? What is the purpose of the K in “know”? And why is there a G in “phlegm”? In many cases, the silent letters are present because the pronunciation of the words changed as the language evolved, while the spelling stayed the same. Other times, the disparity is because the words came from other languages, such as “tsunami” from Japanese and “rendezvous” from French.

When it comes to commonly confused words, there may not be a more understandably mixed-up pair than “lay” and “lie.” The words aren’t interchangeable, though many people use them that way. “Lay” needs an object, while “lie” doesn’t take an object. Technically, saying “I need to lay down” is incorrect, because you have to lay something down. “Please lay that expensive book down on the table carefully” is the correct use of “lay.” But the real confusion comes from the fact that the past tense of “lie” is… “lay”! “He wasn’t feeling well, so he lay down” is correct. The past tense of “lay,” meanwhile, is “laid.” It’s enough to make your head hurt so much that you might need to lie down.

When you say “neither,” you’re referring to more than one person or thing, so “neither” should take a plural verb form, right? Well…no. Both “neither” and “either” are always singular if the two things you’re talking about are singular: “Neither the dog [just one dog] nor the cat [just one cat] is responsible for the mess.” The same goes for “Neither of the pets is responsible” – even though “pets” is plural, “neither” still means “neither one.” The only time it works to pluralise the verb is if one or both of the subjects is plural: “Neither Lady Gaga nor the Backstreet Boys are performing tonight” is correct, since the closest subject to the verb, “the Backstreet Boys,” is plural. Phew!

If “neither” is singular, “none” should be too, right? Honestly, with this rule, even strict grammar nerds tend to throw up their hands and say, “Use your judgment.” Usually, if the subject of the sentence is an uncountable noun, a singular verb makes sense: “None of the beer is left.” But if the subject represents a concrete number of people or things, you can usually get away with using a plural verb – and it tends to just sound better, too, as in “None of my cousins are coming to dinner.”

If your brain can handle it after all this info, read on for 11 thesaurus jokes grammar nerds will appreciate.

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Source: RD.com