How to Avoid Tricky Grammar Mistakes: Confusing Plurals

 

I was watching a financial show on CNBC, and Eric, an executive with the Siemens company, was a guest on the program. He was a pulled-together chap, generally well-spoken, but he said something that made me want to write another "Grammar Mistakes" article. There are a lot of grammar and usage pitfalls in English, a language cobbled together from many other languages, each with their own sets of rules and pronunciation and spelling. I get it; it's hard. That's why your Grammar Diva is here to help you!

So, what was it that Eric said that made my toes curl, but not in the good way? He used the word "processes". And he used it correctly, more or less. The "less" part is that he pronounced it "process-eeze". 

I hear this kind of thing all too often. People who are intelligent and well-educated can frequently make this error--especially when trying to sound intelligent and well-educated, ironically enough--because they are aware that some plural words do indeed end in an "eeze" sound, when ending in -es. However, these words are few and far between. The staggering majority of words that end in -es, for example, actresses, convalescences, sentences, seances, buttresses, glasses, continuances, senses, and yes, processes, are pronounced the easy way. Just say "es" with that schwa sound and a soft (sibilant) or hard (like a "z") "s". I don't think anyone thinks "actresses" is pronounced "actresseeze", and you can safely assume most other -es words also do not follow that pattern.

 Well, which ones do, then? Obviously there are a few out there, setting a confusing example. Words ending in -is, such as "crisis", "synopsis", and "diagnosis" are the main culprits, as these words change to an -es ending in their plural form that is indeed pronounced "-eeze"; hence, "crises" (KRY-seez), "synopses" (sin-OP-seez), and "diagnoses" (DY-ag-NOH-seez). 

By the way, please don't confuse "synopses" with "synapses", whose -es ending is pronounced the normal, non-eezy way (SIN-app-sez). Also please note that the -es ending is not an addition to these words; it is a change, from -is to -es, plain and simple. I cannot begin to count how many times I have heard some poor soul utter the word "crisises" (pronounced "crisis-eeze", of course).

Another group of words that takes the "-eeze" ending in the plural form are words ending in -ex, such as "index" (indices) and "vortex" (vortices). So, if you hear someone referring to "heat indices", she has not lost her mind, she is just being learned. That said, however, it is perfectly okay to say "indexes" and "vortexes", according to Merriam-Webster and other sources. Also apparently according to my Spell Check, which is furiously underlining the -ices words. Suck it up, Spell Check! (Click here for my love/hate relationship with SpellCheck: https://bucketofuseful.blogspot.com/2017/10/why-you-should-never-trust-spell-check.html)

So, to recap: Words whose singular form ends in -is take the -es ending that is pronounced "eeze". Words whose singular forms end in -ex can, but do not have to, take the -ices ending that is pronounced "iss-eeze", as in "indices" (IND-iss-eeze) and "vortices" (VORT-iss-eeze), mentioned above. All other words ending in -ces, -ses or -sses are pronounced the normal way, with a short "e," or really a schwa sound, and a sibilant (hissing) "s" or "z" sound, not a long "e" and a "z" sound. 

In other words, it's very rare that you will be using the "eeze" ending. When in doubt, go with the non-fancy pronunciation.

So pleeeeeze, dispense with the unnecessary "eeze"! Your Grammar Diva thanks you.

Image credit: https://www.pexels.com/photo/portrait-photo-of-woman-in-red-top-wearing-black-framed-eyeglasses-standing-in-front-of-white-background-thinking-3762807/

Learn English Grammar: When to Use the Word "Had"?

The word "had" serves two functions in English: as the past tense of "has/have", but also as a "helping verb" that is added to the past participle of a verb to create another tense, the past perfect. 

Let's look at the following examples:

1. She has a book. She had a book. 

This simply shows the use of the verb "to have" which means "to possess", in its present and past tense.

2. She writes a book. She wrote a book. She has written a book. She had written a book. 

This one shows the present and past tense (write/wrote), and gives an example of how "has" and "had" both act as "helping verbs" when added to the past participle (written) in the formation of the present perfect (has written) and the past perfect (had written).

The present perfect tense is used to describe something that happened (she has written a book) or didn't happen (she has never written a book) from the perspective of the current time, which is why it's called the present perfect. In other words, as of now, the present time, she has written a book.

The past perfect tense is used to describe something that happened in the past at a time before another time that is also in the past. So, "By the time Alice was 16 years old, she had written a book". Alice is not currently 16 years old - that happened in the past, which we can tell because of the use of the past tense word "was". But before that, even farther in the past, she wrote a book.

So when do you use "had"? You use it either to show a simple past tense of possession, or as a helper verb to refer to something that happened longer ago in the past from the reference point of something that also happened in the past, but more recently.

More on writing: 
https://bucketofuseful.blogspot.com/2017/10/why-you-should-never-trust-spell-check.html

Image from Pixabay https://pixabay.com/photos/correcting-proof-paper-correction-1870721/