Myriad: How Does This One Work?

Tamara K. wrote with this question:

The word myriad has been popping up more and more lately. I even heard it in a show about the Great Barrier Reef, on sports newscasts and in business meetings. But, my understanding of the word that it should be used like the word “many.” However, whenever I hear it used it is used more like the work “lot,” as in “a lot.” Which is the proper usage?

We love questions like this (even though they are more about usage than grammar). When questions like this pop up, though, it doesn't take SPOGG to answer them. A good dictionary--the Oxford English Dictionary is a favorite--will tell you all sorts of things about the origin of words. We log into the OED through our local library's site, which offers free subscriptions to patrons. Does your library? Check it out. That's what your tax dollars pay for.

We learned myriad has been used as a noun longer than it has been used as an adjective, even though many people prefer the latter use. Originally, it meant 10,000. Then it meant "a lot." As an adjective, it means "many."

Bryan Garner, author of the indispensable Garner's Modern American Usage, writes that "myriad is more concise as an adjective than as a noun...but the mere fact that the adjective is handier doesn't mean the latter is substandard." (Note: a brand new version of Garner's usage guide is out. We highly recommend it.)

In short: There's no need to spend any time wondering about what words mean and how they're best used. Make a habit of looking things up at the OED and in Garner's book, and you will fill your brain with useful language facts. SPOGG does love questions, of course. So keep on sending them!

A Favor for Bryan Garner

Every so often we link to Bryan A. Garner's daily tips. We also rely on Modern American Usage and recommend it to other writers. We just received this rather disheartening e-mail from Bryan:

I have a favor to ask of you as a loyal reader: In the next few hours or days, would you please go to http://www.amazon.com/ or http://www.bn.com/ and buy one or more copies of the new third edition of Garner’s Modern American Usage as holiday presents? In fact, keep this gift possibility in mind through the end of the year, won't you?

I need your help in sending a message to the major bookstore chains: they’re not stocking the book because they’ve told Oxford University Press that they consider usage guides a “defunct category.” It’s maddeningly unbelievable. Please help me show them that they’re stupendously wrong.

Meanwhile, in the coming months you might ask about the book when you’re in a bookstore: ask the managers why they don’t stock copies, and encourage them to do so.

If you’re curious to see what effect you’re having, watch the rankings on Amazon.com or Bn.com in coming days and weeks. We’ll be alerting the major chains to those numbers, and we want to get as close to the top 50 as we can. If you're trying to order and see that the book is labeled "out of stock," order anyway: the effort is also to ensure that the online booksellers keep adequate stocks.

In return for this favor – it’s a grassroots effort – I’ll be happy to inscribe copies that you send to LawProse for that purpose, if you (1) include a filled-out FedEx airbill for returning them to you, and (2) suggest an appropriate inscription.

Thank you for whatever help you can provide in this endeavor to show booksellers that the concern for good English is alive and well.

Please consider doing this.

Another plea: Consider requesting copies of your favorite books and authors when you go to bookstores. Stores won't carry smaller books if people don't ask for them, particularly back-listed titles. Unless you want to live in a world where only "big" books--Dan Brown and the like--have a chance, it's incredibly important to support writers you like.

Brown can be one of those writers, of course. But there are great, great books that never get noticed on a tremendous scale, and when the big stores--Barnes and Noble, Costco and the like--refuse to carry them, we run the risk of a literary world determined by the mass appetites. It's not that these books are bad (though some of them aren't, shall we say, good). It's just that they crowd out the stuff that's idiosyncratic or meant for people who aren't typical. It's sort of like reducing everything to hot dogs. These are fine at times. But sometimes, you want a finer cut.

So if you think of yourself as anything different from average and if you have tastes that go beyond hot dogs, please express this about yourself by reading widely and courageously, and by supporting authors. Thank you!

Strange Usage and a Fun Debate

This comes from James M. Do read on; there are some gems in here.

A couple of months ago, I sent some statements my freshmen students made (and made me cringe!). I have discovered that bizarre usages are scarcely restricted to college students.

My wife and I are spending about eight weeks in Pompano Beach, Florida (smart move, right, in the summer?), so we read the Sun-Sentinel down here. In yesterday's paper, there was a feature article on the famous Ft. Lauderdale air show, which is resuming after a three-year hiatus. Jack Seiler, mayor of the city, called the air show "one of the neatest, one of the funnest events you can put on."

Ouch! Talk about things that make one "sic"! When and where did "fun" become an adjective and have comparatives? Young people use the expression "so fun" and "very fun" among other strange usages. Is there any hope?*

Also, in the online Paulist Press news for today, there was a headline, "St. John Neumann Stole for Pope." Good grief -- a cardinal breaking the Seventh Commandment?! Turns out the story reported that Obama is visiting the pope soon and will present him with the stole worn by Cardinal Neumann. Sigh of relief coming soon.

Finally, also relating to a mayor, a friend of mine was originally from Nebraska and proudly displayed the big "N" in the rear window of his car, as a supporter of their football team. One day, he said, he parked right outside city hall in Omaha. The mayor happened by, nodded to the sign and said, "You know, son, that letter doesn't just stand for Nebraska football. It also stands for knowledge." As the great Mark Twain once wrote, "Let us draw the curtain of charity over the rest of the scene."

* SPOGG is going out on a limb here, but we think it's OK to use "fun" as an adjective. Bryan A. Garner says it's only as a "casualism," which is a hilarious stuffy word given its meaning.

Here's how "fun" has slid into the adjective forest, Garner explains in A Dictionary of Modern Usage. When we say, "This is fun," fun could either be an adjective or a noun. It's a short leap from this to full-fledged adjectivehood. He clearly hates it, though, calling it "casual at best."

Even though "funnest" remains a silly, awful word, there's just no way we can stop people from using it as an adjective, or they will rightly accuse us of not being any...fun.

A Little Love for Bryan Garner

We get his daily usage updates and often learn new and interesting things. Today, though, at the peak of the allergy season for SPOGG, we were happy (and disgusted) to learn the difference between "mucus" and "mucous."

Garner writes:

These two ought to be kept separate, "mucus" for the slimy substance and "mucous" for the adjective describing whatever contains or secretes mucus. So "mucus membrane" is a mistake -- e.g.: "If a person already has herpes, chlamydia, gonorrhea, or syphilis and is exposed to HIV, he or she is more likely to contract the virus because of openings in the mucus [read 'mucous'] membranes and skin." "Increased Research Leads to Dramatic Declines in Sexually Transmitted Diseases," USA Today (Mag.), Feb. 1995, at 11.

In medical literature, "mucous ball" and "mucus ball" are about equally common. This is a closer case than "mucous membrane," however, because "mucus ball" is a ball of mucus, and the noun is justifiably used in an attributive sense -- e.g.: "Over the ensuing six months, there has been no further problem with mucus balls, his level of dyspnea, or edema." Edward M. Harrow et al., "Respiratory Failure and Cor Pulmonale Associated with Tracheal Mucoid Accumulation [etc.]," Chest, Feb. 1992, at 580. But the best course, outside medical literature, might be to find a euphemism.

Ah, the "mucus ball." We hope your invitation was lost in the mail. Sincerely, and sniffingly, SPOGG.