Open Side Menu Go to the Top
Register
"Grammar" and "Punctuation" nit's unite! You're "head" will literally explode! "Grammar" and "Punctuation" nit's unite! You're "head" will literally explode!

06-29-2013 , 12:39 PM
A historic is 100% correct
"Grammar" and "Punctuation" nit's unite! You're "head" will literally explode! Quote
06-29-2013 , 01:52 PM
Quote:
Originally Posted by Bremen
Nice try. Here's the correct link.

http://books.google.com/ngrams/graph...thing=3&share=

"A historic" is used in books 4.5x as much as "an historic", in America. In other words, over 80% of the time.
"Grammar" and "Punctuation" nit's unite! You're "head" will literally explode! Quote
06-29-2013 , 03:02 PM
Quote:
Originally Posted by NewOldGuy
Nice try. Here's the correct link.

http://books.google.com/ngrams/graph...thing=3&share=

"A historic" is used in books 4.5x as much as "an historic", in America. In other words, over 80% of the time.
I doubt if you'll find any other grammatical so-called error used 20% of the time.
"Grammar" and "Punctuation" nit's unite! You're "head" will literally explode! Quote
06-29-2013 , 04:39 PM
Quote:
Originally Posted by NewOldGuy
Nice try. Here's the correct link.

http://books.google.com/ngrams/graph...thing=3&share=

"A historic" is used in books 4.5x as much as "an historic", in America. In other words, over 80% of the time.
When did "in America" become the gold standard for English?
"Grammar" and "Punctuation" nit's unite! You're "head" will literally explode! Quote
06-29-2013 , 04:42 PM
Quote:
Originally Posted by Bremen
What that shows, of course, is that it's an older, and British, use. But that's the point: that it is not "an error."

Here's ngram for "heroic" for the same parameters.

http://books.google.com/ngrams/graph...thing=2&share=
"Grammar" and "Punctuation" nit's unite! You're "head" will literally explode! Quote
06-29-2013 , 04:50 PM
Quote:
Originally Posted by daryn
"An hotel" LOL

Yep, I think that's case closed there.
"An hotel" was more common in Victorian prose than "a hotel"

http://books.google.com/ngrams/graph...thing=2&share=

The change in which one was preferred comes in 1930.

http://books.google.com/ngrams/graph...thing=2&share=

But "an hotel" continues to be found ...
"Grammar" and "Punctuation" nit's unite! You're "head" will literally explode! Quote
06-29-2013 , 05:26 PM
"Grammar" and "Punctuation" nit's unite! You're "head" will literally explode! Quote
06-29-2013 , 10:42 PM
Quote:
Originally Posted by RussellinToronto
When did "in America" become the gold standard for English?
1776
"Grammar" and "Punctuation" nit's unite! You're "head" will literally explode! Quote
06-30-2013 , 12:13 AM
Quote:
Originally Posted by ObezyankaNol
I doubt if you'll find any other grammatical so-called error used 20% of the time.
I before E tho.
"Grammar" and "Punctuation" nit's unite! You're "head" will literally explode! Quote
06-30-2013 , 08:34 AM
Quote:
Originally Posted by Anarchist
1776
glad I didn't make my 'when we won the war' post before seeing this.

(Wait...)

I'm glad I did not make my 'When we won the war.' post prior to seeing this one.

Last edited by sportsjefe; 06-30-2013 at 08:36 AM. Reason: I must make an effort to post properly in a proper posting thread.
"Grammar" and "Punctuation" nit's unite! You're "head" will literally explode! Quote
06-30-2013 , 09:27 AM
Quote:
Originally Posted by RussellinToronto
When did "in America" become the gold standard for English?
America has 15X more people than your silly country. Majority rules, bro.
"Grammar" and "Punctuation" nit's unite! You're "head" will literally explode! Quote
06-30-2013 , 10:33 AM
Quote:
Originally Posted by txdome
America has 15X more people than your silly country. Majority rules, bro.
Having grown up in your country (and your state, for that matter), I'll resist responding to the inane nationalism of this "mine is bigger than yours" rhetoric and remind you that the point of this current debate was whether the use of "an" before certain words was an error. My argument has simply been that while something may be anomalous in US usage, that doesn't make it universally wrong.

And I don't think America does have the majority of English speakers world-wide. In any case, American English isn't the standard of world-wide English. (There isn't one.)

Sorry, "bro".
"Grammar" and "Punctuation" nit's unite! You're "head" will literally explode! Quote
06-30-2013 , 10:36 AM
Quote:
Originally Posted by RussellinToronto
that the point of this current debate was whether the use of "an" before certain words was an error....
And the original post claiming incorrectness referred specifically to American English.

Quote:
Originally Posted by NewOldGuy
"Historic" has a hard H and should always take the article "a". This is the correct American English pronunciation.

Let the arguing begin.
"Grammar" and "Punctuation" nit's unite! You're "head" will literally explode! Quote
06-30-2013 , 10:56 AM
No. This is the original post.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Hector Cerif
for some reason it's really bugging me when i hear people say "a historic," as apposed to an historic. It just sounds forced.
You answered by limiting it to American English. My point remains: there are other Englishes. It was the original post I was responding to, trying to suggest that getting "really" bugged by a form that is valid at other times and in other places is a silly waste of time.

As this debate has become, I guess.
"Grammar" and "Punctuation" nit's unite! You're "head" will literally explode! Quote
06-30-2013 , 12:38 PM
If you don't follow American English you should smoke a bloody ***.

And if we didn't follow American English *** wouldn't be censored, would it?

I win!
"Grammar" and "Punctuation" nit's unite! You're "head" will literally explode! Quote
06-30-2013 , 01:21 PM
Change the ngram graph to be from 1800 to present, and look separately at American and British English. The trend is clear in each dialect (not really dialect, I realize, but I'm not sure what word to use here), it's just earlier in American English. ("A historic" pulls ahead for good in American English in 1936, in British English in 1965.)

That it's more common doesn't make it correct, of course, and I'm sure we could find quite a few of what we in this thread would generally consider "errors" that are more common than the correct version (fun challenge, actually...). But add that to the style manuals, which as far as I can tell universally recommend "a historic" for American and British speakers, and I think it's about as clear as an evolving linguistic construct can get these days. "A historic" is correct; if you won't admit that "an historic" is incorrect by most definitions, at least observe that we have tons of evidence that people will look at you funny when you say it that way.
"Grammar" and "Punctuation" nit's unite! You're "head" will literally explode! Quote
06-30-2013 , 01:30 PM
I'm pretty sure I've used "an historic" before but agree that "a historic" is correct.

I think I just heard professors using the "an" and picked it up that way. Proving you don't always learn good things in college, I guess.
"Grammar" and "Punctuation" nit's unite! You're "head" will literally explode! Quote
06-30-2013 , 01:38 PM
Is it better to pronounce a long a or as a schwa
"Grammar" and "Punctuation" nit's unite! You're "head" will literally explode! Quote
06-30-2013 , 05:56 PM
Quote:
Originally Posted by garcia1001
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/s...toryId=4994862

The use of "an historic" is in fact, not technically incorrect but is now considered archaic and pedantic.

http://oxforddictionaries.com/words/...historic-event

If horrific was pronounced ‘orrific’ and historic was pronounced ‘istoric’ then it would be appropriate to refer to ‘an istoric occasion’ or ‘an orrific accident’. In the 18th and 19th centuries, people often did pronounce these words in this way.

http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/historic

The court made a historic decision last week.


Historic by itself, say the h. A historic, say the h. Simple.
Speaking of pedantic.
"Grammar" and "Punctuation" nit's unite! You're "head" will literally explode! Quote
06-30-2013 , 06:15 PM
Good call. We wouldn't want pedantry in the grammar nit thread of all places.
"Grammar" and "Punctuation" nit's unite! You're "head" will literally explode! Quote
07-01-2013 , 03:10 AM
Quote:
Originally Posted by Rei Ayanami
Good call. We wouldn't want pedantry in the grammar nit thread of all places.
Someone help me with a word I'm thinking of. Whenever I think of pedantic, I think of someone who is dumb but trying to sound smart; like in that one scene from Good Will Hunting. What is a word for that?

But yeah, dude sounds like that.
"Grammar" and "Punctuation" nit's unite! You're "head" will literally explode! Quote
07-01-2013 , 05:44 AM
Quote:
Originally Posted by Hector Cerif
Someone help me with a word I'm thinking of. Whenever I think of pedantic, I think of someone who is dumb but trying to sound smart; like in that one scene from Good Will Hunting. What is a word for that?

But yeah, dude sounds like that.
Malaprop?
"Grammar" and "Punctuation" nit's unite! You're "head" will literally explode! Quote
07-01-2013 , 11:55 AM
Quote:
Originally Posted by SGT RJ
GOLD
"Grammar" and "Punctuation" nit's unite! You're "head" will literally explode! Quote
07-01-2013 , 02:04 PM
So, usually the New York Times is pretty good with copyediting, but...

Quote:
And those fees can quickly add up: one provider, for example, charges $1.75 to make a withdrawal from most A.T.M.’s, $2.95 for a paper statement and $6 to replace a card.
Source (emphasis added)

I can't believe this would actually be in their house style guide, could it? It's repeated several times throughout the article so it wasn't a "typo."
"Grammar" and "Punctuation" nit's unite! You're "head" will literally explode! Quote

      
m