Journalist Ruth Marcus, in a recent Washington Post column, expressed her ire at fellow journalists and their use of the word “shed”. As in, the labor market shed X number of jobs. Marcus’ bone to pick with shed starts with the Merriam-Webster definition which she cites:
“To eject, slough off, or lose as part of the normal processes of life. To rid oneself of temporarily or permanently as superfluous or unwanted.”
Marcus sees shedding as a dog losing its fir, or an innocent victim shedding his blood. She declares this a gruesome and trite way of dealing with the decline of the jobs market; a place where some 8.4 million jobs have been lost since the economy hit the crapper two years ago.
My 2009 AP Stylebook is silent regarding shed, but perhaps future editions should include this information. Marcus could write the entry.
Now that Marcus has shed her dirty laundry with an overused press colloquialism, allow me to share one of mine. It also has to do with jobs and the economy, albeit on the rebound. It’s the phrase “shore up”. TARP shored up the banks. Obama’s administration is looking for more ways to shore up the economy. Statler Towers needs to be shored up.
Shore up sounds to me like an uneducated way to say you’re bringing this ship in to shore. Nautical themes sail through the theater of my mind whenever I read this overly abused phrase in the media. American Heritage Dictionary provides this explanation, calling “shore up” an idiom or phrase:
“Support, prop...This expression derives from the noun shore , meaning ‘prop,’ a beam or timber propped against a structure to provide support. The verb shore dates from 1340 and was first recorded in a figurative context in 1581.”
Ok…so, this one’s been around a while. Again the AP Stylebook is silent on shore up, but would it kill journalists to just use “strengthen,” “support,” or “bolster”?
I’m going to shed one more grammar-related rant, just to shore up this post. It comes from satirist Gene Weingarten’s “Below the Beltway” column, also syndicated by Washington Post. As Weingarten bounced from topic to topic in last week’s column, he touched on the sensitive issue of using apostrophes.
“Nobody get's it right anymore, and nobody gives a darn, and thats [sic] just the way it is in this era of all-thumbs communication.”
Many years ago, when I worked in a restaurant, Mensa International’s local chapter came for lunch. One pointed out to me that “Extra’s” on the menu had an “offensive apostrophe.” I smiled politely while thinking surely this dame was too smart for her own good. Fast forward some 10 years, and now it’s me picking out the misplaced apostrophes.
Seems like anything that ends in an “s” merits the little curvy swatch, while everything that demonstrates the possessive case lacks it. The day a sign printed advertising a sale on “Sock’s for Men” at Kohl’s and I immediately noticed the error, I knew that I too was getting as bad as those Mensa folks. At least I didn’t request a loaf of bread that was half wheat and half oatmeal…but that’s another story entirely.
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