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Better English 57
Timely Communications Tips
March 8, 2011
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APOLOGIES
-- DISCOURSE ON IMPACT
-- YOUR WELCOME
-- BEING IS A GERUND

One reader alerted me to the fact that the last newsletter was dated February 5 rather than March 5. My apologies for not proofreading.

And another salute to my editor friend in Canada who has volunteered to read my newsletter before I send it out. He's patient enough to accept my contention that I'm usually too far behind schedule to wait another day for him to proofread and return.

DISCOURSE ON IMPACT
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 First, as the very first reader pointed out, I should have written that "impact" is used incorrectly as a verb most of the time.

But it can be used as a verb. I wrote, "To impact" means to strike forcefully, drive close together or to wedge tightly."

My examples showed how the word is used incorrectly, where the writer's statement doesn't agree with any of these definitions.

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My former student from Brown University asks if "impactful" is a word.

I agree with editor John McIntyre of the Baltimore Sun and former president of the American Copy Editors Society who says that it is not an acceptable word in standard English.

In his blog, he also notes that "impactful" is not listed in Webster's New World College Dictionary, Random House Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, the American Heritage College Dictionary, the Encarta World English Dictionary, the New Oxford American Dictionary or the Oxford English Dictionary.

Okay, so it does appear in dictionary.com.


YOUR WELCOME
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 Just as I thought I'd worn out the "you're" mistake with you readers and was enjoying the fast friendly response from the online Hostgator chat supporter, I saw this response:

"Your welcome. Is there anything else I can do for you?"

Maybe the chatter thought that she was texting, and the laws of apostrophe don't apply, and she would go on to change "I'll" to "Ill" and "we're" to "were."

BEING IS A GERUND
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 A gerund is a noun ending in "-ing."

Use the possessive form before a gerund.

Examples: his running, their ridiculing, our pushing. Running, ridiculing, and pushing are nouns.

Tim Dahlberg, national sports columnist for the Associated Press, writes on February 26 that a Tiger Woods "meltdown ended with him being unceremoniously bounced from the Match Play Championship in Arizona ..."

Correctly, it should read, "his being" because the possessive form must go before the gerund or noun, "being."

Yours Sincerely,
Barry Beckham


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