The Penguin Dictionary of American English Usage and Style: a readable reference book, illuminating thousands of traps that snare writers and speakers

INTRODUCTION
Watching Our Words

Aim; Form

The volume in your hands is meant to be both useful and enjoyable, a readable dictionary for all who are interested in our language.

In A-to-Z form, it is mainly a guide to good usage of English, the American variety, contrasted with some 2,000 quoted examples of misusage and questionable usage. It does the job of "illuminating many traps and pitfalls in English usage" (as my editor puts it). I have sought to provide clear explanations in plain language. This book is designed for general readers as well as those who work with words.

The examples were drawn from the popular press, broadcasting, books, and a variety of other sources, mostly in the latter eighties and the nineties. Each entry devoted to a specific word or phrase contains one or more of those quotations. The troublesome forms are contrasted with the proper forms (which are emphasized by italics) and definitions are given.

Entries on general topics are presented too; they deal with matters of grammar, punctuation, style, and so on. A list of them, with further description of the two types of entry, appears under "General Topics," following this introduction.

With few exceptions, the examples have determined the choices of word entries. Thus the book in part amounts to an informal survey of contemporary problems in English usage.

Both perennial problems and new ones come up. Of the misuses discouraged by earlier books on English usage, some persist; others have not turned up, but, as though to take their place, new offenses against the language have emerged.

Here are some hints for finding your way around the volume:


Main entries, headed in boldface, are arranged alphabetically, letter by letter.
Many entries are divided into sections, which are numbered and titled. The sections of an entry are arranged alphabetically, and their titles are listed at the beginning, after the main title. Some sections contain subsections, distinguished by letters and titles.
There are numerous cross-references, some standing alone and others within entries. For instance, in the C's under Comma it says See Punctuation, 3, referring the reader to the entry. Many entries refer to related entries. Alphabetical order is used in listing any series of cross-references and various other series.

Viewpoint

This work could be viewed as an antidote to laissez-faire lexicography and anything-goes grammar. The doctrine that whatever emerges from people's lips is the language and that many verbal wrongs make a right is not advocated here. Nor is the clich ' of English as "a living language" dragged in to justify bad English.

On the contrary, I do not hesitate to distinguish between right and wrong usage when the difference is clear. My inclination is to question deviant forms, challenge innovations to prove themselves, and resist senseless fads. (See also the final section of this introduction.) I thereby risk being labeled a "purist" by some critics -- as though impurity were desirable.

Perhaps in a long-range, philosophical sense there is no verbal right and wrong. But that view does not help you and me in choosing our words and putting together our sentences clearly and properly according to the educated norms of society. Those holding the permissive views follow most of the norms themselves. They do not say or write, "Them guys hasn't came," or "I ain't did nothin nohow," although some people are apt to do so. For the most part, the laws of grammar have not been repealed.