It's not that I'm perfect. It's that I'm a bitch.
Monday, March 13, 2006
Baseless Claims
NPR, you know I love you. I look forward to "This I Believe," your Monday-evening series of personal essays, every week. But when I went to your Web site recently to find a recording of an especially fine one, I was greeted by this text, featured prominently at the top of the page:
Let's review: a participle is a verbal adjective. So, by extension, is a participial phrase. In English, word order is important, and an adjective must be very close -- usually right up next to -- the word it modifies. If you separate them with heaps of verbiage, they will not work together. And a participle certainly cannot be made to modify a noun that is flat-out AWOL from the sentence. It will steadfastly refuse any such unreasonable request; instead it will simply nestle up to the closest noun or pronoun available -- in this case, "Americans."
It also violates language labor laws to attempt to force a participle to impersonate an adverb, but that doesn't stop tens of thousands of lawyers from doing it. I know because I used to edit their copy; scarcely a day went by when I didn't expend some red ink on "The judge ruled based on ..." or some similar construction. These lawyers were callously trying to compel the participle to modify the verb "ruled." But a participle is an adjective, remember? It can modify a noun or a pronoun, but not a verb. It is cruel to ask a participle to take on a task so manifestly contrary to its God-given grammatical nature.
Sometimes the attempt to force the hapless participle into an adverb's job was a bit subtler, as in "Based on that argument, the judge decided that ..." The judge's decision may have been based on the argument, or the judge may have based her decision on that argument, or perhaps she decided on the basis of that argument (see? your average prepositional phrase does not balk at modifying a verb). But the assertion that the judge was based on the argument? That's a baseless claim.
---copycrab ¶ 11:06 AM
Make a StatementAm I the only copy editor in the world who still notices dangling participles? I can't speak for all Americans, but I feel certain that I, for one, am not based on a radio program of the 1950s or any other decade. And the mysterious noun that is supposed to be modified by the participial phrase "based on a 1950s radio program of the same name" (this is meant to refer to the new series, I'm guessing) is not merely distant from the participle: it's not in evidence at all!
Based on a 1950s radio program of the same name, Americans from all walks of life share the personal philosophies and core values that guide their daily lives.
Let's review: a participle is a verbal adjective. So, by extension, is a participial phrase. In English, word order is important, and an adjective must be very close -- usually right up next to -- the word it modifies. If you separate them with heaps of verbiage, they will not work together. And a participle certainly cannot be made to modify a noun that is flat-out AWOL from the sentence. It will steadfastly refuse any such unreasonable request; instead it will simply nestle up to the closest noun or pronoun available -- in this case, "Americans."
It also violates language labor laws to attempt to force a participle to impersonate an adverb, but that doesn't stop tens of thousands of lawyers from doing it. I know because I used to edit their copy; scarcely a day went by when I didn't expend some red ink on "The judge ruled based on ..." or some similar construction. These lawyers were callously trying to compel the participle to modify the verb "ruled." But a participle is an adjective, remember? It can modify a noun or a pronoun, but not a verb. It is cruel to ask a participle to take on a task so manifestly contrary to its God-given grammatical nature.
Sometimes the attempt to force the hapless participle into an adverb's job was a bit subtler, as in "Based on that argument, the judge decided that ..." The judge's decision may have been based on the argument, or the judge may have based her decision on that argument, or perhaps she decided on the basis of that argument (see? your average prepositional phrase does not balk at modifying a verb). But the assertion that the judge was based on the argument? That's a baseless claim.
---copycrab ¶ 11:06 AM
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