Again with the homophones!

In an article in my local campus paper, the writer makes the fairly common mistake of using one homophone when the correct choice would be another. This is the root of the common "your/you're" and "its/it's" errors. In this case, the campus writer used a much more uncommon pair:

Deciding that my answer to the question is yes is a hurtle I have already jumped.

In this case, he mistook the verb form "hurtle" for the noun "hurdle," which in addition to being a different part of speech, also has a different meaning. (Though dictionary.com gives a noun usage for "hurtle," it also lists this as being archaic and referring to collisions.)

From dictionary.com, here are the most common meanings of the words:

hur⋅tle
 –verb (used without object)
1. to rush violently; move with great speed: The car hurtled down the highway.
2. to move or go noisily or resoundingly, as with violent or rapid motion: The sound was deafening, as tons of snow hurtled down the mountain.
3. Archaic. to strike together or against something; collide.


hur⋅dle
–noun
1. a portable barrier over which contestants must leap in certain running races, usually a wooden frame with a hinged inner frame that swings down under impact to prevent injury to a runner who does not clear it.
2. hurdles, (used with a singular verb) a race in which contestants must leap over a number of such barriers placed at specific intervals around the track. Compare high hurdles, low hurdles.
3. any of various vertical barriers, as a hedge, low wall, or section of fence, over which horses must jump in certain types of turf races, as a steeplechase, but esp. an artificial barrier.
4. a difficult problem to be overcome; obstacle.
5. Chiefly British. a movable rectangular frame of interlaced twigs, crossed bars, or the like, as for a temporary fence.
6. a frame or sled on which criminals, esp. traitors, were formerly drawn to the place of execution.
–verb (used with object)
7. to leap over (a hurdle, barrier, fence, etc.), as in a race.
8. to master (a difficulty, problem, etc.); overcome.
9. to construct with hurdles; enclose with hurdles.
–verb (used without object)
10. to leap over a hurdle or other barrier.

Source: http://oudaily.com/news/2009/sep/09/column-can-someone-be-religious-and-still-practice/

Dictionary.com:
http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/hurtle
http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/hurdle

Being Hollywood, there just has to be some added element of complication to the sometimes inscrutable world of relationships, and boy, do those screenwriter love disorders.

Now, I know there are all sorts of disorders out there, but what are"screenwriter love disorders?"

Source: http://oudaily.com/news/2009/aug/28/movie-reviews/

Commas, commas everywhere, and not a drop to think

Another article from the local campus paper caught my eye today. This one is about a local Habitat for Humanity project. My wife volunteers and serves on one of H4H's committees and I remember working together on this particular house, so this article about its completion was of particular interest to me. Hopefully the house itself was better inspected than the article, as the latter is littered with random commas.

The next Cleveland County Habitat for Humanity project, begins Aug. 15, and volunteers are always needed and welcome, Cox said.

There is absolutely no need for that first comma. In fact, it is distracting, as it separates the subject (albeit a somewhat long, complex one) from the verb.

Another sprinkling of commas in this article appears only in the print version. The caption on one of the photos states:

The Johnson family was forced to move into substandard housing when, Jojo, who suffers from Down Syndrome, was diagnosed with leukemia.

The so-called "corrected" version of this caption in the online version is itself fraught with comma errors:

Habitat for Humanity volunteers made it possible for Jojo, his father, Joseph Johson to move-in to their new home.

If you were to look at this sentence completely outside of context, there would be no way to tell who these people are or how they are related. Are they 3 separate people? Is JoJo the father, or is his father Joseph Johnson?

Put simply, the two individuals listed here should be separated by 'and,' not a comma, and the appellative needs to be set off by commas. Thus we need "JoJo and his father, Joseph Johnson, to move."

And then there's the use of "move-in" as some sort of compound verb instead of a noun! Why did the author feel a need to use a hyphen there? There is no reasonable explanation.

Sources
Print: "Sooners aid in new family home." The Oklahoma Daily. 28 July 2009, p. 1.

Online: http://oudaily.com/news/2009/jul/27/sooners-aid-new-family-home/

Let's see you cut-and-paste your way out of this one!

Sometimes mistakes are so obvious, you have to wonder how they made it through to print. Especially when it's in print media which should have thorough editors. For example, this introductory sentence from an article in the OU Daily:

Check out this sentence from C the best-selling "The Angel's Game" by arlos Ruiz Zafon: [...]

This seems to be an obvious case of cut-and-paste tug-of-war between the author and the editor. One wanted to put the Zafon's name before the book and one wanted to put it after.

Interestingly, in the online version of this article, this error has been corrected and Zafon is named before the book:

Check out this sentence from Carlos Ruiz Zafón’s best-seller “The Angel’s Game”:

Sources
Print: "Inexplicable plot twists and too many metaphors sink 'The Angel's Game.'" The Oklahoma Daily, 28 July 2009, p. 4.

Online: http://oudaily.com/news/2009/jul/28/book-review-angels-game/

You keep using that word... I do not think it means what you think it means...

The local campus paper has done it again:

Even though Adrian Peterson made a trip to his old stomping grounds this past weekend to coach children in the fundamentals of football, he said that coming to Norman brought back memories of his days as a Sooner.

That introduction "even though" implies that there is some kind of contradiction coming. Here, that is not the case. Preferable would be something along the lines of "When..."

Source: http://oudaily.com/news/2009/jun/29/peterson-reflects-sooners-career/

As football season approaches, so begins the commentary and speculation on the upcoming season. The OU Daily, local campus paper is already talking about possible Heisman candidates:

So, will this year be any different? Will we have the second player in history to win the Heisman, or will a new player hoist the trophy in December?

Again, we have a perfectly fine sentence, aside from the fact that it is completely inaccurate! There have been numerous winners of the trophy already. What they meant was "second player to win the Heisman twice." Huge difference there.

Source: http://oudaily.com/news/2009/jul/09/tradition-could-give-heisman-mccoy/

Welcome to the Department of Redundancy Department

From the OU Daily (the local campus paper):

Anyone who regularly reads this column regularly knows Robert Kirkman is one of my favorite comic book writers.

Source: http://oudaily.com/news/2009/apr/22/week-comics-kick-ass-no-6-invincible-no-61/

Even the newspaper's getting in on the act!

While they're not "professional" writers, per se, contributors to the local college paper are seeing their work in print, with an editor to review it. Many of them are journalism students, planning on entering the workforce as professional writers upon graduation. So, imagine my surprise when I found the following mistake in a recent article:

I was informed that I was booked on a flight for Tuesday, though this was not very reassuring as, as I was previously booked on the flight that had just taken off without me.

Not only is the 'as' doubled here, the first one is even misplaced, appearing before the comma!

Source: http://oudaily.com/news/2009/mar/24/column-overbooked-flights-shouldnt-keep-us-flying/