Predictably, the language changes

It's the predictably in the headline above that makes my point.

Predictably is what grammarians call a sentence adverb, meaning that instead of modifying another adverb or an adjective or a verb, it modifies the whole sentence.

So why can't hopefully make the smooth transfer in status as a sentence adverb? So many other adverbs have made it. For example, sentences roll trippingly off the tongue even though they begin with actually, apparently, basically, clearly, confidentially, evidently, fortunately, and so on.

One critic, who otherwise -- hopefully -- accepts sentence adverbs such as seriously and ultimately, calls such use of hopefully "slack-jawed, common, sleazy."

Others have also tried to hold the line, which has crumbled under fire from almost all sides. Strunk and White said using hopefully as a sentence adverb offends the ears of those "who do not like to see words dulled or eroded."

But the world spins 'round and 'round.

My friend Walter, who is, like me, fascinated by our language, just today emailed me to say that he long ago gave up on hopefully the way it was once used.

Alas! Even the staid and august AP Stylebook has turned with the tide. The word mavens at the Associated Press said a decade ago (see my old copy of the AP Stylebook above) that it was wrong to write "Hopefully, we will complete our work in June."

Two years ago those AP experts tweeted: "We now support the modern usage of hopefully." The AP has gotten hip in more ways than one.

However -- and this is a big however -- if you are a careful writer, it's probably not wise just yet to go around sprinkling hopefully hither and thither at the beginning of your sentences. Among those who still caution against it is The New York Times. The Great Gray Lady will allow it, but notes primly that such use of hopefully is taking the chance of offending some of the paper's old-school readers.

But I think all is definitely lost in this particular battle. In another generation, no one will even remember that prissy time long ago when hopefully was frowned on as a sentence adverb.

Perhaps we can turn an eye ... dare I say hopefully? ... towards holding the line against another of my friend Walter's pet peeves: using a modifier with unique." Certainly, that's worth fighting for. Or has that battle been lost, too?

Hopefully not.

Commonality

I think Oscar Pistorius might affect us all more than we realize. His trial is introducing the English-speaking world to the South African accent in a major way.

The educated South African pronunciation we're hearing from the judges and lawyers and witnesses in the trial is definitely a precise version of our common tongue, but it occasionally employs emphasis, idiom and cultural custom that don't always fall easy on our American ears.

It's not British English, nor Australian English. Neither is it our own American English.

It's distinctly the English of South Africa.

This broadening of the American experience started with radio. With a flip of a switch (and as soon as the tubes warmed up) we could listen to people from New York and Los Angeles and Chicago, and even Milwaukee (whence comes H.V. Kaltenborn, an early CBS news analyst with a precise and imposing voice).

And so we all slowly and steadily began to talk more or less alike.

Television and film furthered the changes in the American accent. Satellites made us aware that English was spoken quite differently depending on where in the world one is.

Now the "trial of the century" in South Africa is adding a healthy dose of that nation's English to the mix -- adding to what we heard in the recent celebrations of the life of Nelson Mandela.

And it's not only the accents that enrich us. There is also the matter of the words we hear and then adopt.

(We'll pause here while you throw another shrimp on the barbie [Australia] or just do your own thing [Mandingo via Ralph Waldo Emerson].)

I am reminded of what James Nicoll said back when the global Internet was just becoming really useful in connecting us. Nicoll is well-known in the Usenet community and writes and blogs. He wrote:

The problem with defending the purity of the English language is that English is about as pure as a cribhouse whore. We don't just borrow words; on occasion, English has pursued other languages down alleyways to beat them unconscious and rifle their pockets for new vocabulary.

I'm not endorsing language-based violence verbal or physical, but I welcome the enrichment of our common speech. Our language is alive and well.

Lucky us

The snow was swirling yesterday afternoon outside my 9th-floor apartment. Inside, I was reading a charming book lent to me by my nephew's wife.

"Dick's Book: Reflections of a Farmer" is by Samuel Dick Harris, who is my nephew's wife's uncle, her mother's brother. He opens his book with stories about his life growing up on a farm in Spotsylvania County.

As the snow fell on a cold March afternoon in 2014, I came upon this passage describing a snowstorm that happened two years before I was born:

Anyone that lived in central Virginia in January of 1940 will never forget the snow that started on January 24th at around three or four o'clock in the afternoon. By bedtime, it was several inches deep and still coming down hard. When we got up the next morning, it had stopped snowing. You couldn't see out the back porch, for the snow was plastered all over the screen. When the screen door to the outside steps for the back porch was finally pried open, one looked out on a world buried in snow. Some people said it was three feet. I think twenty to twenty-four inches was more accurate. It was difficult to tell because the wind blew so hard and the snow drifted so badly. It totally covered up much of the fences. Of course, the roads were blocked. We didn't go to school for two weeks. The milking, feeding and watering of the cattle and chickens took all day. We had some wood stacked on the back porch for our heating and cooking. Until the wind stopped, it was useless to dig out a path, as it would soon drift full behind you. After the first day, it got extremely cold and set records that still hold until this day. It went below zero degrees Fahrenheit every morning for five days, with one reading of minus twelve degrees Fahrenheit in Richmond....

Samuel Dick Harris also describes the first tractor his father bought for farm work, the coming of electricity to his rural home, the installation of indoor plumbing, hog-killing time and other tough work on the farm, and the joys of running barefoot all through the summer. His account is all the more delightful to read because of the straightforward, no-nonsense style in which he writes.

We've had snow in dribs and drabs this winter, but "Dick's Book" was a good reminder that we've had nothing to compare with the winter of 1940 -- so far.

It was a good book to spend an afternoon with on a snowy day and think about our good fortune, even in the winter of 2014.