Who or whom. All right or alright or allllllriiiiighhht

Two Quick Grammar Tips To Make You Look Smart

Photo by Daniel Lincoln on Unsplash

Since I am the queen of the typo when it comes to my own writing, I sort of constantly fret about grammar things.

Are you like this?

Did you high school creative writing teacher give two grades and you’d get A or A+ for content and then a much lower grade for grammar?

Welcome to my world.

Today, I’m going to talk about two quick rules to make you seem fancy because you know them. You don’t have to use them. You can stick it to the grammar man and all that, but it’s good to know them so then you can stick it to the grammar man on purpose.

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WHO OR WHOM?

This bad boy is a little tricky for us all. But a cool general rule of thumb is that if you’d use the pronoun him in the sentence rather than he? Then you’d use whom in the sentence rather than who.

Examples of weirdness for using WHO:

• Ham-Ham the hamster is someone who longs for smoked gouda cheese more than anything in the free world.

• Ham-Ham the hamster is someone. He longs for smoked gouda cheese more than anything in the free world.

• Who would like to go on a cheese trip?

• He would like to go on a cheese trip.

Examples of weirdness for using WHOM:

• To whom was the singing cheese telegram addressed?

• That singing cheese telegram was addressed to him.

• Ham-Ham is the hamster whom everyone thinks is a hottie.

• Ham-Ham is the hamster. It’s him that everyone thinks is a hottie.

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All right or alright or allllllriiiiighhht

I am so sorry to tell you this but “alright” is all wrong.

Gasp! I know! I know! It doesn’t look wrong.

But it’s like plaid flannel with a polkadot parka in Aruba on the hottest day of the year. It’s not right.

Almost every single style guide (Chicago, AP, MLA are style guides) will tell you to just say no to making all right one word.

If you want to look like a pro, write it “all right” even though everyone else is doing it alright.

If you want to sound sleezy or like Fonzie on the classic show Happy Days, go “allllll riiiiighhhhttt.”

If you want to sound a little stoned like Matthew McConaughey in a movie from 1993 called Dazed and Confused? Say "all right, all right, all right.”

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