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| Author | Bryan A. Garner |
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| Language | English |
| Subject | Style guide |
| Publisher | Oxford University Press |
Publication date | 1998–2022 |
| Publication place | United States |
| Media type | Print (Hardcover) |
| Pages | 1,312(fifth edition) |
| ISBN | 9780197599020 |
Garner's Modern English Usage (GMEU), written byBryan A. Garner and published byOxford University Press, is ausage dictionary andstyle guide (or "prescriptive dictionary") for contemporaryModern English.[1] It was first published in 1998 asA Dictionary of Modern American Usage, with a focus onAmerican English, which it retained for the next two editions asGarner's Modern American Usage (GMAU). It was expanded to cover English more broadly in the 2016 fourth edition, under the present title. The work covers issues of usage, pronunciation, and style, from distinctions among commonly confused words and phrases to notes on how to prevent verbosity and obscurity. In addition, it contains essays about the English language. An abridged version of the first edition was also published asThe Oxford Dictionary of American Usage and Style in 2000.
The first edition was published in 1998 asA Dictionary of Modern American Usage, and released in an abridged, paperback edition in 2000 asThe Oxford Dictionary of American Usage and Style.
In 2003, the second full edition was published under the titleGarner's Modern American Usage, with one-third more content than the original edition.[2] A third edition was published under that title in August 2009.
An updated edition coveringBritish and otherWorld Englishes was released in April 2016 under the titleGarner's Modern English Usage. It was notable for using theGoogle Ngram Viewer to compare some 2,300 ratios of standard versus variant forms of usages, e.g., "Current ratio (harked back vs.harped back): 170:1" (Garner 2016, p. 452).
This was followed by something of a companion volume,The Chicago Guide to Grammar, Usage, and Punctuation (University of Chicago Press, May 2016), Garner's major expansion of his chapter on the topic in the last several editions ofThe Chicago Manual of Style.[citation needed]
The fifth edition was published in 2022.[3]
AuthorDavid Foster Wallace wrote, "The fact of the matter is that Garner's dictionary is extremely good .... Its format ... includes entries on individual words and phrases and expostulative small-capmini-essays."[4] (An unabridged, much lengthier version of Wallace's essay, "Authority and American Usage", appears in his 2005 anthology of essaysConsider the Lobster.) He commended Garner's stance on thelinguistic descriptivism versusprescriptivism debate thatlexicographers (dictionary writers) face. Garner's dictionary is prescriptive in aiming to uphold good English usage, but also concedes to variant forms and usage errors that are so widespread that there is no lexicographical hope of changing them.
Garrison Keillor has calledGarner's Modern American Usage one of the five most influential books in his library. Other critics, includingJohn Simon,William Safire, andBill Walsh have praised the book's clear, simple, and nuanced guidance.[citation needed]
Michael Quinion of WorldWideWords.org said in his review that usage guides "row a course against the current of modern lexicography and linguistics", descriptive fields that often fail to "meet the day-to-day needs of those users of English who want to speak and write in a way that is acceptable to educated opinion". Quinion wrote that Garner lays down rules without falling victim to "worn-out shibboleths or language superstitions".[2]
In a study that compared Garner's usage guide toHenry Fowler's, Robin Straaijer said that the two have many similarities. He pointed out that Garner (who had expressed his admiration for Fowler's work) had organized his book in a similar format and agreed with Fowler on many usage debates.[5]
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