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Article: Notes & Asides.(grammar issues, Francisco Franco)(Brief Article)
- Article from:
- National Review
- Article date:
- April 22, 2002
- Author:
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 2002 National Review, Inc. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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-- Dear Mr. Buckley: Why do otherwise educated people use phrases such as "women pilots"? For one thing, it's a double plural. For another, although "women" seems to be used as an adjective, such a use is not supported by the dictionary. The fact that this abusage has been around for a while (the Society of Women Engineers was founded in 1950) doesn't legitimize it, in my view.
I can think of no similar English construction.
Regards,
Charles F. Kyllonen
University Heights, Ohio
--Dear Mr. Kyllonen: But sometimes, in English, you have to weigh alternatives. If your intention is to note that a pilot on a particular flight was ...