One more thing. I, too, am an apostrophe pedant - which is why this south London hospital drives me absolutely nuts: http://www.guysandstthomas.nhs.uk/Home.aspx

Naturally, the southeast London part is correct while the southwest part ought to know better...

Er, of course they're both in SE1 - but Guy's is much more southeast than is St Thomas'.

(Pedant exits stage left, looking shamed...)

My copy of Fowler says that 'it was formerly customary, when a word ended in -s, to write its possessive with an apostrophe but with no additional s, e.g. Mars' Hill, Venus' Bath [...] In verse, & in reverential contexts, this custom is retained, & the number of syllables is the same as in the subjective case: Jesus' [...] not Jesus's. But elsewhere we now add the s & the syllable, [...] St James's not St James' [...]'

Perhaps St Thomas' are just being consciously old-fashioned.

This post was last modified: 19-01-2014 12:56 PM by robin orton.

We need Harry Hill to adjudicate:

I like St Thomas' traditional lack of an 's' following the possessive apostrophe, but I quite like St James's ability to move with the grammatical times. But - which is best? There's only one way to find out!

Fiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiight!

[Enter stage left, St Thomas, and stage right, St James. They slug it out using grocer's apostrophes as weapons...]

Er, what's wrong with Guy's and St Thomas'? Adding the s is optional, and usually related to what is easier to pronouce.

If you really want to be pained, have a look at the block of flats beside the car park on the hill in Bromley. There is a plaque outside proudly declaring the name of the development to be St Jame's Court.

Unless, of course, there was a St Jame.

In Leicester where I grew up, there is a St Denys' Church (the parish church of the suburban village of Evington), 'Denys' being of course an Anglicisation of 'Dionysius'. I remember being told in all seriousness that the church was dedicated to 'St Deny.'

I've always been puzzled as to why the politician Norman St John Stevas was pronounced "Sinjun" Stevas... Indeed, is it spelt as it sounds?

Perhaps we should get South Eastern train announcements to recognise the station of "Sinjuns" on the way to Lewisham.

I guess that at one time 'Saint' as an element in a name was pronounced rather sloppily as 'Sin'. Cf 'Sinclair' = 'St Clare', and the old pronunciation of St Mary Axe (as in Gilbert and Sullivan's 'The Sorcerer') as 'Simmery Axe.' I suppose some families, such as Norman St John Stevas's (or Stevas'), kept the old pronunciation but regularised the spelling.

I rather like these pronunciation anomalies, although the long term trend appears to be to get rid of them. ('Rafe' as the pronunciation of 'Ralph' no longer seems standard.) I always try to remember to say 'forrid' for 'forehead', but nobody else seems to. (I also make an effort to pronounce 'ate' as 'et', although 'ayte' now seems more or less standard.)

This post was last modified: 20-01-2014 12:00 PM by robin orton.

For years I pronounced Nigel Farage as Nigel 'Farridge' until someone pointed out the error. That person now delights in using the same pronunciation

This post was last modified: 26-01-2014 06:38 PM by Codrington Brill.

Same issue arises with 'garage.'

I thought "Farage" was pronounced "Idiot".

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics...-said.html

I have noticed the expressions 'Music 101' and 'History 101' used (obviously satirically) on the SE26 forum recently. I was puzzled, but research suggests that the number '101' is used in American universities to refer to the first (and therefore most basic and elementary) courses or modules in a particular subject as taught to undergraduates. Has this usage become widespread here? Or is it just that it has featured e.g. in some popular TV programme or something similar and therefore become suddenly fashionable amongst the young and 'switched on'?

I started university in 1992 (in the UK) and 101 was in use to describe 1st year, 1 semester subjects, second semester was 102 - it wasn't so much basic or elementary - just the compulsory, core element of the subjects - in second year, it was 201 and 202 and so on.

I'm just showing my age then - as so often!

Not to be confused with the 'Room 101' derivation of something ultimately terrifying to you personally, from 1984.

How to console a grammarian.

There, they're, their.

Credit-this week's private eye.

I visited room 101 once and it really wasn't so bad.
It had a TV tuned permanently into CNN as I remember, but I can imagine far worse channels to have to endure.

This post was last modified: 07-02-2014 01:21 PM by Perryman.

1. 'Rammed' for 'packed tight.' Clearly a fashionable usage - noticed several examples over the last year or so. Anybody any idea where it comes from?

2. Why are what I used to call 'Oxford University', 'Birmingham University' etc. now pompously called 'The University of (Oxford, Birmingham etc.)'? I wondered whether it's because there are now often more than one university in many large towns, but surely they would be quite clearly distinguished if one said 'Oxford/Birmingham University' and 'Oxford Brookes/Birmingham City University', as we used to?

3. And why, in London, have Queen Mary, Goldsmiths and Birkbeck decided to drop 'College' from their names? Sounds silly to me. OK, they can now award their own degrees rather than those of London University - but so can King's, UCL and Imperial, all of which are proud to continue to be called 'Colleges'.

This post was last modified: 16-03-2014 01:56 PM by robin orton.

Rammed to mean packed tight isn't new, is it? We talk about ramming things into things, so to talk about a place being 'rammed' is an extension of that. If people are rammed in, it's a short logical leap to use 'rammed' as an adjective. Presumably it has become more common because people find it useful.

With universities, have you noticed a new universal rule? Because I've always found The University of Blah and Blah University to be interchangeable in common use, although the institution concerned will consistently call itself one or the other on official documents etc.