Grama Girl here.

This week I have a quick and dirty tip about the difference between a current and a current.

In a meaty middle about the American dialect society's word of the year, the singular

THE.

First, the fruit.

A current with an A is a fruit similar to a raisin.

In the 14th century, farmers in a Greek town called Karens exported these raisins to other

European cities, and the fruit became known as raisins of Karens, or sometimes raisins

of Corinth, and eventually simply as currents.

Current with an E has many meanings.

As an adjective, it has to do with time or prevalence, and as a noun, it's something

that flows, such as water and a river, or electricity along a wire.

I remember how to spell the fruit name by thinking that its name ends with A and T. It's

C-U-R-R-A-N-T, so it ends with ANT, an ANT's eat food.

So current spelled with the ANT at the end is the food, a raisin-like fruit.

And now on to the singular THE.

2015 was a big year for the little pronoun THE, and it's slide into use as a singular

pronoun.

First, in December, the Washington Post admitted the singular THE into its style guide, saying

it's fine for post-writers to use THE, as a singular pronoun for transgender people,

and to avoid awkward sentences.

Then, last week, hundreds of linguists at the American Dialect Society annual meeting

...