800 - What Did You Step On? And Is That a Desert or a Dessert?

Grammar Girl Quick and Dirty Tips for Better Writing

Mignon Fogarty, Inc.

Society & Culture, Education

4.5 • 2.9K Ratings

🗓️ 3 December 2020

⏱️ 10 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Here's why you can ignore zombie rules and why it's actually better to write "What did you step on?" than "On what did you step?" (But also when you can't ignore those rules!) Then, I have two great memory tricks to help you remember the spellings for "dessert" and "desert." They relate to camels and, well, food. Subscribe to the newsletter for regular updates. Watch my LinkedIn Learning writing course. Join the conversation on Facebook and Twitter. Grammar Pop iOS game. Peeve Wars card game. Grammar Girl books. HOST: Mignon Fogarty VOICEMAIL: 833-214-GIRL (833-214-4475) Grammar Girl is part of the Quick and Dirty Tips podcast network. Links: https://www.quickanddirtytips.com/ https://www.quickanddirtytips.com/podcasts https://www.quickanddirtytips.com/subscribe http://twitter.com/grammargirl http://facebook.com/grammargirl http://pinterest.com/realgrammargirl http://instagram.com/thegrammargirl https://www.linkedin.com/company/grammar-girl

Transcript

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0:00.0	[♪ INTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪
0:04.8	From Recreall here, I'm Mignon Foggerty, and you can think of me as your friendly guide to the English language.
0:10.5	We talk about writing, history, rules, and cool stuff.
0:14.1	Since we talked about the phrase, it's where it's at last week.
0:18.0	It's a good time to talk more generally about ending a sentence with a preposition.
0:22.5	And then I'll give you some great memory tricks to remember the difference between the spelling of dessert and dessert.
0:29.2	[♪ INTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪
0:31.4	I know many of you were taught that you shouldn't end a sentence with a preposition, but that's a myth.
0:37.3	In fact, I consider it one of the top 10 grammar myths because so many people believe it's true,
0:43.1	but nearly all grammarians disagree, at least in some cases.
0:47.1	So before I lose you, let's back up what is a preposition.
0:51.4	Well, a preposition is a word that creates a relationship between other words.
0:56.8	It's been said that prepositions often deal with space and time, which always makes me think of Star Trek.
1:03.2	For example, the prepositions above, by, and over, all say something about a position in space.
1:11.1	The picture is above the fireplace. The nightstand is by the bed.
1:16.5	And the prepositions before, after, and since all say something about time.
1:22.3	For example, we went for a walk before dinner.
1:25.9	We had dessert after dinner.
1:29.3	So what about ending a sentence with a preposition?
1:33.2	Well, here's an example of a sentence that can end with a preposition.
1:37.8	What did you step on?
1:40.4	An important point is that the sentence doesn't work if you leave off the preposition.
	...

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