Fri, 05 Dec 2025 23:25:58 EST
Consider This Sentence
The following sentence occurs in The Toronto Star on Apple News. “Frank Gehry, the Canadian-American architect whose dynamic buildings defied convention, cementing him as one of the most important and influential designers of his generation, died on Friday at his home in California.”
The phrase that begins with cementing surprises. We expect the main verb of the sentence and not a modifier. And cemented without the comma works better, but I will omit the phrase because it is editorial in nature.
My rewrite: “Toronto-born architect Frank Gehry died at his home in Santa Monica on Friday. Gehry’s idiosyncratic designs combined collapsed and swollen forms with the straight lines and right angles of traditional architecture.”
Thu, 20 Nov 2025 07:30:05 EST
Canard
The English noun canard derives from the French noun canard, which means duck or hoax. The sense of hoax derives from the 16th-century French expression vendre des canards à moitié, which means selling ducks by the half. The phrase decribed cheating. The original context of the expression has been lost. English speakers adopted canard in the sense of hoax in the mid 19th century.
Thu, 13 Nov 2025 15:08:25 EST
Consider This Sentence
The following sentence occurs in The Globe and Mail on Apple News. “China and Russia continue to target Canada for sensitive government and private-sector intelligence and high-tech goods and are seeking to gain a strategic foothold in the Arctic, the country’s spy agency head said Thursday.”
A little long. Unnecessary present participle: seek to gain will do.
I prefer attributions at the start of sentences.
What does and high-tech goods mean in this context? How do you target a country’s goods? Does the writer mean theft of physical objects or intellectual property?
What does a strategic foothold in the Arctic mean? Each nation is limited to exploiting the resources in its own territory. Is a strategic foothold a defensive military presence? Is a strategic foothold an economic stake in Arctic enterprises?
My rewrite: “According to CSIS director Daniel Rogers, China and Russia strive to exfiltrate Canadian government and private-sector data with particular regard to advanced technology and Arctic development.”
Sun, 09 Nov 2025 16:41:07 EST
Holistic
The adjective holistic means with component parts considered as an interconnected whole.
Describing an approach to managing a system as holistic implies that the approach considers more components to be part of the system than are usually thought to be part of the system. A holistic approach to health considers the roles of both mind and body in overall health. A holistic approach to education considers the influence of psychological and social factors on learning as well as pedagogical factors.