The conviction yesterday of former President Donald Trump in a New York state court on thirty-four felony counts was, everyone agrees, historic, the first such conviction of a former president of the United Sates. But I am not concerned here with the rightness or wrongness of the verdict; instead, I have been asked was it "a historical event" or "an historical event"?
Kai Ryssdal insisted on Twitter that it should be "an historic," and David Hobby (who took the photograph at the top of this blog) flagged me to weigh in.
We use the indefinite article "a" before words beginning with "h" when the "h" is aspirated: a hat, a home, a haven. We use the indefinite article "an" before words beginning with "h" when instead of an aspirated "h" there is a vowel sound: an hour, an honor.
The dispute rises over which indefinite article to use when a word begins with an "h" that is weakly aspirated because the stress comes on the second syllable of the word; thus some speakers say and write an historic or an hotel. (I doubt that you would say "a HO-tel" unless you were content to sound like a rube, but that's on you.)
Bryan Garner, among other authorities, dismisses that argument, saying that everyone should "avoid pretense" and use "a" before all words beginning with "h," warning that practice to the contrary smells of affectation.
Good people, this is America and English is your language, to wield it as it suits you, and I for one am sticking with an historic. People have been telling me that I "talk like a book" since the second Eisenhower administration, and I am not prepared to abandon the habits of a lifetime.
I am bookmarking this column to present to the next – and every – person who takes me to task for my preference for “an historic”.
ReplyDeleteI won't argue with or criticize anyone who wishes to use "an historic...," but I'll stick with Mr. Garner on this one. Neither was is more or less correct than the other, in my view. There are far more important things to resolve than this.
ReplyDeleteHi, Mr. McIntyre. Often there's the option of writing around these situations. "The Drake, a/an historic Chicago hotel...." can easily be "Chicago's historic Drake Hotel...."
ReplyDeleteThank you for your time, and have a good weekend.
Todd J. Behme
Woodridge, Ill.
That was so satisfying.
ReplyDeleteI've joked that after Trump is elected president again, he will have to serve his term from an oval cell. No, John, "a historic event" is correct for those of us who speak American instead of English. We do say the "h".
ReplyDeleteWiktionary has /(h)ɪˈst/ for the start of historic for Received Pronunciation, General American, and New York Metropolitan Area suggesting all say the 'h'.
DeleteEnglish is my language. You colonials forked American.
ReplyDeleteChecking via ngram viewer to find what Ms. Loquendi thinks, and restricting it to American English, when we compare "a historic" with "an historic" the two jostle along essentially the same up to the late 1930s. At that point "a historic" pulls ahead, but both continue to rise. Then around 1990, "an historic" peaks and goes into rapid decline. The result is that today "a historic" has a commanding lead, but both forms are still current.
ReplyDeletePersonally, "an historic" seems slightly more natural to me. "A historic" forces a bit of a stronger aspiration than I want to put in there.