Definition:
Words, phrases, or clauses that do not clearly relate to the word they are intended to modify. See also:
Examples and Observations:
- "One morning I shot an elephant in my pajamas. How he got into my pajamas I'll never know."
(Groucho Marx) - "Her only full-time paid employee is a pleasant young woman with a nose ring named Rebecca, who sits at the front desk."
(reprinted in The New Yorker) - "They just said it's going to rain on the radio."
("Tiger" comic strip) - Hugh Jackman donated a pair of jeans to a charity that sold for over $20,000.
- Certain modifiers are slippery; they slide into
the wrong position in the sentence. The most dangerous are only, almost, already, even, just, nearly, merely, and always.
No: They almost worked five years on that system.
Yes: They worked almost five years on that system.
In general, these slippery descriptors should appear just before the terms they modify.
(Edmond H. Weiss, 100 Writing Remedies, Greenwood, 1990) - "You are welcome to visit the cemetery where famous Russian composers, artists, and writers are buried daily, except on Thursdays."
(in a guide to a Russian Orthodox monastery) - "Mr. Clinton acknowledged the role played by the men who subdued the gunman when he spoke at a dinner on Saturday night."
(The New York Times, October 31, 1994) - "Historians have been kept guessing over claims [that] Dr James Barry, Inspector General of Military Hospitals, was in fact a woman for more than 140 years."
(The Daily Telegraph, March 5, 2008) - "Plastic bags are a favorite of grocers because of their price, about 2 cents per bag compared to 5 cents for paper. Used widely since the 1970s, environmentalists now estimate between 500 billion to a trillion bags are produced annually worldwide."
(Savannah Morning News, January 30, 2008)
Pronunciation: MIS-plast MOD-i-FI-er
