1166. This week, we look the grammar of the Academy Awards and how to avoid an "illogical plot twist" in your sentences. Then, we look at common time-related redundancies like "period of time," the proper way to use "a.m." and "p.m.," and why the abbreviation UTC doesn't actually match its name.
1166. This week, we look the grammar of the Academy Awards and how to avoid an "illogical plot twist" in your sentences. Then, we look at common time-related redundancies like "period of time," the proper way to use "a.m." and "p.m.," and why the abbreviation UTC doesn't actually match its name.
The Academy Awards segment was written by Jim Norrena.
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Grammar Girl here. I’m Mignon Fogarty, and today, we're going to talk about the Academy Awards, and then we're going to talk about writing about time.
But first, I have a quick correction from a couple of weeks ago. A listener named Kendon wrote in to point out that when I was explaining when to use the one-word, adverb version of the word "awhile" versus the two-word version that's an article plus a noun, "a while," I said prepositions CAN'T take adverbs as complements — and that's too strong. Using adverbs to test the situation when you're debating whether to use the one-word version of "awhile" that's an adverb is still a good test. For example, if you wouldn't say, "We played for quietly," you don't want to say, "We played for awhile," using the one-word, adverb version of "awhile." In that case, you need the two-word article plus a noun: "a while."
But there are some prepositions, especially those with temporal meanings, that actually can take adverbs as complements. For example, you could say, "They played together until recently" — "until" being a preposition and "recently" being an adverb. "Since" and "before" are other prepositions that can take adverb complements. So I got a little carried away saying that prepositions can NEVER take adverbs as complements. Thanks for the message, Kendon.
This next segment is by Jim Norrena.
by Jim Norrena
Since its premiere on May 16, 1929, the Academy Awards ceremony has become a favorite among film fans. Presented by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, the event honors film professionals in twenty-four categories, including Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actor, and Best Actress.
The statuette is officially called the Academy Award of Merit, but informally, we also call the statuettes and the event the Oscars (after those statuettes, which, at about eight pounds and made of gold-plated bronze, are heavier than they look). (1,2)
With Hollywood’s biggest night approaching, we get to address an entertaining grammar question: Do we say, “the Academy Awards is” or “the Academy Awards are”?
And the winner is . . . both (with grammar reservations, of course — which are far easier to have than, say, front-row reservations on the red carpet)!
Surprisingly, no major style guide addresses the question, but a Google Ngram search shows that both “the Academy Awards are” and “the Academy Awards is” are in common use. “Academy Awards are” is significantly more common than “Academy Awards is,” though, and the plural treatment becomes even more clearly the winner when you filter out sentences where "Academy Awards" isn't actually the subject, such as "Dressing a star for the Academy Awards is a major boost for an up-and-coming designer." In that case, the subject is "Dressing a star," not "Academy Awards," so that's why we choose the singular verb, "is."
But still … you definitely will find published works where people have written things like "The Academy Awards is my favorite live TV event."
So the question is, "Are sentences like this defensible, or are they just errors that slipped through editing?"
Again, the answer is both.
In addition to slip-ups, some seemingly illogical noun-verb, singular-plural constructions are allowed based on meaning or intent rather than traditional syntax under a condition called notional agreement, or more technically, synesis. An example of a notional agreement would be: Ten Best Actor Awards is enough. (3)
Logically, “ten” should be followed by “are,” but the notion is of a single subject (the act of receiving ten awards). So based on notional agreement, it can be technically correct to say “the Academy Awards is” when you're talking about the ceremony since that's one thing.
But just because a film’s been nominated doesn’t mean it deserves an Oscar, right? In other words, being grammatically correct doesn’t always guarantee the best sentence.
When choosing between “the Academy Awards is” and “the Academy Awards are,” let context take the lead. If you’re writing about the ceremony itself, it can be singular; but if you’re writing about the honors, it’s definitely plural.
Let’s look at two examples in which the ceremony is the intended subject:
"The Academy Awards is Squiggly’s favorite night of the year."
Here, the singular verb “is” confirms that we’re referring to the event, not the awards.
Now consider this:
"The Academy Awards are Squiggly’s favorite night of the year."
It’s difficult to distinguish the ceremony from the awards, and it doesn’t sound quite right to the ear.
In this example, the better choice is “the Academy Awards is” to emphasize the ceremony.
In contrast, when the idea of the subject is multiple "awards," always make it plural, as in this example:
"As soon as the Academy Awards are announced this month, Aardvark will know which films to see. "
The meaning is clear. The syntax is correct. (“As soon as the Academy Awards is announced this month, Aardvark will know which films to see” doesn’t really make sense.)
In short, using “is” can refer only to the actual event. Using “are” the subject can be either the event or the awards, depending on the context.
Often, your ears will be your guide.
And this most likely explains why “the Academy Awards are . . .” is so prevalent: It just sounds right. The meaning works either way. If you must distinguish the event, you can use the singular — but often it will still sound better and be less jarring to your readers if you add a word like "ceremony."
Our earlier example, "The Academy Awards is Squiggly’s favorite night of the year," sounded fine (probably because of the singular "favorite night of the year" at the end), but other sentences where you're talking about the ceremony can still sound more wrong, as in "The Academy Awards is March 15." In that case, "The Academy Awards ceremony is March 15," is a better choice. No more noun-verb disagreement — perceived or real. Problem solved.
Also, even when you’re correct, your grammar checker will likely flag “the Academy Awards is” as an error, since checkers often flag nontraditional noun-verb constructions. Think of it as a helpful reminder to double-check your accuracy.
Fortunately, whether you treat "the Academy Awards" as plural, which is recommended, or singular, the same consideration should apply to other awards, too, like the Golden Globes (or Globes), BAFTAs, the Tony Awards (or Tonys), and the Grammy Awards (or Grammys). Consistency is always the winner!
And like a good script, the reward is in the big picture! The big picture is that you should treat plural-sounding award names as plural, except in the very specific circumstance of referring to the ceremony itself. And even then, it's usually better to rewrite the sentence to avoid the odd singular-plural mismatch that might distract your readers. After all, no one likes an illogical plot twist.
Happy Oscars viewing!
That segment was by Jim Norrena, MFA, who has been writing, editing, and leading grammar and proofreading workshops for more than thirty-five years. He founded TypoSuction.com, an independent editorial service, and is a member of Bay Area Editors’ Forum. He also serves on the board of Professional Publishers Network. You can find him at LinkedIn.
REFERENCES
by Mignon Fogarty
Many parts of the world recently moved from standard time to daylight saving time or summer time, so let's talk about time. First, time zones.
Most countries have signed on to the idea of a standard world time system. In general, the world is divided into 24 time zones, and most zones differ by an hour from the time zones next door. But not everyone uses the same system. For example, some places divide their region into zones that are shorter than an hour.
And actually, it’s even more complicated than that. The state of Arizona, for example, doesn’t participate in daylight saving time, but other states in the same time zone do. So during standard time, it is the same time in Arizona and Utah, but during daylight saving time, it is an hour earlier in Arizona because they don’t “spring forward” like other states in the same time zone.
If you need to indicate that a time is in a certain time zone, the simplest way to do it is to put the time zone abbreviation after the time: for example, for 4:30 Eastern Standard Time, write something like “4:30 p.m. EST,” with no commas and with EST in all capital letters.
And if you aren't sure whether it's daylight saving time or standard time, you can also just write "ET" for "Eastern time."
If you are writing out the full name of a time zone, though, you generally capitalize all the words. For example, in both AP and Chicago style, you capitalize all the words in “Pacific Standard Time” and “Pacific Daylight Time.” But, if you're not writing the full name, then you leave the word "time" lowercase, for example writing "Pacific time," with "Pacific" capitalized and "time" lowercase.
Next, there are multiple acceptable ways to write “a.m.” and “p.m.,” which are abbreviations for “ante meridiem” and “post meridiem.” “Ante meridiem” is Latin for “before noon” and “post meridiem” is Latin for “after noon.” Note that it is “meridieM” not “meridiaN.”
Chicago and the AP Stylebook recommend you write “a.m.” and “p.m.” as lowercase letters with periods after them, but some people write them with all capital letters or with small caps (with or without periods). But no matter how you write them, you should put a space between the time and the “a.m.” or “p.m.” that follows.
A listener named Rae asked whether it’s OK to write 2 p.m. without the zeroes after the 2? If you’re using Associated Press style, that’s how you’d write it, but Chicago style recommends including the zeroes. So it depends on what style guide you follow.
And remember how I said “a.m.” means “before noon,” and “p.m.” means “after noon”? So what about noon itself, then? Technically, noon is neither a.m. nor p.m. Although it’s common to see noon written as 12:00 p.m. and midnight written as 12:00 a.m., it’s not correct and can confuse people. It’s better to stick with just the words “noon” and “midnight.”
There are a couple redundancies that relate to time.
For example, it’s redundant to say “8:00 a.m. in the morning.” By including the "a.m." you’ve already indicated that it’s morning.
It’s also usually redundant to use the phrase “period of time” — either “period” alone or “time” alone will usually suffice. Merriam-Webster’s Dictionary of English Usage argues that occasionally using the full phrase “period of time” adds clarity, but I’m willing to bet that 19 times out of 20 you can use either “period” or “time” without causing confusion. But if you run into a sentence in which you really think you need it, go ahead.
Finally, multiple international listeners have suggested using Greenwich Mean Time (abbreviated "GMT") as an alternative to all the different time zones because GMT is the same for everyone. GMT is tied to the time at the Royal Observatory in Greenwich, England.
But if you want a more universal time-zone designation, the better choice is actually Coordinated Universal Time, abbreviated "UTC," because it's already been adopted by many governments and regulatory bodies. (And yes, I noticed too that the abbreviation “UTC” does not match the words “Coordinated Universal Time.” It turns out the abbreviation is a compromise meant to be acceptable to people speaking different languages. English doesn’t always win.)
Now, although UTC and GMT are always the same time, they actually aren't the same thing. GMT is both a time zone and the local mean time at the Royal Observatory in Greenwich, England, and UTC is a time standard. It turns out that there are hundreds of atomic clocks all over the world, and a body called the International Telecommunication Union maintains UTC based on the weighted average from the time of all these clocks.
UTC time zones are written as an offset from Standard time at the Royal Observatory, so for example, the Pacific Time Zone is called UTC-8 during Standard time, because it's 8 hours earlier than UTC, and UTC-7 during daylight saving time. And that's written with no spaces — just "UTC, minus sign, and the number 7 or the number 8."
And one thing the Time and Date site says causes a lot of problems is that UTC and GMT don't change for daylight saving time, but Britain does. So when they move the clocks ahead for British Summer Time, the time in Greenwich is suddenly different from Greenwich Mean Time.
And just to make things even more complicated, GMT or UTC are also sometimes known as “Zulu time,” which comes from the military, where each time zone in GMT has an alphabetical letter designation. The zone at the Royal Observatory is labeled Z. So the name “Zulu time” comes from the name for the letter Z in the NATO phonetic alphabet: Zulu. You know how A, B, and C, are “alpha,” “bravo,” “charlie”? Well, Z is “zulu.”
Now, although GMT, UTC, and Zulu time are the same everywhere, and they are the standard in some situations like aviation and meteorology, they’re not the current standard in the general public. It may be good to use GMT or UTC if you're regularly scheduling meetings internationally with people in lots of different locations, but I think it would be more confusing than helpful to try to use it for daily general use right now.
However, I do think it’s polite to describe your meetings in the other person’s time zone. For example, I usually say something like, “Let’s talk at 9:00; that’s noon your time.” Just make sure you get the conversion right! I like WorldTimeBuddy.com for checking times in other cities because they have a nice slider you can move around. And still, a couple of times a year, I miss a meeting because someone doing the scheduling got the time conversion wrong — and sometimes it's me. (And every time that happens, the “let’s use GMT” suggestion sounds a little better.)
References
"Abbreviations for Time of Day." Chicago Manual of Style, 10.46. https://www.chicagomanualofstyle.org/book/ed18/part2/ch10/psec046.html (accessed March 3, 2026)
Brians, P. Common Errors in English Usage. Wilsonville: William, James & Co., 2003, p. 205.
Buckle, Anne and Bikos, Konstantin. "The Difference Between GMT and UTC." Time and Date. https://www.timeanddate.com/time/gmt-utc-time.html (accessed March 2, 2026)
Buckle, Anne. "Half Hour and 45-Minute Time Zones." Time and Date.
https://www.timeanddate.com/time/time-zones-interesting.html (accessed March 2, 2026)
Garner, Brian. Garner’s Modern American Usage. Second edition. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2003, p. 599.
Garner, B. Garner’s Modern American Usage. Third edition. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009, p. 619.
Merriam-Webster’s Dictionary of English Usage. Springfield: Merriam-Webster, 1994, p. 728.
"Midnight." AP Stylebook. https://www.apstylebook.com/ap_stylebook/midnight (accessed March 3, 2026)
"Noon and Midnight." Chicago Manual of Style, 9.40. https://www.chicagomanualofstyle.org/book/ed18/part2/ch09/psec040.html (accessed March 2, 2026)
"Time and Time Zones." Chicago Manual of Style, 8.91. https://www.chicagomanualofstyle.org/book/ed18/part2/ch08/psec091.html (accessed March 2, 2026)
"Time Zones." AP Stylebook. https://www.apstylebook.com/ap_stylebook/time-zones?sconvid=3866 (accessed March 2, 2026)
"Z-time (Coordinated Universal Time)." National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. https://www.noaa.gov/jetstream/time (accessed March 2, 2026)
Finally, I have a familect from Trent.
"Hi Mignon, it's Trent from Dallas, and I wanted to send in something for your familect segment. When we're getting ready to leave home to go somewhere or we've been somewhere long enough, and it's time to head back home, one of us will ask the other, "Lou?" Now there's an actual etymology for this. It started with "Are you ready?" which shortened to "You ready?" then "Lou ready?" and finally just "Lou?" So, if you feel like you've been somewhere long enough and your family needs a secret code word for "let's get the heck out of here," you can look at your significant other and ask, "Lou?"
I love it. Thanks, Trent. Very useful and also a great example of how language changes over time.
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I'm Mignon Fogarty, better known as Grammar Girl.
That's all. Thanks for listening!