Straight Talking on Strait and Straight

Hattie McDaniel and Vivien Leigh, 

in a scene from Gone with the Wind

Ms. Picky has noticed an unfortunate spelling trend, and she hopes that, by providing a little historical background and explanation, she might help to turn that trend around. Let’s begin by talking about a word used to describe a prudish sort of person: “straightlaced.” (Rest assured, of course, that that is one term that has never been used to describe Ms. Picky!) 

The problem is that, since it refers to the laces on a Victorian corset, the word should be “straitlaced.” Women did not wear corsets to appear straighter; they wore them to appear curvier. To that end, they laced their corsets tightly. The word “strait” is an old English word meaning narrow, or tight. Let’s take a look at some different examples of where straight and strait are often confused.

The Strait of Gibraltar (or Magellan). In the case of a body of water, a strait is a narrow section of water that links two larger bodies of water. For some reason (and Ms. Picky has no idea what that reason is) the term, when it regards water, is often used, incorrectly, in the plural: e.g., the Straits of Gibraltar. Rest assured, however, there is only one Strait of Gibraltar and one Strait of Magellan.

Straitlaced. If a woman’s corset had been laced very tightly (as mentioned above), it was difficult for her to bend or move easily. Such a woman, then, whose corset was straitlaced, would appear to be very upright, prim, and proper while her corset was laced. There was of course no telling how she might behave when she loosened her corset—or removed it altogether. . . .

Straitjacket. The correct spelling for the long-sleeved garment that mental institutions once used to bind the arms of unmanageable patients is straitjacket, not straightjacket, since it was designed to be narrow and restraining.

Dire straits. The metaphor here is a nautical reference, and so should be strait, as in a strait connecting two bodies of water.

Straitened circumstances. The expression means living without enough money for necessities, and is usually used to describe the circumstances of someone who was once used to having more money and has since fallen on hard times. The idiom here alludes to a tight budget.

Taking the strait (straight) and narrow path. This term is used to mean behaving in a conventional or law-abiding manner. For an answer on whether to use strait or straight in this idiom, let’s go to a biblical source,  Matthew 7:13–14 (KJV):

“Enter ye in at the strait gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way, that leadeth to destruction, and many there be which go in thereat:

Because strait is the gate, and narrow is the way, which leadeth unto life, and few there be that find it.” 

The meaning here is clearly narrow, not straight, but, if you’re not as picky as Ms. Picky, you might get a pass on this one, since, in these ecumenical and secular times, one is less and less inclined to be familiar with the KJV, and the word in this usage is rarely seen spelled correctly, as strait.

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Journalism Wall of Shame

The Journalism Wall of Shame displays errors in grammar, punctuation, or language that have appeared recently in the press. Submissions are welcome. Please include the publication's name and date, the story title, and the reporter's name. The publication of these errors in no way places blame for them on a particular person. Sometimes it is the reporter, sometimes an editor, sometimes a headline-writer, but—somewhere in the system—somebody should have known better.

“Transit police are investigating how a . . . man was injured and later died after he was found Saturday night laying on the . . . railroad tracks . . . , officials said.”

 —“Police Investigate . . . Death,” Pervaiz Shallwani, www.wsj.com, Nov. 6, 2011

Ms. Picky’s readers know that someone might have been found lying on the railroad tracks, but the only way there could have been any laying on the tracks was if a chicken had chosen this unlikely spot as a nest and were producing an egg.

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“Let He Who Lobbed No Missiles Judge Libya Rebels: Stephen Carter” (headline),—Stephen L. Carter, www.bloomberg.com, Oct. 27, 2011

If Mr. Carter or his editor had read this carefully, he would have realized that the case of a pronoun is not affected by the introduction of a relative clause; it should have been “Let Him Who Lobbed. . . .”

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“For consumers, Apple’s ecosystem offers a better value and the cache that Samsung does not.”

—Darcy Travios, www.Forbes.com, “Investing: Investors and Consumers Should Love Apple’s iPhone 4S,” www.forbes.com, Oct. 5, 2011

Cache [pronounced cash] means a secret store or accumulation of something. The word called for here was cachet [pronounced ca-SHAY], which means status, prestige, or distinction. 

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