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Rx for the recurrent misuse of “even as” in news stories

Yesterday, October 8, 2011, the second part of my column on media’s frequent misuse of the conjunction “as” came out in the op-ed page of The Manila Times (Correcting media’s improper uses of the conjunction “as”). That two-part column was actually a recap of my weekly grammar critiques of faulty “as” usage by the leading Metro Manila broadsheets and the news websites of major TV networks for 12 months now. I was hoping that by showing why some habitual uses of the conjunction “as” by reporters and editors are grammatically and logically flawed, such errors in conjunction misuse would no longer recur with disturbing regularity in their news stories.

Well, I’m sorry to say that perhaps I had set my hopes too high.

Consider this flagrant misuse of “even as” yesterday in the lead sentence of a Philippine weather story by a foreign news service agency:

Agence France Presse: Misuse of adverb “even as”

The use of the adverb “even as” by the lead sentence above is wrong both grammatically and semantically. That adverb means “as the same time as,” the sense of which is the simultaneity of the action in the main first clause and in the second clause, as in “The heirs argued over their inheritance even as the family patriarch lay terminally ill.” Obviously, though, the sense and logic of the lead sentence in question is vastly different. The clause “massive flooding in the Philippines brought about by back-to-back typhoons could last for a month” is not an action but a conjecture in modal form, while the other clause, “the storms’ death toll reached 95,” is a statement of fact in the indicative. There is absolutely no way for a conjecture about a future event and an action that has already taken place to occur simultaneously. In short, there is no way for an “at the same time” sentence like the following to be grammatically and logically correct:

“Massive flooding in the Philippines brought about by back-to-back typhoons could last for a month at the same time as the storms’ death toll reached 95, the civil defense chief said on Saturday.”

Note that the “at the same time”-using sentence above is the same grammatically and semantically as that faulty lead sentence using the adverb “even as”:

“Massive flooding in the Philippines brought about by back-to-back typhoons could last for a month even as the storms’ death toll reached 95, the civil defense chief said on Saturday.”

Now the big question is: If it’s incorrect to use “even as” in that sentence, what function word should we use instead?

Let’s see how one newspaper that ran that wire service story made a minor rewrite of that grammatically troubled sentence in an attempt to fix its flawed semantics:

Manila Bulletin: The similarly erroneous “as” fix

The rewritten lead sentence above replaced the adverb “even as” with the conjunction “as” in the sense of “while,” so it will have the same sense as the following sentence:

“Massive flooding brought about by back-to-back typhoons could last a month while the storms’ death toll reached 95 and damage to property breached P13 billion, the National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council (NDRRMC) said Saturday.”

We can see right away that the use of the conjunction “while” in the above sentence is likewise grammatically and semantically incorrect. As in the case of the adverb “even as,” the conjunction “as” gives the wrong sense of simultaneity of the action in the main first clause and in the second clause. As I’ve already pointed out, however, the first clause is a conjecture in modal form, while the second clause is a factual statement in the indicative. It is therefore logically erroneous for these two grammatical elements to be made to appear as if they have occurred or can occur simultaneously. 

So where does this “even as”/”as” grammatical conundrum lead us? Indeed, what function word can logically and satisfactorily link those two disparate grammatical elements?

It may come as a shock to the uninitiated in the ways of the English function words, but the correct choice is none other than the additive conjunction “and.” See how “and” smoothly and beautifully works out the logical connection between the two clauses of that problematic lead sentence:

“Massive flooding in the Philippines brought about by back-to-back typhoons could last for a month and the storms’ death toll has reached 95, the civil defense chief said on Saturday.”

With “and” as the functional link between the two clauses, it becomes crystal clear that two separate and distinct statements were made by the civil defense chief, namely:

1. “Massive flooding in the Philippines brought about by back-to-back typhoons could last for a month.”
2. “The storms’ death toll has reached 95.”

What the conjunction “and” has done is simply to compound—add up—the two clauses into a single statement.*
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*It can be argued, of course, that perhaps the source of that statement actually used “even as” verbally in an interview or in a press release, so the reporter is obliged to retain that adverb in the news story. I suspect that this is indeed the case in a great many cases, but I think this can’t justify perpetuating flawed English in print or in broadcast. Journalists must not only be factual but also grammatically correct in their English at all times. After all, they have the power to paraphrase the actual or quoted statements of their respondents to whip any wayward grammar and semantics into line.

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