word wednesday: mondegreen

Mondegreens are misheard versions of common phrases and expressions. An interesting tidbit: the term mondegreen is a mondegreen itself. There's a Scottish ballad that read: "the hae slain the Earl o' Moray and laid him on the green," which was misheard as "They hae slain the Earl o' Moray and Lady Mondegreen."

I can think of a few:

- A lot of people say "I could care less" when they actually mean the opposite, correct phrase: "I couldn't care less." (Wow, someone actually made a diagram for this one!)
- A staff writer at my high school newspaper hilariously wrote "took it for granite" when he meant "took it for granted."
- If you look at the internet long enough, you'll find tons of people writing "per say" when they really mean "per se" which means "by or in itself or themselves; intrinsically" (I thought it also means "necessarily")
- A line in Elton John's "Tiny Dancer" is sometimes heard "Hold me closer, Tony Danza" when it's really saying, "Hold me closer, tiny dancer."
- And you can't forget precious Sydney's Pledge of Allegiance: "I pledge of allegiance to the flag of the I don't belong to America."

Here are a couple that I don't really use but I've seen them used incorrectly all the time:

far be it for me

This is a mondegreen. The correct phrase is far be it from me, which means "I don't want to presume..."

for all intensive purposes

This is also a mondegreen. And it doesn't even make sense! The correct phrase is for all intents and purposes which, the Grammarist says, is a totally useless phrase anyway. It says that sentences work perfectly well without it. Hm! Good to know!