Over and Over Again

King AEthelstan presenting a book to St. Cuthbert, c.895-939. The Laws of AEthelstan included “over” meaning “more than” back in the 10th century. Illuminated manuscript, c.930, via Wikimedia Commons.

For the most part, a newspaper stylebook aims to fly under the radar, directing journalists to use the least obtrusive terminology and forms, so readers will not be distracted from the reporter’s message. But the stylebook is put together by individuals (editors) who have strong feelings about right and wrong, at least when it comes to writing. And their personal feelings show up in stylebooks too. After all, it’s hard to distinguish a personal preference from a widely accepted norm.

So some stylebook entries, deriving from those strong personal feelings, are odd. And journalists accept them, not just because their editors insist, but also because those usages have the useful function of separating the sheep from the goats, professionals from amateurs, as is the way with the particular jargon of so many professions.

For example, if you’re a professional journalist and know Associated Press style, you know to use the spelling adviser in your story, even though advisor is more common, with 139 million hits on Google yesterday vs. 21 million. You know that numbers one through nine will be spelled out (except in certain situations), but for some reason 10 has to be 10, even though it takes only three letters to spell the word for 10. And so on.

One of the strangest rules of AP style has to do with something nonjournalists wouldn’t even notice, because it’s a prohibition and wouldn’t show up in published stories. Until now, the AP stylebook told reporters never to use over with amounts, as in “over 800 people watched the show.” No, in such situations AP style required “more than.”

It’s not as if over in this situation was new. The Oxford English Dictionary shows this usage beginning more than a thousand years ago, including “over 12 winters” and “over eight pennies” in the 10th-century Laws of AEthelstan. Examples continue century by century down to the present. In Emma (1816), for example, Jane Austen wrote, “It had not been over five minutes, when in came Harriet.” And the OED found “These studies are done on small panels, not over ten inches in height,” in a book on Rembrandt published in 1948 by Harvard University Press.

But no matter. For some unexplained reason, as Merriam-Webster’s Dictionary of English Usage tells us, back in 1877 the eminent journalist, editor, and poet William Cullen Bryant, in his eighties at the time, declared over off limits in that usage, without giving a reason. His prohibition was reinforced by Ambrose Bierce in 1909. It was adopted not just by AP but by newspaper stylebooks around the nation.

But then last month came the announcement by the AP regarding its recent update of the stylebook: “Guidance has been changed to allow use of over, as well as more than, to indicate greater numerical value.”

And so it is, as subscribers to the online stylebook will find under those respective headings:

more than, over Acceptable in all uses to indicate greater numerical value. Salaries went up more than $20 a week. Salaries went up over $20 a week.

over Acceptable in all uses to indicate greater numerical value. The crop was valued at over $5 billion. 

So what? Well, to many copy editors and professional journalists, it’s a big deal. It pulls the rug (or the stylebook) out from under the journalist’s feet that have been planted so firmly on it. And it’s one fewer way to tell a real journalist from a mere pretender.