Column: A Word, Please: When dealing with grammar issues, consult an adviser ... or advisor

For this week’s column, we break from our regularly scheduled program of well-fleshed-out individual topics to reach into my grab bag of language issues popping up in my little corner of the grammar universe.

Here are some terms that have been on my mind.

Adviser. Have you been seeing this word a lot lately? If so, have you wondered why it’s not “advisor”? If you think the E spelling looks weird, you’re not alone. And if you used to think the E spelling looked weird but find it more normal looking with each passing day, you’re not alone in that, either.

For years, I’ve been waiting for the E spelling to fade into memory so the O spelling could take its place in news media. But with each new headline mentioning an “adviser,” the spelling looks more normal to me.

The Associated Press Stylebook is “adviser’s” most powerful advocate. This style, followed by many news outlets, is a longtime advocate of the E spelling.

But AP isn’t everything. Many news organizations, including the Los Angeles Times, say to spell it “advisor.” Who’s right? They all are. Dictionaries allow both spellings, and there’s no clear consensus among them on which is better.

Jibe. “That story doesn’t jibe with what he said last week.” Confession time: I’ve altogether given up using “jibe” and “gibe.” I’ve researched the difference multiple times. I’ve even written about these terms. But I don’t use them much. So I forget.

Then, when I need to discuss how one thing doesn’t make sense in relation to another, I find it quicker to recast the sentence than to look up the correct usage. Time to try once more to commit them to memory.

Setting aside the question of whether the words’ meanings overlap (they do), here’s the traditional distinction editors like to observe.

The verb that means to agree starts with a J. The verb that means to taunt starts with a G. So you would say, “That idea doesn’t jibe with my plans.” Or you could say, “The children gibed at the new kid on the playground.”

If that sounds a little odd, it’s probably because you’re more accustomed to seeing “gibe” as a noun: “Their gibes were cruel.” It’s a different form of the same word.

The dictionary also allows you to spell this one with a J. But I don’t recommend it. Whatever you do, don’t write, “That story doesn’t jive with what he said last week.” That’s a bridge too funky.

Capital letter after a colon. If the stuff that’s introduced by a colon is not a complete sentence, start with a lowercase letter: like this.

That’s the easy part. But when the words that come after a colon constitute a complete sentence, you’re faced with a dilemma. Do you want to emulate news media? Then follow the Associated Press style of capitalizing the first letter after a colon anytime it begins a complete sentence.

Would you rather follow in the footsteps of book and magazine publishers? Then go with the Chicago Manual of Style, which says to capitalize the first letter after a colon only if the colon introduces two or more complete sentences.

Phrasal-prepositional verbs. Finally, here’s a term I just learned. Do you know about phrasal verbs, which are so called because they have two words that together mean something different than the verb would alone?

For example, “to give up” means something very different than “to give.” That’s why “to give up” is a phrasal verb. But some verb combos have a third word thrown in — a preposition: “get away with,” “put up with,” “face up to,” “live up to.”

The term for these, I just learned, is phrasal-prepositional verb. I doubt I’ll remember that tomorrow. But it was fun to learn about today.

JUNE CASAGRANDE is the author of “The Best Punctuation Book, Period.” She can be reached at JuneTCN@aol.com.