Grammar Editing: Quick and Easy Fixes—Like vs. As · 9:08am Jun 26th, 2014
After proofreading a couple of stories and reading story upon story, I commonly see a multitude of errors. Many of these are simple and easily ignorable. However, it annoys readers on end to have to read a poorly written sentence and then have to rewrite the sentence in their heads in order to understand the author. Good grammar follows a series of rules that helps readers to easily understand a writer's intent. Bad grammar interferes with readers' abilities to understand the literature and hurts writer's abilities to connect with readers. As such, here's a quick rule to improve your writing that is easy to find and fix in your writing.
Like vs. As
When it comes to literature, "like" is strictly a verb or a preposition, not an adverb. That means that if there is a complete thought after "like" like this sentence has done, the sentence has bad grammar. Of course, Oxford dictionary states that writers have been breaking this rule since the 1400s, but writers shouldn't ignore this rule as they only hurt their writing. The reason why a writer should even care about this rule is because to use either "like" or "as" changes subtly the logic of the sentence.
Like: having the same characteristics or qualities as; similar to
As: used to indicate by comparison the way that something happens or is done
From the definitions above (These are the definitions of "like" and "as" that often result in confusion between the two words. There are many more that I will happily address with anyone who sends me a PM.), "like" is focused on qualities whereas "as" is focused on process. For example, "Bob makes cookies like mine." Because of like's position, Bob's cookies are similar to my cookies, their qualities similar. This is an easy example of a case where making "like" an adverb makes no sense as any different location of "like mine" makes the sentence awkward and klunky (I do realize that klunky is properly spelled clunky, but I believe that "k" is clunky).
The nuances come up when you make the object of "like" me. When you make "like" an adverb, you face a slew of grammar problems that are easy to make. For example, "Bob makes cookies like me." This one properly uses the direct object "me." However, the placement of "like me" creates ambiguity as to what is similar: "Like me, Bob makes cookies," "Bob, like me, makes cookies," "Bob makes, like me, cookies," and "Bob make cookies like me." In the first two, it is clear that Bob is similar to me because we both make cookies, i.e. a quality we share. That comes from the fact that in your head, you are using "like" as a preposition. The fourth sentence is pretty focused on how Bob's making of cookies is similar to my making of cookies. The third sentence is between the two possible meanings, making the reader confused as to what the author's intent is. By using "as," the meaning in the third and fourth sentences is clearer: "Bob makes, just as I make them, cookies," and "Bob makes cookies just as I make them." Notwithstanding the fact I added words to make which meaning of "as" I'm using clear, the third and fourth sentences now make a lot more sense in contrast to when the word was "like."
I hope that through this grammar post, writers, proofreaders, editors, people who write, et. al. will improve your skills by understanding the nuances and power that comes from the literature you write.
Finally, I would appreciate PMs and comments about concepts you think I should cover, how I can improve this blog, what went right and wrong, among other criticisms and suggestions.
Ah, very useful. Thanks for putting so much effort into explaining this.