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aggression, aggressiveness. “Aggression in U.S. pays off for Tilling Group” (Times headline). Aggression always denotes hostility, which was not intended here. The writer of the headline meant to suggest only that the company had taken a determined and enterprising approach to the American market. The word he wanted was aggressiveness, which can denote either hostility or merely boldness.

aid and abet. A tautological gift from the legal profession. The two words together tell us nothing that either doesn’t say on its own. The only distinction is that abet is normally reserved for contexts involving criminal intent. Thus it would be careless to speak of a benefactor abetting the construction of a church or youth club. Other redundant expressions dear to lawyers include null and void, ways and means, and without let or hindrance.

AIDS is not correctly described as a disease. It is a medical condition. The term is short for acquired immune deficiency syndrome.

Air Line Pilots Association for the group that looks after the interests of American commercial pilots.

airlines. “It is thought the company may also be in exploratory talks with another U.S. carrier, Alaskan Airlines” (Times). It’s Alaska Airlines. “It was found only a few miles from where a Swiss Air jet crashed two years ago” (Boston Globe). It’s Swissair. Perhaps because airlines so commonly merge or change their names, they are often wrongly designated in newspaper reporting. The following are among the more commonly troublesome:

Aer Lingus

Aerolíneas Argentinas

AeroMexíco

AeroPéru

Air-India (note hyphen)

AirTran Airlines (formerly ValuJet Airlines)

Alaska Airlines

All Nippon Airways (not -lines)

Delta Air Lines (note Air Lines two words)

Iberia Airlines (not Iberian)

Icelandair

Japan Airlines (Airlines one word, but JAL for the company’s abbreviation)

KLM Royal Dutch Airlines (normally just KLM)

LanChile (one word, but formerly Lan Chile, two words)

Sabena Belgian World Airlines (normally just Sabena)

Scandinavian Airlines System (normally just SAS)

SriLankan Airlines (formerly AirLanka; note one word on SriLankan)

Swissair

United Airlines (Airlines one word, but UAL for the company’s abbreviation)

US Airways (formerly USAir, one word)

Virgin Atlantic Airways

“Alas! poor Yorick! I knew him, Horatio,” is the correct version of the quotation from Hamlet, which is often wrongly, and somewhat mysteriously, rendered as “Alas poor Yorick, I knew him well.”

albumen, albumin. Albumen is the white of an egg; albumin is a protein within the albumen.

Alfa-Romeo for the Italian make of automobile. Not Alpha-.

alias, alibi. Both words derive from the Latin root alius (meaning “other”). Alias refers to an assumed name and pertains only to names. It would be incorrect to speak of an impostor passing himself off under the alias of being a doctor.

Alibi is a much more contentious word. In legal parlance it refers to a plea by an accused person that she was elsewhere at the time she was alleged to have committed a crime. More commonly it is used to mean any excuse. Fowler called this latter usage mischievous and pretentious, and most authorities agree with him. But Bernstein, while conceding that the usage is a casualism, contends that no other word can quite convey the meaning of an excuse intended to transfer responsibility. Time will no doubt support him—many distinguished writers have used alibi in its more general, less fastidious sense—but for the moment, all that can be said is that in the sense of a general excuse, many authorities consider alibi unacceptable.

allay, alleviate, assuage, relieve. Alleviate should suggest giving temporary relief without removing the underlying cause of a problem. It is close in meaning to ease, a fact obviously unknown to the writer of this sentence: “It will ease the transit squeeze, but will not alleviate it” (Chicago Tribune). Allay and assuage both mean to put to rest or to pacify and are most often applied to fears. Relieve