# Grammar at Graduation **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [May 17, 2004, 1:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/grammar-at-graduation/245588 "2004-05-17T13:22:02Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 11\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![jebert](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ec9cab/32.png) [@jebert](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jebert)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2004, 1:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/grammar-at-graduation/245588/1 "2004-05-17T13:22:02Z")
Since it is the appropriate season, and since I have seen it in print both ways, I am left wondering which construction is grammatically correct: “He graduated college” or “He graduated from college.” Including the preposition sounds right to me since it appears to be a transitive construction without it. But IANAEM, so I open the floor to those who are (and to anyone else who cares to add his $0.02 worth, since I know you will anyway). ---
**Author:** ![Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spectre_of_pithecanthropus/32/12343_2.png) [@Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spectre_of_Pithecanthropus)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2004, 1:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/grammar-at-graduation/245588/2 "2004-05-17T13:38:18Z")
I think it’s not quite correct to say _he graduated college_, but the word may be undergoing an evolutionary process that will one day make that usage correct. The verb _to graduate_ already has gone through one significant change. It used to be used in the passive voice; that is, somebody would say i]he **was** graduated from college. I think there the sense of it was something like, _he was graduated from college (by the trustees or regents)_. Now the graduate himself has become the subject of the sentence. Perhaps some of the board grammarians can come up with some examples of other verbs that have gone through a similar change. ---
**Author:** ![Acsenray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/acsenray/32/4519_2.png) [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2004, 3:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/grammar-at-graduation/245588/3 "2004-05-17T15:16:02Z")
**SoP** essentially has it right. Originally, the university was the actor – _The university graduated him_. Then it went through the process that **SoP** describes. First, the passive voice – _He was graduated from the university_\*. And then _He graduated from the university._. I’ve seen the final form, _He graduated the university_, ever since I was in high school, about 20 years ago. It still sounds illiterate to me, but, unfortunately it seems to be more common than any of the other forms. So it has become correct, I suppose. ---
**Author:** ![jebert](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ec9cab/32.png) [@jebert](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jebert)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2004, 5:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/grammar-at-graduation/245588/4 "2004-05-17T17:31:54Z")
That’s the part that gets me - it’s _becoming_ correct. How do things that are clearly incorrect in standard English get started in the first place, let alone become so widely accepted so as to eventually become correct? ---
**Author:** ![Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spectre_of_pithecanthropus/32/12343_2.png) [@Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spectre_of_Pithecanthropus)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2004, 6:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/grammar-at-graduation/245588/5 "2004-05-17T18:02:52Z")
I think in this case it’s a matter of the grammar evolving to conform to the sense people have of the word. People now perceive the graduate to be the actor, as **acsenray** notes, but the essential meaning of _to graduate_ remains the same. This is not the same as when people totally misuse a word, in my view. ---
**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2004, 6:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/grammar-at-graduation/245588/6 "2004-05-17T18:05:47Z")
Spoken English is almost a different language from formal written English, but the former strongly drives the latter. ---
**Author:** ![Acsenray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/acsenray/32/4519_2.png) [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2004, 6:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/grammar-at-graduation/245588/7 "2004-05-17T18:07:12Z")
Well, in the sense of “essential” that means “opposite.” It still grates on me because I always see some callow frat boy trying to hand a diploma to an ivy-covered building. To me, this is as close as anyone gets to real misuse. It’s essentially the same type of mistake as when people mix up imply/infer or comprises/composes. ---
**Author:** ![AskNott](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/asknott/32/5790_2.png) [@AskNott](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AskNott)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2004, 1:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/grammar-at-graduation/245588/8 "2004-05-18T01:12:15Z")
Before even I was a kid, “sup” meant “eat, in the evening.” If Grandpa ever said, “Sup, dog,” it was a command when he set down the pooch’s bowl. Now, it’s a greeting; ('Sup, dog?) from one man to another. English, and perhaps moreso, American English, is a continually changing thing. Someday, it may be proper to _congradulate_ a friend on her graduation. Or, maybe not. ---
**Author:** ![Richard\_Pearse](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/richard_pearse/32/13144_2.png) [@Richard\_Pearse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Richard_Pearse)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2004, 1:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/grammar-at-graduation/245588/9 "2004-05-18T01:48:51Z")
Well sup (supper) is a different word from sup (what’s up) so there was no mutation in meaning of the word “sup”. But you knew that, good story :). ---
**Author:** ![moriah](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/b2d939/32.png) [@moriah](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/moriah)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2004, 7:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/grammar-at-graduation/245588/10 "2004-05-18T07:12:28Z")
Do you think you will graduate? I already graduated. You graduated? Yes, I graduated yesterday. You really graduated high school? High school? I’m 22. I graduated college! Do you think you’ll graduate from a university one day with a doctorate? Why not? My dad graduated university when he was only 23. ========= Spoken English takes shortcuts. When the ‘from’ is not really need due to context, it drops out. Just like the ‘to’ or ‘for’ in front of indirect objects (“give (to) the boy a diploma!”). As mentioned above, formal writing or speechifying would always include the ‘from’ after ‘graduat\*’. Peace. ---
**Author:** ![Cunctator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/43a26b/32.png) [@Cunctator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cunctator)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2004, 7:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/grammar-at-graduation/245588/11 "2004-05-18T07:23:20Z")
I’ve never heard the verb “to graduate” used in that transitive sense in Australia. Here people definitely say “I graduated \*from \* ABC university with a degree in XYZ”.