Sneaked or Snuck? Which is correct?

Same with “pleaded,” I think.

Really? Because I’d had the impression that “pleaded” was taking over from “pled,” especially in the media. Are we returning to old ways or bringing in something new? Either way, I prefer “pled”. Guess I’ve just got a thang for those strong, manly verbs.

But to be fair, you’d have to go through those uses of “snuck” and see how many times its use was tongue in cheek, was in a quotation or a letter to the editor, or was otherwise not the intentional choice of an AP staff writer. I would hazard a guess that “serious” uses by professional writers (at AP and elsewhere) are much, much rarer than that 513/1460 ratio would suggest.

Don’t forget the wonderful “shat”.

I’ve always read that “sneaked” is correct and “snuck” isn’t, (in fact, my spell checker is redlining it even as I type). But “snuck” has always sounded more natural to me. I don’t know why that is. “Dove” in place of “dived”, on the other hand, does make sense by analogy with the past tense form “drove”.

American English does seem to prefer a few past tense forms now considered obsolete in the UK, like ‘spit’ instead of ‘spat’, ‘shit’ instead of ‘shat’, and so on. OTOH, I think UK English favors “shone” (intransitive) while Americans say “shined”.

I have a hard time with this. Snuck sounds more natural to my ear, in the same way that “hung” sounds more natural than “hanged”, even though I know “hanged” is proper–I have to make a conscious effort over it.

I bet the ones with ovaries would be bummed to hear that.

You know it’s only “hanged” when it refers to the execution of a human being. Everything else is hung.

Well, yes, I know–which is largely why I have to make a conscious effort to remember that the low-down hornswoggler and generally dirty varmint got hanged, and not hung, like the side of beef did.