Does this need a hyphen?
I can't tell if I'm going to get a Vassar t-shirt from Michael's Arts & Crafts that I have to color myself with markers made in China, or kid leather appliqués of an Adelphi logo on Himalayan cashmere.
--Wombat of the Copier
I copyedit for a living, including many clients whose first language is not English, and even I can't make any sense out of this. A hyphen wouldn't help, not anywhere in the entire two phrases. Unless they mean you're supposed to wear it outside, in which case they should just say so.
ReplyDeleteMaybe the millennial attention span can't make it past punctuation marks, and these guys really know their audience?
ReplyDeleteI see a second-level, maybe even third level, play on words.
ReplyDelete"Designed to wear out (on the town, as in formal or semi-formal, whatever passes for that these days) and crafted so it never will (deteriorate- it will always look new and nice.)
But isn't "new and nice" what the kids aren't into these days? I can't keep up even though I have two of them (kids, not new and/or nice things). In fashion, one day you're in; the next day you're out.
That said, is it marketed to "kids these days" or a demographic that prefers things to not "wear out" in the deteriorative sense of the word?
Am I reading too much in to this?
I thought Wombat was asking whether it should be Quality-College Apparel (Vassar T-shirt, a quality college and apparel relating to it) or whether it should mean Quality Apparel, College-Themed. The hyphen would definitely make "quality" modify college. You wouldn't hyphenate "college-apparel." The best solution is "Quality Apparel for Collegians and Alumni."
ReplyDeleteI, too, am puzzled, and don't see where a hyphen would help.
ReplyDeleteI took "wear out" to mean something along the lines of "wear a lot," because it's one of your favorite pieces of clothing. I didn't think of "wear when going out" because I don't think of logo apparel as dressy/going out clothing, but I also, probably due to some combination of generational and undergrad affiliations, still think it's kind of uncool to where college-logo apparel at all, especially that of your own institution. Maybe at reunions or other alumni gatherings, but that's about it. As a result, the very few items of uni-logo apparel I own are likely to last me a lifetime, regardless of quality.
Which brings me to my own pet peeve (which is somewhat related to Prof S's comments): I don't like the use of "quality" as an adjective. Everything has quality (or qualities), so it seems to me that you need to specify the kind-level: high-quality? best quality? [that usage strikes me as a bit archaic, but still clearer than just "quality"?] low quality? mid/mediocre quality? Or, even more formal (but more space-hogging): of [fill in the blank] quality?
I suspect this is a case parallel to that of grade inflation: we've gone from recognizing that there are things (pieces of clothing, work) of varying qualities, and that there are tradeoffs (price, time required) involved, to just equating the existence of something with the highest possible rating.
You're right, Cassandra and Perfesser Slaughter. I wasn't looking at the "Quality College Apparel" caption, just at the two phrases above the picture. Grammatically it's ambiguous, but the intended sense is clear: it's the apparel that's "quality," not necessarily the college. A hyphen between Quality and College would mean that the apparel is from (or for) quality colleges, but it isn't what one would normally write. Slaughter's "Quality Apparel for Collegians and Alumni" is much more elegant.
DeleteAnd I further agree with Cassandra about the inappropriateness of "quality" as an adjective. But that's a battle I've been fighting for thirty years, and no one listens any more.