Curiously, the Modesto Bee 404′d this article after I pointed out their error to them. Till is not the shortened form of until. The shortened form is ’til, but you shouldn’t use that in a headline.
You're right: "till" is not a shortened form of "until." The words are, however, synonymous; "till" is the older form, and it's perfectly OK in the headline. Here's World Wide Words:
"The most common belief is that till is a shortened form of until. You can see how this could have grown up, but the truth of the matter is that till is by far the older word, being recorded from about the year 800, while it took another 400 years for until to appear in the language (it’s a compound of till with the archaic Old Norse und, as far as, which also survives in the archaic unto). But the first sense of till was to, as it still can be, for example, in Scots and some dialects. Though the modern sense of till in standard English is always connected with time, this only appeared about 1300."
I disagree. Until is more formal, thus it is the appropriate form for a news headline. Till may substitute for to in Scots and other dialects, but in American English newspaper style it's rare. I searched Google News for "till," and of the first 30 results only two US sources used till as a substitute for to (one was a blog). The rest were Indian and British.
This reminds me of words like learnt and spelt, which are perfectly acceptable in Britain/Australia/New Zealand but not in the USA.
The Merriam-Webster Dictionary of English Usage usually just provides explanations of what various usage writers have recommended and leaves it to the reader to make an educated guess on which usage to use, depending on the context.
However, on “till”, they state: “But if you are writing for publication, you will do well to spell it ’till’.” The “til” spelling is described as “casual” and informal.
The Corpus of Contemporary American English lists numerous examples of “till” used for that mean, in academic and newspaper contexts–far more than “til” in fact.
You're right: "till" is not a shortened form of "until." The words are, however, synonymous; "till" is the older form, and it's perfectly OK in the headline. Here's World Wide Words:
"The most common belief is that till is a shortened form of until. You can see how this could have grown up, but the truth of the matter is that till is by far the older word, being recorded from about the year 800, while it took another 400 years for until to appear in the language (it’s a compound of till with the archaic Old Norse und, as far as, which also survives in the archaic unto). But the first sense of till was to, as it still can be, for example, in Scots and some dialects. Though the modern sense of till in standard English is always connected with time, this only appeared about 1300."
Read more about 'til/until/till: http://www.worldwidewords.org/qa/qa-unt1.htm
I disagree. Until is more formal, thus it is the appropriate form for a news headline. Till may substitute for to in Scots and other dialects, but in American English newspaper style it's rare. I searched Google News for "till," and of the first 30 results only two US sources used till as a substitute for to (one was a blog). The rest were Indian and British.
This reminds me of words like learnt and spelt, which are perfectly acceptable in Britain/Australia/New Zealand but not in the USA.
The Merriam-Webster Dictionary of English Usage usually just provides explanations of what various usage writers have recommended and leaves it to the reader to make an educated guess on which usage to use, depending on the context.
However, on “till”, they state: “But if you are writing for publication, you will do well to spell it ’till’.” The “til” spelling is described as “casual” and informal.
The Corpus of Contemporary American English lists numerous examples of “till” used for that mean, in academic and newspaper contexts–far more than “til” in fact.
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