It's 'home in,' not 'hone in'
January 2, 2009 7:42 AM
I was catching up on the news and reading Slate’s “Today’s Papers” from yesterday when I spotted one of the confused idioms that really drive me up a well (that’s a joke, people).
The NYT also hones in on the human cost of bombing in Gaza, complete with overwhelmed hospitals and torpedoed ambulances.
I hear this one with increasing frequency. Sorry, Ms. DePillis, but “hone in on” is an eggcorn.
“Honing” is the lost art of using a whetstone to sharpen things, like knives. As a metaphor, this can be extended to concepts such as skills.
“Homing” is the ability to zero in on a target — like home — the way homing pigeons do. The analogy also describes certain guided missiles and other weapons, and also electronic devices which employ locating signals.
You “hone” or you “home in,” but you do not “hone in.” Caprice?
Wrong. The original phrase was "hone in", as to "hone in on" a missle, or to sharpen one's focus upon something. "Home in" became increasingly popular, hitting a pinnacle about 5 years ago, after which time people like myself who recall the genuine phrase from 30 years ago, began to promote the correct phrasing, i.e., "HONE in" upon. My father, a high-ranking officer in the Air Force and an extremely educated, erudite and articulate man, introduced me to this phrase when I was a small child, about 30 years ago. Webster's Dictionary from 45 years ago lists "HONE in" but NOT "home in". Granted, to "home" is to return to something, but "homing in" would, in that case, be redundant and excessive. It is HONE in, Mr. Czerniac, not HOME. Thank you.
World Wide Words agrees with Mark, in some detail: http://www.worldwidewords.org/qa/qa-hom1.htm.
But Mark's piece contains an error of its own: "caprice" means "whim". Mark was trying to use an colloquial form, "capish", of the Italian phrase, "tu capisci", meaning "do you understand".
Mark has bumped into Muphry's Law"(sic).