Driving back from the airport this weekend after our vacation, I put on an audio CD for the kids, one of the Horrid Henry stories. In part of the story, he was said to have “sneaked” into a room. Sneaked? Surely he “snuck” into the room, I thought. But then I lost confidence. Have I been saying “snuck” all these years by mistake?
To reassure myself, I quickly tried to think of other irregular verbs ending in -eak where I would do this. I couldn’t think of any. Instead, I thought of examples where I don’t do this. For example, I wouldn’t say:
- cruck rather than creaked
- fruck rather than freaked
- wruck rather than wreaked
So how on earth did I come to believe that it was snuck rather than sneaked? AskOxford told me that I wasn’t alone and that it was an American form that has grown popular. Common Errors In English agreed but warned I’d be safer sticking with “sneaked.”
Random House’s The Mavens’ Word Of The Day left me most reassured about snuck. It wrote comprehensively about how usage had changed, how it is indeed unusual as a -eak verb to have a -uck form and why no one should feel “snuck” is non-standard for American English
Interestedly, Francesca Simon — who writes the Horrid Henry books — is an American who grew up in California (like me) who lives in the UK (like me). So why didn’t she use “snuck” rather than “sneaked?” No idea, but since her British books use British spellings, I’m guessing “sneaked” won out over here.
While discovering why I use “snuck,” I also learned it was both a past tense and past participle for sneak. And what was the difference between “past tense” and “past participle” again?
Yeah, here I am an English major asking about this. Cut me some slack. English majors don’t take lessons in grammar. You know how we relearn grammatical forms we’ve long forgotten since elementary school? We study a foreign language! That’s why I have on my shelf my trusty copy of English Grammar For Students Of German.
Rather than reach for that, however, I first did a little web searching. A lot of what I found explained how a past participle was formed but not what it was in terms of when you use it.
In other words, plenty of pages told me that a past participle is usually a verb with -ed added as a suffix, except for irregular verbs. Great, but what’s the difference between that and the past tense in terms of usage, not in terms of how you make the verb form?
OK, this page had a good definition of past tense: an action that was both started and finished in the past. The verb form to show this usually ends in -ed, so:
- The race ended.
- The car stalled.
What about the past participle? That same page indirectly explains this is a verb form usually ending in -ed and with a helper or auxiliary verb that is used to represent the various perfect tenses, such as:
- Present Perfect Tense: An action that happened in the past at an indefinite time or began in the past and continues into the present.
- The race has ended.
- Past Perfect Tense: An action that happened in the past before another past action.
- The race had ended, and the awards were given out.
- Future Perfect Tense: An action in the future that will happen before another future action.
- The race will have ended before the awards will be given out.
So to bring it back to sneak, if you consider it to be a regular verb, you use -ed as the suffix for the past tense and the -ed suffix with a helper verb to make the past participle form used for the perfect tenses. Examples show it better:
- He sneaked into the room. (past tense)
- He has sneaked into the room. (present perfect tense)
- He had sneaked into the room, and then he was caught. (past perfect tense)
- He will have sneaked into the room, before stealing the money. (present perfect tense)
If you are like me and prefer to treat sneaked as a irregular verb, then forget that -ed suffix and use snuck:
- He snuck into the room. (past tense)
- He has snuck into the room. (present perfect tense)
- He had snuck into the room, and then he was caught. (past perfect tense)
- He will have snuck into the room, before stealing the money. (present perfect tense)
Isn’t grammar fun? No doubt, if I’ve got it wrong, folks will leave comments below.
Postscript: From below, a video of Conan O’Brien smacking Jennifer Garner down as she tries to correct him from saying snuck:
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AP style guide says…sneaked is “preferred as past tense of sneak. Do not use the colloquial snuck.” American? British? Don’t know. I’m just sticking with AP.
Wow, Pamela — my AP guide doesn’t have anything on it at all! My mine’s the 1980 copyright edition, so it’s a bit out of date
Thank you so much for the info and explanation – I was completely stuck on this with a paper I’m writing. I finally get it!!
One of my favorite rants – thanks for posting. I think there should be a revision of the declension, to wit: “sneak, snack, snuck” … ho-ho.
My ears and brain are annoyed every time I hear “snuck”. Have you thought about a word much like it with only one letter change? It is also a word I definitely abhor. Sneaked sounds right to me, but then I am not a native Californian and certainly not a Southern Californian. A native Califronian told me to just”get over it”. I don’t think I will. I have lived in california for nearly 30 years, and I hope to retain my English grammar sensibilities.
“He will have sneaked into the room, before stealing the money. (present perfect tense)”
I believe this should read…
“He will have sneaked into the room, before stealing the money. (future perfect tense)”
In case you’re interested, you say above, “Past Perfect Tense: An action that happened in the past before another past action”, and that’s RIGHT.
“The race had ended, and the awards were given out”, is WRONG. Right is, “The race ended and the awards were given out”.
“Call me a taxi”. “O.K., you’re a taxi.” The past perfect doesn’t work that way. You can’t make it work by putting ‘had’ in front of a past tense verb.
Let me know if you don’t know why I said what I said.
I don’t talk so good myself sometimes.
Somebody, somewhere, sometime, will get a kick out of that.
…and another thing: you wrote “…if I’ve got it wrong…”. You are saying then (without the contraction) “…if I have got it wrong…”. I believe the preferred way should be “if I have it wrong”, or even could be “if I got it wrong” OR “if I have GOTTEN it wrong”. Just like “you’ve got mail”. You HAVE mail, you don’t HAVE GOT mail.
And that’s MY little abhor-ation.
The work snuk is like fingernails on a blackboard to me !
That is the thing I was taught in grade school it was snuck not sneaked. Is that not wierd! I just saw sneaked on one of my kids TV shows and thought it was wrong and googled it to find out I am the one that was wrong. I should have known better being proficient in two foreign languages that it did not make any sense my way! I guess you learn something new everyday!
I realize snuck does not follow the rules of the english language, but since when is there not an exception to nearly every rule in the english language. I like snuck.
“Snuck” sounds right to me. “Sneaked” is ridiculous.
I was born and raised in New Zealand, where we apparently speak a version of British English…but I first notice this strange word “sneaked” sometime last year. Over here, it’s been “snuck” ever since I remember having snuck into my parents room and stolen 50cents from the jar for an ice-cream when I was 8.
To .steph. – don’t you mean ’sticked’?
English is losing its history in German, Latin and Greek. Apart from ’sneaked’, I have also witnessed the horrifying adoption of ‘fishes’.
speak
spoke
Rules in the English language are meant to be broken
To Nancy -
I believe that “fishes” refers to multiple species of fish together. You use the plural “fish” for multiple ones of the same species. I could be wrong though!
Backed to sneak v. snuck
This English major and teacher educator says the word is sneaked. Moreover, aspiring teachers should save their money by not purchasing Donna Huggins’ “Exam Cram Praxis I” 2005 guide for the teacher examination. In question two of the Writing Exam section where the object is finding an adverb, the author gives future teachers this sentence: “I watched the cat as she quietly snuck up behind the bird.” Is teacher education in trouble when those who market gatekeeper exams to students push this level of ineptitude? Needless to say, I quit reading their defective product at question two.
Thank you for this! I’m a snuck person myself, but was reading The Sea of Monsters, which uses both “sneaked” & “leaped.” After multiple uses of both words (instead of snuck or lept), I just had to look it up. Thank you for making it easy. Not that it is easy: the Englidh language is messed up & as long as a work is consistent, we’re all right.
Thanks for writing this- it was a big help. I’ve always heard ’snuck’ growing up, and ’sneaked’ sounds a bit silly to me, somewhat awkward in a sentence, but if it’s the right way, then I’ll use it. Thanks again!
Gregory is correct. I believe this is also the case for other irregular plural animal words, such as deer.
The reason that “snuck” has become acceptable is because of the great number of the masses using the word incorrectly. Without sounding like the proverbial old fart, there was a time that these items were corrected and learned. Now it seems that the majority rules when it comes to language, whether it is proper or not. “Sneak” is a regular verb, requiring an -ed ending for both the past and the past participle. The nuns, brothers and Jesuit priests that educated me made sure I was aware of this–and other anomalies.
Well, NPR evidently considers “snuck” okay, because I have heard two different news announcers report that the Honduran President “snuck” back into the Brazilian Embassy in his country. He did not evade security or elude pursuers or outwit adversaries, no, he just plain snuck back. What larks.
9/23/09
Snuck versus sneaked. Who cares? The reality of language is that it evolves constantly. What was grammatically correct 200 years ago is completely different today. The fact that some “experts” of today claim snuck is incorrect does not make it incorrect. Language never was and never will be controllable by the few who study it.
“The fact that some “experts” of today claim snuck is incorrect does not make it incorrect.”
Nor does saying the opposite make it correct. Speaking and writing are treated differently for the reason that it would be difficult for us to understand the meanings of texts if written language just blindly followed spoken/slang shifts.
It is the standardized, albeit arbitrary, rules of language that determine whether sneaked or snuck is the correct usage, the former being the standard and therefore correct in terms of written language. One need not be an “expert” to claim that with authority.
You can say what you want, and if others think and speak the same way, they’ll understand you. Your papers may not get published, but who cares, right?
The papers that make the big money get published using snuck. Regardless of sneaked being “correct” grammatically is of no consequence to giant media. The best seller list authors use spoken language rather than “proper english”, as do newspaper writers and mass media. My claim was that language evolves and that is more important than the rules of today. I have pet peeves in language myself, including “these ones,” “those ones,” and announcers using “crash” instead of accident or wreck. Yet nothing will not stop their misuse nor freeze the language into what is considered “proper” by today’s experts.
I also can not stand double negatives. My last sentence was supposed to be: “Yet nothing will stop their misuse nor freeze the language into what is considered “proper” by today’s experts.”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lBplQmbqNmg
I’m with conan on this one.
AHHHHHH! All of you prescriptivists need to open your eyes! American English is NOT British English and just because a grammar book says something does not make it a law. It shows examples of the langauge at any given point in time. A lot of people say snuck, and whether or not you shudder when you hear it, it is not wrong and you need to get over it. Language is always changing and those grammar books that you get your information from won’t even be accurate 100 years from now. Deal with it.
Great to have all the info. I wrote a poem using my Californian “Snuck” and kept getting the dang red line from spell check! I finally “ignored” it but started freaking out last night that I might be wrong. Sneaked sounds TERRIBLE to me, and does not fit the rythmn of my poem, so I am definitely sticking with SNUCK!!! ^_^
I guess you’re stuck with snuck!
Ellen Leahy,
I’m not an expert in use of English or anything, but shouldn’t it be “Is teacher education in trouble when they who market gatekeeper exams to students push this level of ineptitude?” instead of “Is teacher education in trouble when those who market gatekeeper exams to students push this level of ineptitude?” I was always taught that the way to tell the difference was to drop the extraneous portion of the sentence, reducing it to “Is teacher education in trouble when they push this level of ineptitude?” Was I miseducated? Again, not trying to seem pedantic, just curious. Thanks!
I believe that everyone should use “snuck.” Why? “Sneaked” sounds a lot like “squeaked” which is not what you want to be doing when you’re sneaking around. In my opinion, “snuck” sounds softer and sneakier (perhaps why it caught on in the first place?) and generally more like what the word means. I’ve always felt that words should sound similar to what they mean, if at all possible.
(Of course, if you’re writing a poem about a person who sneaked into the room, but the door squeaked, you might have to go with “sneaked.” It’s good to have choices. It’s what makes English great! Also it’s what makes English terrible to non-native speakers. Oh well.)
Kit,
Maybe you would like “squck” instead of “squeaked”..
I have always said sneaked. What is bizarre about this is that everyone in my Appalachian area says snuck, which sounds so strange to me. Maybe this is because my mom always said sneaked. I don’t understand why you would make an irregular verb out of a regular verb if you don’t need to. I understand that the English language is always changing, but I don’t agree with changing the English language just because everyone starts saying something out of ignorance. If we are going to change the English language, then it should be changing the ridiculous rules like “capitalize Mother if it is in place of someone’s name but not if it has a possessive pronoun in front of it.”
Guess what Suck rhymes with?
To Paul. . . . . . How gross and innapropriate. (gags a bit)
I was never good in school but my teacher told me it was sneaked. . . I was the only one who said that. So growing up people would laugh leaving me never knowing which one it was. Thanks to this site I now know that those people who laughed at me were wrong. That makes me feel so happy to know that!
Oh and why are you all getting off the track of ’sneaked’ and ’snuck’ ? really? you’re ALL crazy escpecially you Paul (my biggest fan club member) I am really a Jonas Brother. . . . . . . Joe actually. oh GOTTA go got a Hot chick in the house!
First, to those who dig their heels in insisting that (written) language is immutable, read Steven Pinker’s column from the NYT following Obama’s swearing in snafu:
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/22/opinion/22pinker.html
Note also that “snuck” has been used since the 19th c. and, according to the Oxford American Dictionary, “in the last few decades its use has spread, particularly in the US, where it is now generally regarded as a standard alternative to ’sneaked.’” (Admittedly, the following line states, “In formal contexts, however, ’sneaked’ remains the preferred form.” Still, this statement seems to me reminiscent of the matter of splitting infinitives, where conventional usage will overrule (arbitrary) formal conventions.)
Incidentally, many of you complaining about how grating “snuck” sounds to you make your own share of grammatical and syntactical errors.
In the end we just continually move closer and closer to Newspeak. Sneaked. Leaped. Pant. Why buy a pant from the store when your dog seems full of them? But I’m sure you’ll find them on sale everywhere.
I’m delighted at your exploration of this in your blog – I hope many more read it and that I no longer have to hear those around me saying “snuck” (audible cringe/shudder.) In the meantime, I plan to use your made up past tense of freak: “fruck” with those using “snuck” – I love it! Perhaps future generations of grammar nazis like me will have me (well, and you) to blame for “fruck” catching on!
Really, I don’t mind so much when my blue-collar co-workers use imperfect English. I do expect teachers, education administrators, journalists (including TV’s talking heads) to properly use the medium of their careers, living language or no.
Yes, if you consider freak to be an irregular verb, I suppose you can go with fruck. Most people wouldn’t. I think that’s clear in that we don’t have an on-going debate over freaked/fruck with conflicting and confusing dictionary definitions.
We do have that with sneaked versus snuck, which tells me there isn’t a commonly accepted correct usage. So when you’re expecting those teachers, educators and journalists to properly use language, they are, even if they say snuck.
Oops – I forgot to mention my favorite tool for verb conjugation – the song in the Grinch cartoon movie! Remember when the song goes: The three words that best describe you, are, and I quote: “Stink. Stank. Stunk.” If I’m confused about a verb and can’t get to the dictionary or internet, the soothing voice of Tony the Tiger!
Also, like Trish from Appalachia, I was raised (though in an Indiana backwater) by a mother who used proper English. I say we are NOT stuck with snuck! Fight back with knowledge, rather than turn your back on it!
Whew, Danny, you clearly missed the playful nature of my posting. My diabolical plan is to turn freaked/fruck into just such a debate. What’s good for the snuck is good for the fruck, with apologies to both goose and gander for that.
I did, sorry! Long day. Very long day.
It’s a dangerous plan, though. One slip of the R, and people will be really frucked.
That’s simply part of my diabolical masterplan! Bwa-ha-ha… (My friends and I, by the way, would identify that as a “fallopian slip” rather than, you know, the established name.)
Though I was being playful, I am seriously frustrated with the condition of our language, for most of us the only one we have. While I’m somewhat less than appalled by journalists’ (and other educated folks’) lack of knowledge of proper English, I’m sad that my own two sons are among them! I spoke well at home, read to them often, earned my BA while they were little kids, and raised them with the expectation that they would earn higher educations – which they did… But through all of that, what happened to their grammar??? Did they learn “snuck” and develop a lack of understanding of when to use “lie” versus “lay” at elementary school through college? Did the bad grammar of their friends supercede all the efforts of mother and professional educators? Was my decision NOT to follow in my mother’s footsteps (those of a grammar nazi, eternally correcting the errors of small children) wrong-headed? It seems that my expectation that people completing a higher education (especially in fields such as journalism, English, communication, etc.) should come out with a better rather than worse understanding of their native tongue! I’m all for relaxed standards in casual conversation in real and literary life, but formal and professional situations demand use of proper English.
And, of course, everyone deserves latitude for long, tiring days, especially when they’re creating a forum on their own time for people like me, who sometimes act like jerks. I appreciate the your responses. But I suspect I will never subscribe to the “oh, well” attitude of several posters. Thanks for the site, and best wishes with all your present and future aspirations (which, after taking a belated first trip around the rest of this page, I see are both accomplished and many! Question: Are you British and/or in England?
I’m American — but I spent 12 years living in Britain
Do you mean, ‘If I have it wrong’…rather than ‘I’ve got it wrong’?
Read a poem once that went like this: “I dreamed a dream”
Should it be “I dreamt a dream?”
i still cant identify the difference
arent they the same thing???
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