{"id":1090,"date":"2000-01-01T00:00:58","date_gmt":"2000-01-01T08:00:58","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/erin-billy.preview143.rmkr.net\/?p=1"},"modified":"2000-01-01T00:00:58","modified_gmt":"2000-01-01T08:00:58","slug":"how-it-looks-like-cringe","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bizio.com\/blog-writing\/how-it-looks-like-cringe\/","title":{"rendered":"WHAT IT LOOKS LIKE vs HOW IT LOOKS LIKE vs HOW IT LOOKS"},"content":{"rendered":"
Summary: It’s correct to use the question word<\/span> what<\/span> with the preposition<\/span> like<\/span>, but incorrect to use\u00a0\u00a0the\u00a0question word\u00a0how<\/span> with the\u00a0preposition\u00a0like<\/span>. So what it looks like<\/span> is correct, but *how it looks like<\/span> is incorrect. In grammatical terms, we need to use the noun what<\/span> after the preposition like<\/span>, not the adverb how<\/span>.<\/div>\n
Introduction<\/h5>\n

First, take a look at this sentence and the question that follows. Think about whether the constructions are “grammatical” in Standard American English (SAE).<\/p>\n

*I’ve heard of John Lennon, but I’ve never seen a picture of him. How does he look like?<\/span><\/p>\n

If you thought there was something ungrammatical in the writing above, give yourself a pat on the back because you’re right. Here is how the above could be corrected:<\/p>\n

I’ve heard of John Lennon, but I’ve never seen a picture of him. How does he look?<\/span><\/p>\n

This is also correct:<\/p>\n

I’ve heard of John Lennon, but I’ve never seen a picture of him. What does he look like?<\/span><\/p>\n

But why? What’s wrong with the original question? Let’s take a closer look. And don’t worry. We’re going to do this the easy way, so if you run away from grammar terms like conjunctive adverb<\/span>, you should be okay. Of course, if you have any questions, please post below, and I’ll do my best to help.<\/p>\n

The easy explanation<\/h5>\n

I wrote out five different explanations of why this is wrong, and in the end, I think the easiest way to explain why “how does he look like” is wrong is to use the “move the words around” method, which actually works surprisingly well for a lot of grammar explanations. First, it’s important to wrap your head around the concept that many utterances (i.e., things you say or write) in English can be worded differently and still have more or less the same meaning (although different emphases will likely result). For example, I can ask “What were you writing with?” or “With what were you writing?”, and the two questions mean pretty much the same thing, although of course, the latter sounds more formal than the former. Let’s do the same thing with our above examples.<\/p>\n

But we’ll need to shorten things a bit. Let’s just get rid of the opening sentence and focus on the question, i.e., the “what does he look like?” part. Now, let’s rearrange the words a bit, do some other magic, and write two equivalent clauses. Let’s start with the two correct examples:<\/p>\n

“What does he look like?” can be rearranged thus: “He looks like… what?”<\/p>\n

Similarly, “How does he look” can be reordered like this: “He looks… how?”<\/p>\n

Finally, and this is the important one, following the same procedure, “*How does he look like?” would be reordered like this: “*He looks… like how?” Does that sound wrong to your ears? I hope so, because it sure does mine! When was the last time you heard someone say “like how”? We hear “like me”, “like you”, “like a movie”, etc., but not “like how”. Right?<\/p>\n

For the same reasons, these are also wrong and need to be rewritten:<\/p>\n