Scandal gripped the Sister Wives case last week with the statement released on this blog. In my statement responding to the decision to appeal the decision striking down the criminalization of cohabitation, I included the following line: “these are not Utahan rights but American rights.” I consciously used “Utahan” rather than “Utahn” as preferred by many in the state. This results in a couple news sites running the quote with a correction for a misspelling: Turley wrote. “Nevertheless, these are not Utahan (sic) rights but American rights. It will be an honor to defend this decision, and the rights of the Brown family, in Denver.” I stand by my decision in the use of Utahan as correct despite the disagreement from many of my Utahn friends.
Utahan is the spelling often given by the U.S.government while Utahn is treated as a local usage. I just do not see how one can place a consonant “n” after the consonant “h”. Nevertheless, I do not view Utahn as ungrammatical but a “local usage” as does Webster’s dictionary. Indeed, in a case that embraced pluralism and tolerance, I view it only fitting to welcome the use of both Utahan or Utahn, but I fail to see the basis for including sic (or sic erat scriptum, “thus was it written”) to indicate a grammatical mistake.
