• either •
Pronunciation: ee-dhêr, ai-dhêr • Hear it!
Part of Speech: Adjective, adverb, conjunction, (pro)noun
Meaning: 1. (Adjective, (pro)noun) One and/or the other of two, as 'the trees on either side of the road', 'take either path', or 'either will do'. 2. (Conjunction with or) Giving a choice of two things, as 'either the red one or the green one'. 3. Moreover, used after the second of two negative choices, as 'not fast or smooth either'.
Notes: Either comes with a negative partner, neither "not either", as 'neither the red nor the green one'. I believe that either isn't a pronoun, but that the adjective may be used as a noun, just like so many other adjectives: 'the rich', 'the reds', 'the dominants'.
In Play: As a (pro)noun it may be used when delicious choices like this pop up: "Pecan or chocolate pie? I love either (one)." How many times have all parents given a kid this choice? "Either you clean your room, or you're grounded this weekend." As an emphatic adverb, we might hear either used this way: "I don't trust anyone but myself, and I don't even trust myself entirely, either."
Word History: Today's Good Word has come a long way since Old English where it was ægðer, a contraction of ægwæðer "both", combining ay "ever, always" + ge-, a collective prefix + hwæðer "which of two, whether", which went on to become whether. Ay, which is aye today, goes back to PIE aiw- "vitality, eternity, long life", source also of Sanskrit ayuh "vitality", Greek aion "age, eternity", Latin aevum "age, eternity", and Albanian jetë "lifespan".
Hwæðer was made from kwe-/kwo-, the stem of relative and interrogative pronouns, like English who and what (pronounced [hwaht]) + a comparative suffix. The offspring of kwe-/kwo- are Russian kto "who", Latin quo "where", Irish ce "what", Welsh pwy "who", Lithuanian and Latvian kas "who, what", Hindi kya "what", Bengali ki "what", Marathi kaya "what", and Nepali kē "what". (Susanne Williams, before she left us in 2018, proposed today's delightful Good Word, which our Agora manager, Slava, thought should not be lost.)
