This is such a special time of year. My Facebook is flooded with pictures of young men and women dressed to the T's and heading to their high school proms. It takes me back to a special time when I went to my prom (and of course, won Prom Queen my senior year). Those memories are some of my fondest of high school. Now I have the honor of seeing my niece prepare for her prom(s). I accompanied her as a part of her entourage to find the perfect dress. I have loved seeing the Snaps of her makeup swatches and I am more than excited that her date asked her in a very considerate way. What I'm not OK with is her arguing her point that it's just prom, not the prom!
What?
This has my mind in shambles. I never even considered it being anything other than the prom. It is the dance of the year, it is the most popular formal of a school year. It is the prom.
Most importantly, it is a noun and is perfectly acceptable to use with the article 'the' in front. What I have also found is that while both are interchangeable (going to prom or going to the prom) it is a sign-of-the-times. From the discussions boards I have seen, the younger generation say prom, whereas the older generation refer to it as the prom.
The best example I found was one person responding with the argument, you don't say you're going to hospital. It's true, so why would you say you're going to prom? You would go to the hospital just like you are going to the prom. Does this make sense?
In the blog, Literal-Minded, there is a clip from Entertainment Weekly about the movie "Prom." "A mere decade ago, the event was still called 'the prom,' but in 'Prom,' the shrewdly wholesome and likable new Disney teen movie directed by Joe Nussbaum, it is never referred to as anything but 'prom'— as in, Who are you asking to prom? It’s not even fully clear whether prom is now a noun or a verb (are you going to prom? We’re going to prom like it’s 2099!). And that signals that the prom is no mere party but, in fact, a state of mind."
It seems that both are interchangeable, but being old-school, I guess the prom is more grammatically correct. So again, another thing the "kids" are saying is they're going to prom. What else will they change? I say use what you're comfortable with, neither is incorrect (up for debate of course), but what's more is that the older crowd is the better crowd, especially if they're going to the prom.
