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An interesting article about english grammar and those who go screaming into the night to protect it.
"To protests that the language police are only protecting the accuracy, precision and clarity of our tongue, Lynch lifts a skeptical eyebrow. Many of the most roundly deplored "debasements" of English are nevertheless perfectly comprehensible: I didn't confuse you by writing "Ain't it the truth?" in my opening paragraph, did I? The only truly unbreakable rules of grammar and usage are the ones that, when broken, result in a genuine failure to communicate. The rest is a form of covert class warfare, and today's usage reproofs constitute a status-protecting thump on the head delivered by the upper middle class to uppity members of the lower middle."
Did you copy and paste this sentence from the article? "To protests that the language police are only protecting the accuracy, precision and clarity of our tongue, Lynch lifts a skeptical eyebrow"
If so, the very first sentence of the article violates the rule of subject-verb agreement.
" I've never heard of a relationship being affected by punctuation " Jerry Seinfeld
Love that episode!
When I was twelve my family went to the beach with another family and they had a boy my age who liked me, but I did not like him. As we stood knee-high in the ocean he said "I think I love you", and I sternly said "don't you think you're a little too young for that"? Later he handed me a love letter and it had spelling errors! I really wanted to discourage him so I circled the mistakes using red ink (as if I were a teacher) and gave it back to him. He didn't bother me much after that.
I can't believe what a meanie I was! But I'm feeling much better now!
I'm sure I make grammar mistakes and even spelling (perish the thought), but when I see my own mistakes I cringe and squirm. Other people may see their own mistakes but they don't care and it doesn't seem to bother them. It's the "not caring" part that bothers me. I just hope bad grammar isn't contagious or we are all in trouble.
If I had a quarter for every time someone asked me if I was the spelling police...WOW!
I'm just too terrified to write anything for/in fear of misplacing a coma, or something worse!
Don't be terrified. Just do your best. It's nice to know that you've enjoyed the responses because it did get a tad heated. I care about the English language and I appreciate anyone else who does as well.
And, someone stop me - I can't help myself...... aaaaiiiiiieeee!!!...........you spelled "comma" wrong.
Thanks for the thread OVCATTO. It's been interesting and informative.
On the contrary. He uses bad grammar at work to fit in. Although he is a supervisor, he still needs to be one of the guys. Speaking at their level helps facilitate that.
By using a certain style of speech to, as you say, fit in, he is using effective communications to accomplish more than simply giving instructions. By using the same grammatical constructions as his employees he is communicating empathy and a sense of commonality; solidarity if you will. As such, wouldn't you consider that to be an important objective of language and communication?
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As to "punctiliousness of far too many grammatical arguments", I think poor grammar and sloppy writing is just one of the the many degradations happening in American life.
I think that your argument is as old as complaints about the overall decline of society, which are about as old as society to begin with. Again, there is justification for being upset about grammatical and spelling errors which make communication intelligible, and a Teutonic adherence to rules that actually just get in the way.
One last thought, for the moment, we admire rule breaking in all the arts, music, painting etc, especially if it gives us a new, and fresh viewpoint. Why doesn't this apply to the written word?
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Nothing wrong with *trying* to correct people in whatever subject.
Just do it in private and not in public.
There is a way to do that, even on this forum.
A poster above called it *rude* to correct a teacher ...
Why ????
Just do it in private.
My family is a polyglot family, since we lived in foreign countries for so long.
When my kids went back to the USA to finish High School,
they often had to *correct* the *German or French* teacher,
but they always did it in private.
We found out at some *Parent-Teacher* conference, and it was mentioned to us.
I often wonder why there are mistakes, since the text written on this forum is done on a computer.
It takes just a small effort to let *Spell Checker* do most of your work.
In my case, I very often jumble up letters, (like teh, adn ..) as many people do.
The *Spell Checker* takes over, and most of the time it does it automatically, since it *learned* what I do wrong *most of the time*.
Other times, it suggests really funny alternatives ...
When I was twelve my family went to the beach with another family and they had a boy my age who liked me, but I did not like him. As we stood knee-high in the ocean he said "I think I love you", and I sternly said "don't you think you're a little too young for that"? Later he handed me a love letter and it had spelling errors! I really wanted to discourage him so I circled the mistakes using red ink (as if I were a teacher) and gave it back to him. He didn't bother me much after that.
I can't believe what a meanie I was! But I'm feeling much better now!
I'm sure I make grammar mistakes and even spelling (perish the thought), but when I see my own mistakes I cringe and squirm. Other people may see their own mistakes but they don't care and it doesn't seem to bother them. It's the "not caring" part that bothers me. I just hope bad grammar isn't contagious or we are all in trouble.
If I had a quarter for every time someone asked me if I was the spelling police...WOW!
I think bad grammar is contagious. Bad habits seem to spread more quickly than good ones.
I know that I am not perfect, but like you I cringe when I catch a mistake. It is one thing to use bad grammar on an informal message board or when you are IMing your friends but there really shouldn't be blantant errors in letters, corporate communications, etc.
I see your grammatical debating style is the same as when it comes to politics; there are only two shades, black and white. Huck, there is a huge gap between illiteracy and grammatical perfection. You feel me?
Did you copy and paste this sentence from the article? "To protests that the language police are only protecting the accuracy, precision and clarity of our tongue, Lynch lifts a skeptical eyebrow"
If so, the very first sentence of the article violates the rule of subject-verb agreement.
I would think that using a block quote with a link below would qualify as proper citation of a quotation as a matter of discussion group style.
Don't be terrified. Just do your best. It's nice to know that you've enjoyed the responses because it did get a tad heated. I care about the English language and I appreciate anyone else who does as well.
I was sort of joking, to paraphrase Bernie Mack, you don't scare me!
Of course this reminds me of a very good friend who was a speech writer for Congressman Moe Udall. This friend loved to split infinitives and his girlfriend/editor hated him for it, but, the speeches were so much the better for them. The same is true of my wife, a legal editor by profession. She absolutely despises my use of parenthetical phrases, I love them.
And, yes I am enjoying the thread.
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Thanks for the thread OVCATTO. It's been interesting and informative.
I think bad grammar is contagious. Bad habits seem to spread more quickly than good ones.
A grammatical pandemic? Commatitist?
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Not very nice
But I'm feeling much better now!
