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Discussion » Statements » Rosie's Corner » How many things in the world are LIFE or DEATH? Is "PROPER" grammar among them? Is stilted rigid de rigeure 24/7? Boring?
RosieG

How many things in the world are LIFE or DEATH? Is "PROPER" grammar among them? Is stilted rigid de rigeure 24/7? Boring?

Posted - November 28, 2018
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Responses


  • 3719
    Proper grammar is not stilted or boring - those are matters of poor style, not grammar.

    However, the better you are at correct grammar, the more effective and credible you can be at writing to match intended audience and purpose.

    It might be highly precise and passive, as in a legal or scientific report; it might be lively and more personal, perhaps playing with words to encourage a particular impression or emotion; or it might be intimate and informal as in a love-letter.

    I look at (or listen to) the choice of words more than construction, for if the words are ill-chosen they suggest the writer (speaker) does not actually understand them beyond a very thin veneer of approximate meaning. I lose faith in the message as a whole; and ask myself, "Does he or she really know the subject?" This happens even with quite simple words, hence tautology like "meet with" and "revert back"; or muddles like "motivation" instead of "motive"; or sheer ugliness like "inspirational" instead of "inspiring" - those do mean the same but the latter is far more elegant and mellifluous, hence eloquent.

    (One British politician once even tried to sneer at an opponent's change of mind, but came unstuck by calling it  "a complete 360º turn!".) 

    This is worse when people use technical terms they do not really understand, as metaphors, and so convey a meaning far from what they might intend. A common example: "I want us to be at the epicentre of...", when they probably mean almost the opposite, "... the focus of..." (to use the appropriate fellow metaphor). I expect many Californians or Alaskans will tell you about that mistake.

    Finally, there is also a matter of pride in creativity. No-one seriously expects every last rule adhered to in an informal conversation. However, I would ask those who sneer at whom they call "the grammar police" (or worse), why it is right to take pride in your car, your house, your own appearance, the standard of your work... but wrong to take similar care with writing.   
      December 3, 2018 5:21 PM MST
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  • 113301

    Thank you for your thoughtful reply Durdle. You make some good points. I disagree with you about some of them. Here goes. I am an ENGLISH MAJOR. I know what is correct appropriate proper and what is not. However I think language is not dead and fixed and rigid. Language is the way we communicate with one another. You do know that spelling correctly does not indicate intelligence correct? I worked in a research lab long ago with GENIUS scientists who invented things. They wrote reports and it was my job to edit them for proper spelling. They were far too busy inventing to concern themselves with spelling. Now how we use words and the size of our vocabulary is definitely an intelligence indicator. I play with words all the time. I make some up to suit myself because I feel like it. FUTURELY is mine and I like it. Just an example. I also spell stupid stoopid sometimes because it amuses me to do so. People who know me know that about me. English is not always the first language of folks on an internet social site. They do the best they can. They do NOT show up here or elsewhere to be criticized for spelling. They show up to communicate and engage with the rest of us. It's like looking at a beautiful garden and focusing only on the weeds. What kind of person does that? The kind of person with whom YOU want to engage and spend time? Spelling police ride on the coattails of others. If they were creative inventive imaginative they would be asking and answering questions. But they aren't. Yet they lust after being noticed and the only way they have been able to attract attention is by setting themselves up as arbiters of "correctness" and feel quite proud of that distinctive slice of the pie they have cut for themselves. You may find them useful helpful effective. I don't.  If all they have to contribute to the dialogue is interjecting and interrupting to point out errors I do not waste my time on them. They intrude promiscuously and wantonly. During a discussion about serious things they show up with a correction! That is at best intrusive and at worst insulting. They are not invited to join in but they barge in with their pompous condescending supercilious arrogant "correction".  Others don't mind them and I expect still others think they are very very very very swell. I do not. I do appreciate your point of view. I simply do not share it. It happens.  Happy Tuesday to you! :)  As for your views on taking pride in a car or house or my own appearance I think spelling is not remotely analogous to those examples. SIGH.

    This post was edited by RosieG at December 4, 2018 8:59 AM MST
      December 4, 2018 3:53 AM MST
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  • 3719
    Thank you Rosie. In fact I agree with much of that and have answered similar points in replying to Our Food Is Poisoned, including agreeing it is rude to criticise gratuituously, especially in a thread not otherwise of real interest to the critic.

    As it happens I worked for some 20 years in an R&D establishment, so was surrounded by professional, very highly-educated and experienced physicists and engineers. I noticed many of these extremely good mathematicians etc. were not always as literate. This came over very strongly when I helped archive a lot of old reports, entailing typing thousands of references into a spreadsheet. Many of the titles I had to type on just a lap-top were so clumsy, some nearly abstract length, that I wondered how needlessly turgid the texts were!

    I understand your deliberate miss-spelling: see my corresponding remark in my other message about MS 'Word' trying to stop me inventing turns of phrase it thinks ungrammatical. However I also say I am well aware there are likely to be contributors who have had to learn English as a second language - and that I respect them for doing so to a higher level than I can learn a second language. There may also be a few who are dyslexic.  

    I know languages change, but I think the pace and type of change is being forced by commercial interests including Microsoft, and change is not always for the better. English in its many dialects is a beautiful language, capable of expressive play such as your "stoopid" and my games with construction; and new inventions or concepts need new names; but it is a shame to see it spoilt and levelled by lack of respect, commercial pressure or just neglect. I am pleased to say you are too literate and understanding to be among them, but I feel some who see pride in endeavour as wrong, can be as bad as their "Grammar Nazi" victims.

    I accept a home or car is a weak analogy, but my comment about pride is of creativity and skill, so perhaps a better and certainly closer analogy might be craft or artistic projects. 

    I am not calling for 100% precision and accuracy in everything everywhere (I'd have to use a dictionary to remind myself of the difference!) as that can be stifling and stilted. Rather I call for honest endeavour in doing one's best, and am upset to see some critics celebrate lowering quality and attack striving for better.  And that in writing, or in anything - I see parallels in other aspects of life.
      December 4, 2018 8:13 AM MST
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  • 113301
    Your take is macroscopic Durdle. Mine is microscopic. My only issue here is the egregious and unnecessary correcting of errors of others in terms of spelling or grammar just to show off. Now if someone misstates a FACT that is entirely different. You don't want folks spreading things that are untrue so you speak up. Thank you for your thoughtful and detailed reply. We're not on the same page here. My concern is very limited while yours is very broad. .
      December 4, 2018 8:51 AM MST
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  • 3719
    Oh yes, I take your point - it is wrong to pick fault for the sake of it - unless as you say, the statement is either wrong by mistake, or a lie.
      December 16, 2018 9:55 AM MST
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  • 46117
    Proper grammar has its very important place in the scheme of things.  This is not the place for it.  We are writing and thinking and creating by the seat of our pants.   I think grammar is fine, but not the be-all, end-all of Answer Mug.  I happen to know how to punctuate and spell.  I had a natural inclination to learning about grammar.  But other people on here are not in the same category as far as getting a thorough education on grammar.  They are just as bright and just as interesting to read.  

    When someone is answering my questions, I deem it very rude to correct anything about their verbiage.  Like this:  I DON'T HAVE TO LISTEN TO YOUR ANSWER, I'll JUST POINT OUT YOUR ERRORS.  Totally stupid and they are trying to show everyone how superior their knowledge is about a subject that no one asked their priceless advice on.  (dangling preposition there)

    I find it boorish at best.  Leave the grammar for things like President Trump's tweets.  There is a perfect example of a buffoon who cannot punctuate to save his soul.  That begs for correction, since he is representing the Country and this is the vomit our leader spews out.   Obama would never send out such a message (a message?  How about 5,000 messages so far.)   Anyway, Obama would never consider sending out any tweet ever.  So retarded it just reeks of DUMBA$$ showoff who wants everyone to listen to his every thought and whim even at 3:00 a.m. since he cannot sleep when no one is watching.

    So, unless the meaning of the message is distorted, I think we should let the grammar slide here.  WHO CARES?  It's like having two immature, children trying to run around and cause an uproar for attention.  Quite nauseating from my perspective.


      December 4, 2018 4:08 AM MST
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  • I agree completely.    I have explained a few times that I am dyslexic.  I know I should not choose to feel the need to defend or explain myself when corrected, so perhaps I need to work on why I do that.     I wasn't bothered by the corrections at first, but then I began to see many others also being corrected.   This is not a classroom.  We are not being graded here. I find it  to be rude, patronizing, disrespectful and anything but helpful. Even if I weren't dyslexic, it's not nice nor is it necessary.  I am referring to grammar, typos, everything related. This post was edited by Benedict Arnold at December 4, 2018 8:56 AM MST
      December 4, 2018 8:55 AM MST
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  • 113301
    The egregious self-serving boorish insertion of an uninvited person who shows up just for spelling corrections interrupting the conversation of others is the only way they can get attention. They are not creative inventive or imaginative. If they were they would occupy themselves by asking and replying to questions. They obsessively need attention and the only way they can get it is by riding on the coattails of others. I think they think it gives them credibility respect admiration but in fact it does the opposite. They continue doing it because it is absolutely all they got.  SIGH. Thank you for your reply Sharon. This is not a school, a publishing firm or a newspaper. Frustrated  spellcheckers should find employment somewhere they can show off and get paid for it. Probably at minimum wage because being a spellchecker is probably not a job that pays well though I honestly do not know how much they earn per hour .  An internet social site is not the proper forum for it. They do not impress they just annoy. I believe they know it and that is their intention. This post was edited by RosieG at December 4, 2018 9:00 AM MST
      December 4, 2018 8:56 AM MST
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  • 3719
    Whilst some of your message is needlessly aggressive, I agree it is rude to try to correct others' grammar on an informal chat forum like this, where precision of text is secondary to precision of message; but why  is it wrong otherwise to care about language? I might shout at the radio when I hear a commentator use a muddled metaphor that undermines the message, or an ugly artifice like "inspirational" or "decrescendo" (the latter most likely in a music review); but I would not reprimand anyone in face-to-face conversation where I may be as likely to split an infinitive as they are.

    Similarly on here, where I am as aware as anyone that English, even the American form, might not be the writer's native language. After all, I can just about order two coffees in a French village café, but for all I would know, from someone able to read a Dickens novel in English!

    I have been annoyed in turn by being pulled up short, in writing, when building a linguistic twist for effect causes Microsoft's "Word" to accuse me of bad grammar. Perhaps, but as a deliberate style device, rather like poetic licence. If I try to use a Graeco-Latinate plural, the same criticises the spelling - here the programmer knows all about 0s and 1s, but not the elegant word-endings like "a", "ae", "i", "ii" and "ices" - though to be fair I have sometimes to think which is normal for the particular word! However, I believe MS contracts its code-writing out so perhaps much is done by non-native-English speakers, and I do greatly respect such people for learning ordinary English (and IT!) to a far higher level than I could learn theirs (and it!).

      
    As for Twitter, I think it wrong that politicians should use it , Facebook or any other chat site to broadcast their policies and views, no matter who the individual, party or nation, are. It cheapens what should be taken seriously, and suggests the messenger is incapable of presenting his or her case in a rational, analytical, so professional manner.

    Mind you, I think similarly when I hear on the news that this or that leader uses advertising clerks with pretentious titles like "Director of Communications" - implying their own inability to create even the usually anodyne opacity that evokes corporate "mission statements"! (BTW, do firms still issue such things, or were they yet another short-term business fad?)   
      December 4, 2018 5:55 AM MST
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  • 11384
    A old English teacher once told me - those who can write creatively write creatively - those who can't write creatively become grammar Nazi's. Cheers!
      December 4, 2018 9:06 AM MST
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  • 3719
    It's a sweeping generalisation but does have a point! I think you can apply it to many things - those who can, do; but those who can't often deride those who can and do; but it certainly can't be said of everyone. Many who can't are at least honest enough to admit it.
      December 16, 2018 9:58 AM MST
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