Hug your local Grammar Nazi

[maestro8]

I find it odd that people turn down free knowledge. Whereas auto mechanics and doctors are routinely pestered by family and friends for free advice, no one ever bothers the Grammar Nazis. Why is this? I realize it's no longer fashionable to come off as overly intelligent or eloquent, but that's no reason to be dumber than Britney's rug rats...

A recent article from The Canadian Press (http://cnews.canoe.ca/CNEWS/Canada/2010/01/31/12686831-cp.html) claims that 30% of the incoming students at Waterloo University cannot pass a basic English exam. Many exams demonstrated a misunderstanding of basic punctuation marks such as the comma or the apostrophe. Some exams even contained emoticons and netspeak such as "lol" and "cuz". It leaves me wondering how these students passed high school English...

If one in three students are barely literate, one would figure Grammar Nazis would be in high demand. Working in overtime, on holidays and weekends. After all, people don't want to be undereducated, unemployable and perpetually misunderstood. Or do they?

I'm just going to leave these links here for homework. Being that the subject is English, in which I'd assume you all are fully versed (you "foreigners" are excused :D ), this should all be review. As such, if I catch anyone repeating these mistakes, I will strike down upon thee with great vengeance and furious anger those who attempt to poison and destroy my language.

Dr. Grammar's FAQs (http://www.drgrammar.org/faqs/)
Misplaced modifiers and dangling participles (http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/english_grammar_style/65452)
Often mispronounced words and phrases (http://www.yourdictionary.com/library/mispron.html)

You have been warned. Now c'mon over here and gimme a hug or I'ma get medieval on you.

[Mikefule]

Why the capital G in "Grammar"?

[Boethius]

I realize it's no longer fashionable to come off as overly intelligent or eloquent,

I don't believe there was ever any danger that I might be fashionable.

[reprah]

Xxooxxooxxoo

[maestro8]

Why the capital G in "Grammar"?

No one takes the lowercase g "grammar" seriously.

If I've learned anything from the "nouveau English" of net users, it's the POWER OF THE CAPS LOCK KEY.

[MuniOrBust]

YouTube- Downfall of Grammar

[evil-nick]

Modern English has no formal grammar, just usage.

This is in opposition to languages such as French and German which have language academies to regulate the languages.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_language_regulators

[john_childs]

I propose a thumb wrestling match between maestro8 and Miss Ayelery. The winner gets to be the resident English authority.

[reprah]

...Miss Ayelery.

Be still, my heart.

[BillyTheMountain]

no one ever bothers the Grammar Nazis. Why is this?

It's the Nazi Resistance!

[Boethius]

Be still, my heart.

Haven't you heard that opposites attract? She can't possibly be drawn to an intellect such as yourself, but more toward an animalistic being such as myself.

[Naomi]

We fight a losing battle when the forum itself prevents us from indenting paragraphs.

I would add the following educational link:

http://www.editingandwritingservices.com/TitlesCapitalization.html

As a foreigner, I am excused all errors in my own posts.



Nao

[Zzagg]

Nao, how come you didn't hug Maestro?

[rob.northcott]

Some interesting stuff in those links, although some of it obviously doesn't apply to speakers of non-American English (the list of "mispronunciations" is just ridiculous though - surely people aren't that stupid, are they? Old timer's disease?!).

One thing that particularly caught my attention was the use of commas in a list. I was always taught not to put a comma before the "and" at the end of the list (e.g. sausage, egg and chips), but that link suggests that it should be there (sausage, egg, and chips). Have things changed since I was at school, or is this an American peculiarity, or was my teacher just wrong?

I do tend to be the annoying person who notices typos and grammar mistakes, but I think sometimes proper formal grammar can make you sound a bit silly. For example, if I was remarking on the relative unicycling skills of Kris Holm and myself, I would probably say "Kris is a better unicyclist than me," which is of course gramatically incorrect. But "Kris is a better unicyclist than I" just sounds utterly stuck-up and pretentious IMO. I might say "...than I am," which doesn't sound so bad, but is probably not formally correct because of the "am" stuck on the end, but it sounds much better to me.

Spoken English and formal written English are not the same thing, and people who insist on speaking in utterly gramatically correct language all the time sound ridiculous (Brian Sewell et al).

Rob

[GILD]

Ooooh, that's the thin end of the wedge Rob.

[rob.northcott]

Ooooh, that's the thin end of the wedge Rob.
Eek - what did I say? Have I offended the Brian Sewell fan club? I was trying to keep my remarks general, not too ranty and not directed towards anybody in particular (sorry Mr. Sewell if you should ever read this!)
Did I fail? :eek:

Rob

[GILD]

Sorry, I should've quoted for clarity.

I simply meant that your suggstion that we're allowed to change grammatical usage so as not to sound silly is "the thin end of the wedge".
Cuz what duzn't snd ciley 2 U..., and all that

[Gadge]

Brian Sewell is a great man. One is so hurt.;)

[rob.northcott]

I simply meant that your suggstion that we're allowed to change grammatical usage so as not to sound silly is "the thin end of the wedge".
Cuz what duzn't snd ciley 2 U..., and all that
That's true.
I didn't intend to imply that everything should be a free-for-all. It's just that I had a very pedantic English teacher, making me probably more of a "grammar Nazi" than most (in that I tend to notice those sort of details), but certain "correct" usage still sounds wrong to me, so I'll occasionally favour common usage over "correctness for the sake of it", especially in speech.

Rob

[GILD]

Ah, sounds like a good dose of common sense.

Which, sadly, isn't nearly as common as it's name would seem to imply.

[Into the blue]

One thing that particularly caught my attention was the use of commas in a list. I was always taught not to put a comma before the "and" at the end of the list (e.g. sausage, egg and chips), but that link suggests that it should be there (sausage, egg, and chips). Have things changed since I was at school, or is this an American peculiarity, or was my teacher just wrong?

Nope, I was taught the same thing.

No bacon or mushrooms though?
What kind of fry-up do you call that?

[Hung Like Saddam]

*hugs maestro8*

There you go.:D

[Borges]

I find it odd that people turn down free knowledge. Whereas auto mechanics and doctors are routinely pestered by family and friends for free advice, no one ever bothers the Grammar Nazis. Why is this?

There are three kinds of people:


Those who make the mistake of thinking they're actually pretty good at writing, despite a few grammatical errors here and there.
Those who make the mistake of thinking they are actually pretty good at writing because they don't make grammatical errors.
Miss Ayelery (and present company ofcourse ;)).


None of them think they need a friendly neighbourhood grammar nazi.