Grumpy Grammar Grinch Grouses...

[Veronica]

"I seen" and "he don't" are not acceptable among educated speakers in any part of the country.

Pam

Not afraid to speak your mind I see.

I believe there is a time and a place for everything - even bad grammar.

Veronica

[tulip]

I haven't read through all of the posts, so I apologize if this one has been discussed already.

LESS and FEWER. Get it right, people!

Ah, that's better.

[PamNY]

I believe there is a time and a place for everything - even bad grammar.

Seriously? Outside of fiction? I'm not arguing; just curious. I do think bad grammar can be used for emphasis in a joking way -- I can't think of an example that would work in writing, but we did it a lot in my family. In fact, this thread has reminded me that I should write down a few of the things we laughed about in my family so I don't forget them.

Pam

[Pedal Wench]

Seriously? Outside of fiction? I'm not arguing; just curious. I do think bad grammar can be used for emphasis in a joking way -- I can't think of an example that would work in writing, but we did it a lot in my family. In fact, this thread has reminded me that I should write down a few of the things we laughed about in my family so I don't forget them.

Pam

I write a column (online, for the SciFi Channel) and I regularly use sentence fragments and words such as "ain't" and "I dunno." It's conversational and I think allowed in that context.

[Eden]

Now, I don't view this as an excuse to not learn the proper grammar of the day, but just remember that language is not static. It is ever evolving and that the rules that were used just a generation or two ago may not apply in this day and age. Someday everyone may properly use words or forms that in this time seem to be slang or poor grammar and today's rules may seem impossibly stiff and formal.... (my husband's great aunt was a school teacher and her grammar book still had all the rules and conjugations for thee and thou)

[Veronica]

Seriously? Outside of fiction?

Bad grammar in conversation often comes from the home. When you criticize a child's language, you're criticizing their homelife and maybe even their culture.

Often they are following certain grammatical rules. They are not standard English grammatical rules, but they are rules.

Veronica

[PamNY]

I write a column (online, for the SciFi Channel) and I regularly use sentence fragments and words such as "ain't" and "I dunno." It's conversational and I think allowed in that context.

I would call that poetic license.

Pam

[Duck on Wheels]

From an on-line recipe for pumpkin soup:

*To make pumpkin purée, cut a sugar pumpkin in half, scoop out the seeds and stringy stuff, lie face down on a tin-foil lined baking pan. Bake at 350°F until soft, about 45 min to an hour. Cool, scoop out the flesh. Freeze whatever you don't use for future use.

[Trek420]

Takes a pretty big oven to do that

[lph]

*snort* hilarious! I think that's the best lie/lay confusion I've ever seen.

[beccaB]

How about a cookbook my kids had that says to beat the eggs with a fork. It did not say to crack them open first. My oldest got a big kick out of me beating the heck out of those eggs with a fork. Made a big mess but was good for some laughs!

[Trek420]

Bad grammar in conversation often comes from the home. When you criticize a child's language, you're criticizing their homelife and maybe even their culture.

Often they are following certain grammatical rules. They are not standard English grammatical rules, but they are rules.

Veronica

Language is a beautiful evolving thing. But at a certain point isn't it the job of the entire village idiot that raises the child and even educates adults because we never stop learning to say "you ain't going to get or keep a job if you can't use standard written and spoken English" ?

I'm not criticizing, I'm not saying anything about your parents, family and culture, I'm just sayin' at a certain point it's like showing up for the interview with the knuckle tattoo. I can express myself any way I choose off the job but at work I will need clear standard English.

I'm a teeny tiny itsy bitsy cog working in a to remain unnamed large company. We recently got a chat application so you could be on our website right now, it says "click to chat" and you reach me, or another rep.

I was surprised, shocked really during the training .... it's cross cultural, racial, age, height .... there were many of us being taken off the application and told "sorry, you're fine on the phone but you can't write your way out of a paper bag".

Well, the company could say "This is your job. We're doing everything online now." What if I could not write?

Like the bumpersticker says "if you can read this, thank a teacher"

[Dogmama]

Bad grammar in conversation often comes from the home. When you criticize a child's language, you're criticizing their homelife and maybe even their culture.

Often they are following certain grammatical rules. They are not standard English grammatical rules, but they are rules.

Veronica

"People judge you by the words you use." Wasn't that a commercial for something?

[Duck on Wheels]

*snort* hilarious! I think that's the best lie/lay confusion I've ever seen.

I keep trying to envision a way it could make sense. Only safe-to-try-at-home one I've come up with is that it was so exhausting cutting and cleaning the pumpkin, that while the pumpkins is in the oven you take a nap on the floor, face down on the spare baking sheet. Even that image is pretty funny.

[spazzdog]

Here is set of words that I see miss-used/miss-spelled on a regular basis:

rain
rein
reign

My brain is not cooperating, so please, someone supply a fun sentence using all 3 properly.