Pet peeves - grammar

[Visitor]

Everyone one here who's complaining about hating the use of "like" unecessarily; Angela Chase uses it all the time! I'd say it's part of what makes her character real; she uses slang or whatever.

[mglenn]

Hmm, this is funny because you misspelled "grammer"!
Very cute!
Did you do that on purpose?

Yes, I did that on purpose. I wanted to throw one little one in there and see if it was picked up. So bonus points for you! But on a side note I think its only fair of me to point out that I SUCK at spelling. I'm horrible at it. That and remember peoples names I've just met. Hell on the names subject I miss spelled my own name in second grade on a spelling test. That was the day I started using Mike instead of Michael.

[pgh kenny]

I don't think this a rule of grammar. It's more of a style preference....

I can't stand when people begin a sentence with "this" dangling by itself.

BAD: "In response to a myriad of complaints, the IRS issued a report on online vendor debauchery. This failed to explain why CEOs are rarely convicted for tax evasion."

GOOD: "In response to a myriad of complaints, the IRS issued a report on online vendor debauchery. This lengthy report failed to explain why CEOs are rarely convicted for tax evasion."

A dangling 'this' is too confusing. In the BAD case, 'this' could refer to complaints or to the report.

As a side note, I'll never forget 10th grade english. We had to use vocabulary words in a sentence when we were called on by the teacher. We read these sentences out loud in class. We got extra points for using old vocabulary words. However, I was banned from this activity because I insisted on using a form of the word 'debauchery' in EVERY sentence. I loved those vocabulary words that could be used to convey twisted ideas. And I admit I've used long words to make fun of coworkers who I know didn't take AP English in High School.

[mglenn]

Kenny,

I look on with veneration at your pleonasm. The succinct attempts people use to make their postulations is execrable in this day and age. The agitprop that is promulgated by those employed in pedagogy is opprobrious in my predilections of education.

I'll now abdicate from further discussion on this malapropos, nimiety and hauteur but yet fugacious and discursive performance as it is having a somnolent effect on me.

[mglenn]

Oh and heres a link to dictionary.com just incase you need it!

[Natasha (candygirl)]

I understand a little more when people say things like, "Who are you going with?" (as opposed to "With whom are you going?") because it's colloquial.

Im willing to bet cash money that you understand this a little more because you do it. Don't ya?

Who says "whom" anymore (ok I do but that's not the issue) - fact is language evolves - grammar along with definition. I like being quite vigilant about grammar, but only because it helps me express what I mean more clearly.

Whether I say it or not isn't what makes it colloquial or what makes me understand it. I know (and understand why) people don't follow every single grammar rule, especially when they are speaking. I don't have a huge issue with people NOT using the word whom. What I was trying to say (very unclearly) is that it's annoying when people end a sentence (or, more likely, a question) with a preposition that does not belong in the sentence.

"Who are you going with?" - the preposition does belong in the sentence, but "Where are my keys at?" - the preposition doesn't belong anywhere. It's completely extraneous, so what bothers me more is that it's in the sentence at all, not its placement.

[SanDeE*]

Everyone one here who's complaining about hating the use of "like" unecessarily; Angela Chase uses it all the time! I'd say it's part of what makes her character real; she uses slang or whatever.

I said it bugged me when people used "like" conversationally in essays/papers/etc. for school or work.

BAD: She was all like, "Let's go to the park; it's like nice out."
BAD: That was like really stupid.
GOOD: She said, "Let's go to the park; it's nice outside."
GOOD: Her skin was like fine paper.

It doesn't bother me when people use the word "like" when you're talking in person or listening to dialogue on TV. It bothers me when I read it in someone's supposedly serious college English paper. Was it or wasn't it really stupid? Is it or isn't it nice outside? How can someone be "all like" when all they've done is said something? It trips me up reading things like (as in similar to) that in papers. But I hardly notice it at all in everyday conversation.

[Natasha (candygirl)]

I know what you mean. I hated peer reviewing papers for that very reason. I don't mind it in conversation (as long as it doesn't occur every other sentence), but for some reason people don't seem to understand that writing a paper for school is NOT the same as talking to someone about what happened on TV last night. "Like" or "all" are not synonyms for "said" when you are being graded. That's why the section on the SAT is called the Test of Standard Written English, not I'm All Whatever!

[Nostradamus]

Mike,

I found your multiloquent chrestomathy both sententious and superlatively Rabelaisian.

To those who cerebrate on the foibles of the English tongue, I can perchance best rejoin from the moribund Latin:

Errare Humanum Est