What are your pet peeves re English usage?

Re: ... to Jeff and I

JTT wrote:

Clary wrote:

But Grand Duke, giving something to Jeff and I is TERRIBLY INCORRECT - all you have to do is to remove Jeff and you will see how silly it sounds. This doesn't stop many people saying it, but they are hypercorrecting so they don't make the mistake of 'saying Jeff and me saw the film.

I am in the business - EFL publishing - and I know these things!

The Cambridge Grammar of the English Language and many other ESL/EFL language sources disagree with you on this, Clary. The CGEL specifically notes that the analogy you've made, the most common one given by prescriptive language sources, is "illegitimate".

I am surprised to think that this is now legitimized and can hear my father spinning in his grave. However, as a lexicographer, I am used to bowing to the majority opinion, but it still grates on me. What do other A2Kers think? Am I a fossil?

0 Replies

I am squarely with Clary on this. "Gave to him and I" is atrocious English! The objective case is "me". "I" is always the subject. If there are now grammar books which teach the opposite, they should be burned immediately and the writers thereof arrested. I teach English and will never be a party to this revisionism. Unbelievable.

[Note to self: watch blood pressure.]

0 Replies

Science is never a question of people voting for what they like best, Merry Andrew. As a teacher, you should know this intuitively. Read this again, please. There is a second quote below. If you'd like to read the complete article, I've provided a link.

Oh, it's not revisionism. English was misanlaysed to begin with. Read on.

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

Consider the possibility that English grammar has been misanalysed for centuries because of grammarians' accepting fundamentally flawed assumptions about grammar and, not least, because of a flawed view of the history of English; and that these failings have resulted in a huge disconnect between English grammars and the genius of the English that really exists among educated native-speakers.

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

http://pinker.wjh.harvard.edu/articles/media/1994_01_24_thenewrepublic.html

For here are the remarkable facts. Most of the prescriptive rules of the language mavens make no sense on any level. They are bits of folklore that originated for screwball reasons several hundred years ago and have perpetuated themselves ever since. For as long as they have existed, speakers have flouted them, spawning identical plaints about the imminent decline of the language century after century. All the best writers in English have been among the flagrant flouters. The rules conform neither to logic nor tradition, and if they were ever followed they would force writers into fuzzy, clumsy, wordy, ambiguous, incomprehensible prose, in which certain thoughts are not expressible at all. Indeed, most of the "ignorant errors" these rules are supposed to correct display an elegant logic and an acute sensitivity to the grammatical texture of the language, to which the mavens are oblivious.

0 Replies

Merry Andrew wrote:

I am squarely with Clary on this. "Gave to him and I" is atrocious English! The objective case is "me". "I" is always the subject. If there are now grammar books which teach the opposite, they should be burned immediately and the writers thereof arrested. I teach English and will never be a party to this revisionism. Unbelievable.

[Note to self: watch blood pressure.]

Exactly, good for you

I wonder if JTT is thinking of the now-archaic 'It is I'? In our lifetimes it has ceased to be correct, really, sounds very pedantic. As a teacher of English as a foreign language, neither I nor my numerous students would dream of saying 'gave it to Fred and I'. Especially the Germans.

0 Replies

This isn't exactly a pet peeve, (usage is a social thing anyway), but there are two pronunciations that have always interested me:

Overt and Covert.

Isn't covert pronounced Cuvert as in "...he stole into the cuvert of the woods.."?

0 Replies

certainly in Brit English we say OHvert and CUvert but the word covert meaning woodland is pronounced cover.

0 Replies

Yes Letty, it's pronounced "cuvvert".

Clary, you are right and Charles-James wossname is wrong on this. Trust me, I'm a Scot.

0 Replies

I do trest you. Absolutely. But;s nothing to do with being a Scot.

0 Replies

I'm the only non-Scot I know who can -- very glibly, too -- say "'Twas a braw bricht moonlicht nicht" faster than Danny Keye ever could. ('Cource, he wasn't a Scot either.)

0 Replies

Clary wrote:

Merry Andrew wrote:
I am squarely with Clary on this. "Gave to him and I" is atrocious English! The objective case is "me". "I" is always the subject. If there are now grammar books which teach the opposite, they should be burned immediately and the writers thereof arrested. I teach English and will never be a party to this revisionism. Unbelievable.

[Note to self: watch blood pressure.]

Exactly, good for you

I wonder if JTT is thinking of the now-archaic 'It is I'? In our lifetimes it has ceased to be correct, really, sounds very pedantic. As a teacher of English as a foreign language, neither I nor my numerous students would dream of saying 'gave it to Fred and I'. Especially the Germans.

No, I wasn't actually Clary, but the "It is I" was never "correct" either. It too was a concocted rule that confused Latin with English. Dubious parallels like this were the cause of many of the 'rules that never were'. Another one was the split infinitive rule.

Regarding the issue at hand, the distinction that you want to make is not "correct" versus "incorrect". Some usages are nonstandard but nonstandard does not mean incorrect, nor does it mean ungrammatical.

Here is a discussion of the specific grammatical issues surrounding these types of collocations, viz. Me and Bill are going ...

Probably no "grammatical error" has received as much scorn as "misuse" of pronoun case inside conjunctions (phrases with two parts joined by [and] or [or]). What teenager has not been corrected for saying [Me and Jennifer are going to the mall]? The standard story is that the object pronoun [me] does not belong in subject position -- no one would say [Me is going to the mall] --

{CONTINUES AT:}

http://pinker.wjh.harvard.edu/articles/media/1994_01_24_thenewrepublic.html

{This is also from the same site/article. The 3rd paragraph is particularly important to what I said about "correctness". The whole article is enlightening, especially for ESL/EFL teachers}

S Pinker continues: I hope to have convinced you of two things. Many prescriptive rules are just plain dumb and should be deleted from the usage handbooks. And most of standard English is just that, standard, in the sense of standard units of currency or household voltages.

It is just common sense that people should be given every encouragement and opportunity to learn the dialect that has become the standard one in their society and to employ it in many formal settings.

But there is no need to use terms like "bad grammar," "fractured syntax," and "incorrect usage" when referring to rural and Black dialects. Though I am no fan of "politically correct" euphemism (in which, according to the satire, "white woman" should be replaced by "melanin-impoverished person of gender"), using terms like "bad grammar" for "nonstandard" is both insulting and scientifically inaccurate.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

0 Replies

I didn't provide a link for this one that I posted a few postings back; sorry 'bout that. If you want to read the rest of this, [and all those who harbour these peeves should], you'll have to type,

HOW GRAMMARS OF ENGLISH HAVE MISSED THE BOAT

into a Google search. The second hit is a downloadable hit. It doesn't take you to a website.

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

HOW GRAMMARS OF ENGLISH HAVE MISSED THE BOAT
THERE'S BEEN MORE FLUMMOXING THAN MEETS THE EYE

Charles-James N. Bailey

Consider the possibility that English grammar has been misanalysed for centuries because of grammarians' accepting fundamentally flawed assumptions about grammar and, not least, because of a flawed view of the history of English; and that these failings have resulted in a huge disconnect between English grammars and the genius of the English that really exists among educated native-speakers.

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

0 Replies

1) Writing "it's" when it should be "its"
(You'd be amazed over how many times this happens!!)

JTT: It's an easy mistake to make. It happens with other English words that have the same or similar pronunciations; you're/your; they're/their/there; ...

It's not nearly as bad as the errors that have been made and continue to be made on a daily basis by adherents of prescriptive grammar.

2) Saying, "Sam gave the coin to Jeff and I."

[Has been discussed]

3) When someone answers the phone and you ask for, say, Edward, and the persons responds, "This is him."

Perfectly natural, correct English.

4) Not using the serial comma (Ex. "The red, white and blue")

These punctuation issues are simple conventions that are not followed in a uniform fashion by all ENLs. Even within, one country, say the USA, there are differences to be found in different style guides. These things really have little to do with what language really is.

5) Saying "Me and him"

Fine for casual nonstandard English. [see the posting two before this one]

6) Using foreign phrases and mispronouncing them. I heard on the radio the other day someone attempt "pince-nez." He pronounced it as spelled.

When any language "borrows" a word from another language, it does NOT borrow that language's sound system. People who fool themselves into thinking they are pronouncing the 'new' language correctly are deluding themselves.

Those who shift the new word to match the sounds of their native language are doing what is natural and correct. Japanese has thousands upon thousands of borrowed English words. Most ENLs wouldn't recognize a one.

Try a few: [they're printed to aid you to say them as Japanese would]

kakutayroo -

garoo -

meerookoo -

garahjee -

7) Excessive use of "awesome," "dude," and "cool." The Grand Canyon is awesome, only we can't use that word to describe it anymore.

This is a specious argument for words do not get "worn out". The meanings that words acquire for different age groups have differing nuances.

The Grand Canyon can change within one's perspective; for some it may be oh-hum. At some times of the day, it could be awesome at others, incredibly awesome, and yet at others, something else.

Language is used by people to say what they mean and the genius that drives language makes a mockery of this type of simplistic analysis.

0 Replies

kitchenpete wrote:

I've almost given up on this one. It still sounds wrong, though.

"Different" should take the preposition "from", not "to" or "than".

So many people use the incorrect forms that there's no point trying, any more.

I think some of the points you've made, above, are about slang usage which is, almost by definition, not the "correct" usage.

KP

You should give it up, Pete. PGs have been trying to change these things for centuries, with virtually no success. The reason; it's impossible to change what is natural behaviour.

When we are taught errant rules in language class or by our parents or friends, the natural rules we have in our mental grammars overrides these artificial rules.

The CGEL notes that all three prepositions occur with 'different'. Some are more common, and there are differences in dialects.

Slang is only informal vocabulary. It isn't incorrect in any way, shape or form. Much of yesterday's slang is now mainstream English. Why would English choose to make "incorrectness" a source for new words? It just doesn't make sense, does it?

One of the greatest successes that PGs have had was in stigmatizing <ain't>. Yet it's persisted and it's in common use in English today.

The really ironic thing is, <ain't> was "colloquial upper-class BrE speech until the 19th century or even later. [CGEL footnote p1611]

0 Replies

CalamityJane wrote:

It gets confusing, doesn't it

0 Replies

Sorry, I posted this in the wrong thread. See "was/were" thread

0 Replies

Merry Andrew wrote:

I am squarely with Clary on this. "Gave to him and I" is atrocious English! The objective case is "me". "I" is always the subject. If there are now grammar books which teach the opposite, they should be burned immediately and the writers thereof arrested. I teach English and will never be a party to this revisionism. Unbelievable.

[Note to self: watch blood pressure.]

I'm with the two of you. If it were correct, then why wouldn't it be "give to he and I?"

I also continue to be pedantic and will frequently say It is I....'cause I is it. Very Happy

I have also done a brief perusal of the pdf and am unconvinced, truly unconvinced.

0 Replies

Quote:

I also continue to be pedantic and will frequently say It is I....'cause I is it.

I have also done a brief perusal of the pdf and am unconvinced, truly unconvinced.

Then that's what you shall remain, Piffka, a pedant. No one is demanding that pedants become enlightened. To become enlightened would take much more than a "brief perusal". I appreciate that it's much easier to remain a pedant.

0 Replies

Yes, JTT, I remain unconvinced, one who prefers the old and dusty to the new and radical. What I read from C.-J. Nice Bailey was embolded material covering large tracts of grammatical real estate. The paragraphs covering I/me usage based this new rule mainly on Bailey's assessment of which language played the strongest role in forming current English.

I understand many people use "me" or "myself" as a direct object. <shrug> I don't and I advise any students who will be taking standardized tests to be careful before following JTT's advice.

This is the meat of Bailey's issue with the usage:

Quote:

Consider the English pronoun pairs, her : she, him : he, me : I, us : we, and them : they. It is easy to show that the uses of these paired forms are not directly related to functional (subject and object) “cases” in the manner of Latin and Anglo-Saxon but exhibit uses that remind us more than a little of the Romance languages. If the educated generally say a kind of Frenchified “Martha and myself arrived late” and “That’s me” (just like French). Marilyn Monroe was made to sound silly by saying “That's I!” Why then do grammarians ignore the significance of such indicators of the system of English? Can’t they guess why quasi-French usages like “Me and my father cleaned the house up today"—typical of that legendary 13 3/4-year-old British adolescent, Adrian Mole—have proved so ineradicable? (Note that “the phone was answered by a she” has nothing to do with the foregoing; for she here is effectively in quotations marks—a noun rather than a pronoun.)

At all events, shouldn't a grammar offer some hint of a reason why many educated speakers insist that for her and me is ungrammatical? Grammarians can hardly avoid conceding that many unexceptionable usages violate their prescribed “case” rules; e.g. “We did it by ourselves, just Dad and me”; “Who’ll do it if not me?”; and “Someone—probably me—will do it.” To contend that these deeply ingrained, ineradicable, and clearly Romance-derived usages are contrary to the genius of English is a serious misreading of the facts. The system, a very strict one, of real English grammar is missing from the books. The sociolinguistic situation of early Norman England was the same as what we find in the birth of daughter languages of English in our time: The grammar structure comes from the overclasses, and many words—especially functor words (see below on calquing) come from the vocabulary of the underclasses. Freely borrowable words—28 per cent of English vocabulary is Anglo-Saxon according to one count—offer no index of the lineage of a language structure and hence hardly constitute a reliable criterion for determining its history.

The source of the problem—the problem lying behind the assumption that English is a direct descendent of Anglo-Saxon—is the supposition that functor words—auxiliary verbs, prepositions, relative pronouns, etc.—are never calqued, i.e. translated, in the mother language of a given language. But we see this constantly occurring in new languages being born in the Pacific, Africa, and Caribbean. Calques may look Anglo-Saxon in English, but it they are functor words, they are grammatically French. Thus, the which in earlier English calques Old French laquele/liquels—later laquelle/lequel. The relation between whereof and French dont (from Latin de unde) “whose” is similar. Whom? does not directly derive from the Anglo-Saxon accusative; Germanic (non-neuter) accusatives end in -n, whereas the dative was hwa`m? If final -m became -n through what linguists call an unmarking development, this process was operative at language-birth and must have been influenced by Latin (non-neuter) accusatives ending in -m (cf. Latin quem? “whom”).

A2K readers should take the time to check Bailey's publication website:

http://orlapubs.com/A/index.html

0 Replies

JTT wrote:

Quote:
I also continue to be pedantic and will frequently say It is I....'cause I is it.

I have also done a brief perusal of the pdf and am unconvinced, truly unconvinced.

Then that's what you shall remain, Piffka, a pedant. No one is demanding that pedants become enlightened. To become enlightened would take much more than a "brief perusal". I appreciate that it's much easier to remain a pedant.

Interesting that you should equate generally accepted standard useage as pedantry, JTT. By that standard, virtually all rules can be ignored, dismissed as mere pedantry, and consigned to the dustbin of archaic vernacular. It is, I think, quite irrelevant what the linguistic lineage of a particular grammatical rule may be -- French, German, Latin or even Celtic. The relevant point is that it is a rule which has stood the test of time rather well.

Certainly, language is an evolving phoenomenon and what our grandparents may have considered improper is quite accepted today. I still remember being told in school that one should never end a sentence with a preposition. When I wanted to know why, the teacher had no adequate explanation. That proscription has long gone out of style. It was a silly rule, with no logical justification. This is not the case with the me:I, him:he, them:they etc. rule. It simply makes good sense to the Anglo-Saxon ear. There is no formal declension of nouns and pronouns in English as there is in most other Indo-European languages. But the two simple cases of Nominative and Objective are well-established. And, again, the distinction has stood the test of time well. I can see no discernible reason for allowing a divergence from the rule now. It is a concession to laziness on the part of learners, no more, no less.

0 Replies

JTT wrote:

Quote:
I also continue to be pedantic and will frequently say It is I....'cause I is it.

I have also done a brief perusal of the pdf and am unconvinced, truly unconvinced.

Then that's what you shall remain, Piffka, a pedant. No one is demanding that pedants become enlightened. To become enlightened would take much more than a "brief perusal". I appreciate that it's much easier to remain a pedant.

Interesting that you should equate generally accepted standard useage as pedantry, JTT. By that standard, virtually all rules can be ignored, dismissed as mere pedantry, and consigned to the dustbin of archaic vernacular. It is, I think, quite irrelevant what the linguistic lineage of a particular grammatical rule may be -- French, German, Latin or even Celtic. The relevant point is that it is a rule which has stood the test of time rather well.

Certainly, language is an evolving phenomenon and what our grandparents may have considered improper is quite accepted today. I still remember being told in school that one should never end a sentence with a preposition. When I wanted to know why, the teacher had no adequate explanation. That proscription has long gone out of style. It was a silly rule, with no logical justification. This is not the case with the me:I, him:he, them:they etc. rule. It simply makes good sense to the Anglo-Saxon ear. There is no formal declension of nouns and pronouns in English as there is in most other Indo-European languages. But the two simple cases of Nominative and Objective are well-established. And, again, the distinction has stood the test of time well. I can see no discernible reason for allowing a divergence from the rule now. It is a concession to laziness on the part of learners, no more, no less.

0 Replies

What are your pet peeves re English usage?

Related Topics

Quick Links

My Account

able2know