Posted on 06/20/2012 6:30:54 AM PDT by Constitutionalist Conservative
It’s not a limited circle, it’s the majority. Proper grammar has never been how the masses communicated.
Groups get their own sub-dialects. It’s the nature of sub cultures. I work on an SF convention, we have entire conversations that “normal” people wouldn’t understand a single word of, because we have the shared knowledge. Same kind of thing in the software industry. When people are trying to communicate group ideas to non-group people they need remember to not use internal grammar.
Most of the time the “standards” are how the elite talk. It’s the language of government, top end of business and academia. Promoting them isn’t a superiority complex, but declaring yourself better because of them is. Look at the condescension on this thread, THAT’S a superiority complex.
Informality? Try stupidity.
I see it here on FRee Republic. I had to ask what "my bad" meant a few years ago. It seemed like all the twenty somethings understood the phrase immediately.
Re your post #7, unfortunately, about 99.44% of Freepers cannot differentiate between “lose” and “loose,” invariably using the latter when they should use the former.
Ugh! Hip-hop “culture” is responsible for the use of “disrespect” as a verb, and for the teeth-gritting term “24/7.” I hate them both.
Why do you say “magna cum laude?”. There is no evidence of that whatsoever. O was selected to be president of the Law Review because the prior year Harvard changed the criteria to include affirmative action. O has been quoted as saying that he benefited from that decision.
I disagree. I’m 45 and proper grammar was a given when I was growing up. My parents and grandparents, who never went to college, all spoke well with few exceptions - even those to whom English was a second language.
We didn’t suddenly have a need for new ways to confuse adjectives and adverbs. We suddenly had an education system that stopped teaching grammar, and the masses were left to fill in that gap piecemeal with whatever words kinda sorta fit because they didn’t know any better.
Your point being?
the prescriptives for English were very different in the 19th century to what was recorded in the 20th
You still are missing the distinction between grammar and style. On a good day, my own style is more Augustan than anything else. Regardless, the rules of grammar prevailing today were standard 150 years ago and largely so a century before as well. "Between you and I" will always be a barbarism not because it violates a prescriptive canon or because it isn't used by the right sort of people, but because it's illogical, contradictory, and confused -- defects that cannot evolve away.
Yes!
I go nuts when I see "viola" or, worse yet, "wa-la" (!) used instead of "voila."
I’m about to hit 43, while we did proper grammar in proper company in casual conversation we were more with the regular folks. Nobody made “new ways” they’re just the masses ways.
The masses already fill in the gap. Where’d “ain’t” come from? I remember English teachers having fits over it, but we used it anyway, they were clearly teaching us grammar, and we clearly didn’t care. People aren’t filling in gaps piecemeal, they’re talking the way the people around them talk, because that’s the version of the language they understand AND that they know will be understood.
This “modern grammar” you reference is but a cover term for ignorance. And you damn well know it.
Effect/Affect - "How is the union strike going to effect prices?"
Inferred/Implied - "When Bob said he was short of cash, he inferred that he was having business problems."
Irregardless
Wala
I could care less.
Blame the MSM mostly.
They deliberately say ‘I’ when they should say ‘me’ just to trigger that fingernails-on-blackboard quivering of the spine.
My point being that “proper” grammar has never been the language of the masses and anybody thinking there’s a sudden change now just hasn’t been paying attention.
I’m not missing anything, you’re changing what I said in a desperate search for something to be right about. The rules of grammar change.
Barbarism?! BWHAHAHAHAHAHA. See that’s exactly the egotistical BS I was talking about. Grammar nazis are just stroking themselves. Really, get over yourself. You’re not that cool.
But which speaker can be understood by more people?
You posted: It’s not illiteracy, they can read, they can write, they just don’t put the words in the order a 100 year old book says they should. Which is your problem, not theirs.
***
I disagree. The grammatical errors demonstrated in this thread result in imprecise speaking and writing. True, grammar books are old, but that only shows that the rules are long-standing. The misuse of language is unattractive and suggests a lack of care in what one is saying. Sadly, most don’t even know that they are making errors, much less how to correct them.
Grammatical capital offenses:
1. Subject/verb disagreement.
2. Nominative/objective case confusion.
3. Improper use of reflexive pronouns.
4. Casual use of passive voice.
Misdemeanors:
1. Malapropisms
2. Dangling prepositions
3. Abuse of the present progressive (”the reason being IS ...”)
4. Participial paroxysms (”I could OF helped ...” “He should OF been there ...”)
5. Incorrect future subjunctive (”If he WAS ...” instead of “If he WERE ...”)
6. Dropped infinitives (”This shirt needs washed” instead of “This shirt needs TO BE washed” or “This shirt needs washing”)
7. Poorly latinized plurals (”Media” is a plural noun; “the media ARE biased churls” not “The media IS a biased churl”)
There are more ...
Actually, ain’t has been a legitimate part of the english language for about 500 years. It just isn’t (ain’t?) erudite usage.
No it’s not, it’s speaking to people in a way they understand. The ignorance is thinking there’s something wrong with being understood.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.