So I’d read @Rossweisse’s comment about “uneducated” in that context. Given that grammar is taught here—at least in the experience of many of us—writing that breaks some basic rules very well may be seen as uneducated. It’s not a matter of snobbery, any more than it would be a matter of snobbery to expect someone who’d been through school to know basic rules and functions of math.
Grammar is not mathematics. If you are taught that these are rules that you use to show you are not uneducated, then that's a fatal flaw in your education system, not an indication that you are right in claiming that a specific style of writing represents "correct" grammar.
None of that is what I said, nor have I actually made that claim.
Like it or not, the education system you describe above is creating grammar snobs.
Like it or not, it’s clear you don’t have a clue what you’re talking regarding with our educational systems. They have many problems. Creating grammar snobs generally isn’t one of them.
Oh right, so the person above insisting that they are right even though others, including people with multiple degrees (I have three) and people who are professional writers, keep saying that the grammar rule isn't relevant to them is a snob for reasons other than your education system that you say teaches the notion of a "standard English".
American grammar snobs are not created by the American educational system. If you think otherwise you must have a very high opinion of our educational system, which is kind, but unsubstantiated by the conditions on the ground.
I think all educational systems teach something that’s of the mold “standard language L” as that’s probably the only way to teach language to youngins.
In other words, we’re all starting with assumptions, but they’re not shared assumptions, and that may be effecting how we’re interpreting what’s being said.
Yeah and the main assumption being thrown around here is that North American grammar represents correct Standard English.
Can you seriously not hear how that sounds to anyone else?
American grammar snobs are not created by the American educational system. If you think otherwise you must have a very high opinion of our educational system, which is kind, but unsubstantiated by the conditions on the ground.
I think all educational systems teach something that’s of the mold “standard language L” as that’s probably the only way to teach language to youngins.
I don't have a particular affection for our education system, but I have yet to meet anyone who went to a state school who believes that there is a single correct way to use English.
Some clearly only speak and read one form. Others who have had more exposure to different forms are proficient in more than one
What possible value is there in thinking that "Me and Thomas" is bad English whereas "Thomas and me" or "Thomas and I" is good?
I have never met anyone who would stop for a single second to think about it, unless they were trying to write for a specific audience where that was not the norm.
American grammar snobs are not created by the American educational system. If you think otherwise you must have a very high opinion of our educational system, which is kind, but unsubstantiated by the conditions on the ground.
I think all educational systems teach something that’s of the mold “standard language L” as that’s probably the only way to teach language to youngins.
That's probably true. Presumably, snobbery stems from attitudes and values in society at large, or certain sections. But this can be refracted into schools, so my school definitely did this, and told kids with regional accents/dialects that they were substandard. Mind you, this was 50 years ago, so hopefully things have changed. I couldn't comment on US schools.
I really only remember being taught academic English. A strange beast, unwieldy and lacking elegance, and never being presented as the gold standard of English (except in philosophy courses because they’re annoying.) I had a linguistics professor who said that normally developing children are completely fluent in their native languages with complete command of the grammar by age 7, and that after this they’re just taught style.
To reiterate: . . . I was never taught the 'rules of grammar'.
Horse hockey. You learned to speak, didn't you? Further, you learned this vital skillset long before you ever set foot in any school. How did you learn this? By copying the speech practices of your discourse community (likely your immediate family & friends). Those speech practices, however regarded by other discourse communities, maintained consistent internal practices and patterns (=their operational rules or grammar or usage). It's the consistency over time which makes these patterns and practices mutually intelligible among the speakers in the discourse community. You were taught, on the fly and willy-nilly, maybe, but taught nevertheless, the rules of grammar which apply to the language used by your discourse community.
I probably guessed what many of them were due to reading literally everything I could get my hands on from a very early age.
Learning to read introduces most of us to a new, possibly different, discourse community. More accurately, it may introduce us to several, or even many, such communities, and the more widely we read, the more exposure and variety we absorb. Some learners will accept and embrace all this variety; other learners will reject it.
What this sometimes boils down to is this: to what extent are an individual's speech patterns tied in to his/her identity? I've had students who regard grammar instruction as a kind of invasive "takeover" of their cultural being. Though they might not be able to articulate this, speaking / writing according to the "rules" of a different discourse community feels (choose one) like they're being inauthentic, untrue to themselves, or "acting" like someone they're not; or it feels like a kind of betrayal of their "tribe" -- the current discourse community of friends, or the family in which they grew up, or the class they perceive themselves as belonging to. This is why I always present the rules required in academic contexts as a sort of "new dialect" to add to their existing skills and NOT as a replacement for their existing skills.
So I’d read @Rossweisse’s comment about “uneducated” in that context. Given that grammar is taught here—at least in the experience of many of us—writing that breaks some basic rules very well may be seen as uneducated. It’s not a matter of snobbery, any more than it would be a matter of snobbery to expect someone who’d been through school to know basic rules and functions of math.
Grammar is not mathematics. If you are taught that these are rules that you use to show you are not uneducated, then that's a fatal flaw in your education system, not an indication that you are right in claiming that a specific style of writing represents "correct" grammar.
None of that is what I said, nor have I actually made that claim.
Like it or not, the education system you describe above is creating grammar snobs.
Like it or not, it’s clear you don’t have a clue what you’re talking regarding with our educational systems. They have many problems. Creating grammar snobs generally isn’t one of them.
Oh right, so the person above insisting that they are right even though others, including people with multiple degrees (I have three) and people who are professional writers, keep saying that the grammar rule isn't relevant to them is a snob for reasons other than your education system that you say teaches the notion of a "standard English".
Right, gotcha.
No. I’m saying that your three degrees notwithstanding, your responses are informed as much if not more on your (sometimes faulty) assumptions as anything else. And in the process, your own biases are showing.
In other words, we’re all starting with assumptions, but they’re not shared assumptions, and that may be effecting how we’re interpreting what’s being said.
Yeah and the main assumption being thrown around here is that North American grammar represents correct Standard English.
Not quite. The main assumption that seems to underlie some posts here is that what is considered standard for written English in the US, particularly when it comes to compound nouns that include pronouns, is identical to what is considered standard elsewhere in the Anglosphere. It may be a fine distinction, but I’m sure that with your three degrees you can parse it. It’s not an assumption that we’re right and others are wrong. It’s the assumption that the rules and expectations here are the same as the rules and expectations elsewhere, that we do things the way everyone does. It’s a faulty assumption, I would say (and this thread demonstrates it to be so), but also a fairly common one with regard to all kinds of things, not just language.
What possible value is there in thinking that "Me and Thomas" is bad English whereas "Thomas and me" or "Thomas and I" is good?
I have never met anyone who would stop for a single second to think about it, unless they were trying to write for a specific audience where that was not the norm.
And here, it seems to me, you’re doing precisely what you excoriate others for doing. You’re presenting what you’re used to as the norm, from which it is pointless at best and snobbery at worst to deviate. Your experience is now the rule to measure others by.
I don't believe there is any such thing as "correct English" and I've said that multiple times now. I have also said that people tend to learn to change the way they express themselves to suit different audiences.
How you get from that idea that I'm somehow presenting a "norm" (other than somehow presenting a "multiple variations of English are the norm" norm) is beyond my understanding.
I'm not ruling anything. I'm perfectly happy to accept that there is an academic norm that students need to learn in order to be accepted in that culture.
But that's not "correct English". How hard is this really to understand?
And I'm quite happy to not discuss my university education and employment history. I only noted it because someone else kept claiming that their job means that we should all accept what they say about a minor grammatical point. And a more major philosophical point about the existence of "correct English".
How you get from that idea that I'm somehow presenting a "norm" (other than somehow presenting a "multiple variations of English are the norm" norm) is beyond my understanding.
I get that idea from comments like
What possible value is there in thinking that "Me and Thomas" is bad English whereas "Thomas and me" or "Thomas and I" is good?
This suggests the idea that it is pointless to employ such a rule.
And this:
I have never met anyone who would stop for a single second to think about it, unless they were trying to write for a specific audience where that was not the norm.
suggests you are measuring things by your own experience.
Have you read this thread? We have other commentators, including a published author and someone who says he actually is interested in linguistics, who say that this particular grammatical point is not relevant.
So how is this suddenly about usage that I'm dictating? In fact the reverse. Someone else is trying to tell me how English should be correctly used in books that I read.
In actual fact, I don't know what the correct version should be, what I know is the usage I perceive and I accept the things said above by a published author.
In all fairness, Ross is a professional critic and thus also a published author. So there’s one on each side.
Each side of what? One person in a different country is telling someone else that the line taken by his publisher on a grammatical point is wrong.
Unless the first person is actually the publisher in question, they are either calling the second a liar or that they are misguided about the instructions from the publisher.
It is acceptable grammar in novels published in British English. One can continue arguing and decrying everyone else's intelligence or one can simply accept that you are wrong.
Yes, I have. I wasn’t responding to everything that has been said by everyone else; I was just responding to what you said, and doing so in the context of underlying assumptions at play in this discussion.
But I may not bother responding to any of your posts going forward, or maybe even reading them. The sputtering outrage is wearing thin.
Yes, I have. I wasn’t responding to everything that has been said by everyone else; I was just responding to what you said, and doing so in the context of underlying assumptions at play in this discussion.
But I may not bother responding to any of your posts going forward, or maybe even reading them. The sputtering outrage is wearing thin.
In all fairness, Ross is a professional critic and thus also a published author. So there’s one on each side.
Each side of what? One person in a different country is telling someone else that the line taken by his publisher on a grammatical point is wrong.
Unless the first person is actually the publisher in question, they are either calling the second a liar or that they are misguided about the instructions from the publisher.
It is acceptable grammar in novels published in British English. One can continue arguing and decrying everyone else's intelligence or one can simply accept that you are wrong.
That’s a rather lot of vitriol for pointing out that both Ross and Doc Tor are published authors. One says one usage, the other says a different usage; those are the sides I was referring to.
I also don’t know what I’m wrong about as I didn’t suggest anything and had been inclined to see things your way. However, I agree with Nick. Your frothing outrage is really offputting.
In all fairness, Ross is a professional critic and thus also a published author. So there’s one on each side.
Each side of what? One person in a different country is telling someone else that the line taken by his publisher on a grammatical point is wrong.
Unless the first person is actually the publisher in question, they are either calling the second a liar or that they are misguided about the instructions from the publisher.
It is acceptable grammar in novels published in British English. One can continue arguing and decrying everyone else's intelligence or one can simply accept that you are wrong.
:rolleyes: Yes, and I have said all along that dialogue in fiction doesn't have to follow accepted rules. Please learn to read for comprehension, should such a concept not be offensive to people in your country.
To reiterate: . . . I was never taught the 'rules of grammar'.
Horse hockey. You learned to speak, didn't you?
*bzzzz* Pedant alert!
I'm absolutely certain that you knew exactly what I meant - that I was never formally taught grammar at school - and you've deliberately twisted that to make out that I'm either stupid or lying.
So, slow golf clap for you. Upthread someone quoted a linguistics professor who baldly stated that native speakers know all the grammar they need by the time they're seven. I'm with them. No point at all in examining it. Just let us use it to communicate.
To reiterate: . . . I was never taught the 'rules of grammar'.
Horse hockey. You learned to speak, didn't you?
*bzzzz* Pedant alert!
I'm absolutely certain that you knew exactly what I meant - that I was never formally taught grammar at school - and you've deliberately twisted that to make out that I'm either stupid or lying.
So, slow golf clap for you. Upthread someone quoted a linguistics professor who baldly stated that native speakers know all the grammar they need by the time they're seven. I'm with them. No point at all in examining it. Just let us use it to communicate.
On the contrary. I am making three points:
1. Neither teaching nor learning is confined to school. Nearly all the most crucially important skills learned by humans are learned before and outside of school. Language is one of these. Yes, I know what you meant. But you DID learn, it appears, several sets of "rules." The fact Mr Fudgefield or Sister Mary Joseph was not among your instructors in these matters is irrelevant.
2. All this perfluffle over "what is correct" is entirely dependent on context and audience. If, among the folks you interact with, "me and Tom" is accepted usage and "Tom and I" is not -- and those are the folks you want to engage with -- go with "me and Tom." If you write characters in novels who talk this way, proofreaders will not correct this usage, because it ISN"T WRONG in that context.
If you and a colleague send a write-up of some study or experiment to an academic journal in which you claim, "Me and Dr. Jones wish to draw attention to . . ." some editor or proofreader will likely either change this or request that the principle author do so.
3. Academic usage -- what we learn (or don't) in school is only one context, one discourse
community (which, like the others, has its own "rules"). Because you were an early and voracious and receptive reader, you learned, absorbed, were taught, what you needed to know to write your works. You plainly have at your disposal the tools to communicate effectively in multiple discourse communities.
You seem determined to deny that you have this capacity; I can't imagine why.
I don't recall being taught many grammar rules either. Though I'm sure at school my spoken and written English would've been corrected.
'I seen him do it,' would not have been allowed on a page or in a conversation with teachers. 'He done it', ditto. 'I was sat on the floor' or 'she was stood on the box' would've got the red pencil, along with, 'me and him'. But I don't remember ever being taught these things, specifically, as lessons, though it's possible it came under general blackboard teaching. Even punctuation was a bit of a mystery. I do remember learning the difference between an adjective, a verb and a noun. But still don't understand the fuss over a split infinitive, and I know that my sermonising - in grammatic terms - must cause great pain to the teachers in the congregation, and those raised on observing the rules!
I do remember my father checking out a letter I was writing one day, and telling me that 'yous' was not the plural of you. And I was twelve at the time. In dialect, it was totally acceptable in casual conversation. But I must have never have had to write it down, applied in that way before!
You folks are lucky, if you never had to sit through hours of endless explicit standard English grammar instruction. It's par for the course in the U.S. Which is why I was bored to tears in school--I learned that stuff through massive amounts of reading, and after filling out the worksheet (3 minutes tops), there was nothing to do but mess around.
Someone (forgive me for not remembering who!) is correct in saying that this is probably the origin of the "correct/incorrect" shorthand used by people discussing American English usage. We all had basically the same lessons across the country, although for some of us it involved learning a new paradigm to add to the one we used at home. Code switching is a real thing, and an okay thing, and all depends on knowing one's audience.
But within the realm of standard American English usage there is indeed a "correct" and "incorrect," because this is a sort of lingua franca used mainly in writing, especially academic, scientific, professional, and so forth. It is possible to get something "wrong" if you are using a local usage when you ought to be using the standard expression (given the constraints of your writing situation). It would be like me using an SQL coding expression in the midst of a bunch of C# coding. If it's not a quotation or inset, the computer (= reader) is going to stumble over it.
There are also those folks in any discourse community and any setting who think faster than they write, and accidentally produce text that is not "correct" for any paradigm. I used to see them all the time in remedial English classes. Half a sentence would have vanished into the ether, leaving only its sandals behind--and a very confused reader. My goal was to get these people to slow their roll enough to get the whole thing down.
By the way, on sentence diagramming (which I learned in 9th grade, with the mysterious encouragement: "It will be good for you some day":) --I did in fact find the perfect use for it, which was helping a classful of preseminary guys dissect their koine Greek exercises and figure out where the subject and verb were, and etc. They were awed and amazed. I had to laugh. It made me feel like a wizard, and brought life back to the old connection between grammar and Grammarye.
LC and Ohher express positions closest to my own. No dialect is wrong or bad English, but if you want to get along in a certain sphere, say the sphere of US business, academia, or government, then you will need to be able to speak the dialect that sphere uses. Hence, code switching, as Ohher alludes to and LC names outright. Teaching "standard" English (or whatever you want to call it) gives people a new tool to use. It doesn't force them to stop talking any certain way in other contexts. I was fortunate in the sense that my family/class dialect growing up is very close to business standard. But I certainly don't talk the same way with my mom as I did when I was at the University. I understand that for people whose dialect is more different from business standard, it may seem unfair to have to learn a dialect further from their own than I do. But that, it seems, while maybe a good point, is about the way the world should be, whereas giving people tools is about the way the world is. I'm willing to be corrected on that.
Also, Blahblah, cool your jets. You're embarrassing yourself.
To repeat. Formal grammar pedants can shake their walking sticks as much as they want. I'm a kid of 53 and I'm not getting off thoeir lawn, just because.
(Eta - I have several scientific papers to my name. No one taught me 'academic English' either. What the hell is that even?)
To repeat. Formal grammar pedants can shake their walking sticks as much as they want. I'm a kid of 53 and I'm not getting off thoeir lawn, just because.
(Eta - I have several scientific papers to my name. No one taught me 'academic English' either. What the hell is that even?)
This post doesn't say anything. Do you have a point or position you wish to advance or defend?
Oh, mt. You have yet again mistaken Hell for Purgatory. You also mistake Purgatory for Hell, so there's that.
Oh, it was just mindless vehemence. I'm sorry, other people were making logical points and discussing content. How foolish of me to think you were also.
Much as I prefer to say Jill and I went to coffee together, that's now very uncommon. Me and Jill is common and even more so, at least here, is Jill and me went. They have become the normal usage (sorry Rossweisse). On the basis that in language normally accepted usage determines what's right and wrong I'd say that either is correct. What is unaccepted is I and Jill went to coffee and I'd say that was wrong.
It's curious that "I and John" constructions are unacceptable, whereas "Me and John" is OK in both subject and object position. I suspect Karl is right, and we have the marked/unmarked variation at work, and "me" is unmarked (default).. Hence, on the phone we say, "it's me", not "it's I". Also, "it was me who let the dog out". You can say, "it was I who ...", but it sounds old-fashioned to me.
In the late 90s I taught at an all boys school. I always insisted on inclusive language in writing, especially course work, which led to arguments. Many arguments. Some of those lads now have academic careers. I hope they are grateful.
It's curious that "I and John" constructions are unacceptable, whereas "Me and John" is OK in both subject and object position. I suspect Karl is right, and we have the marked/unmarked variation at work, and "me" is unmarked (default).. Hence, on the phone we say, "it's me", not "it's I". Also, "it was me who let the dog out". You can say, "it was I who ...", but it sounds old-fashioned to me.
Like most other things on this thread, it is curious - but in this case that matches both my thinking and general usage.
To repeat. Formal grammar pedants can shake their walking sticks as much as they want. I'm a kid of 53 and I'm not getting off their lawn, just because.
Way up thread you said you had "gifted" someone with season tickets instead of, "given" them the tickets and for that I would like to run you off my lawn with a sawed off shot gun.
Oh, yes indeed, alas, ye may chance to discover all sorts of words bespoken thousands of years ago, that doesn't mean it was common use when I grew up in the 1950's to hear kids say Santa that gifted them with lots of toys. My husband didn't gift me with an engagement ring in the 1980's and I didn't gift my friend with a gift this Christmas. I fucking gave her one.
Oh, yes indeed, alas, ye may chance to discover all sorts of words bespoken thousands of years ago, that doesn't mean it was common use when I grew up in the 1950's to hear kids say Santa that gifted them with lots of toys. My husband didn't gift me with an engagement ring in the 1980's and I didn't gift my friend with a gift this Christmas. I fucking gave her one.
But gift has a different range of senses from give. Thus, she gave me a parking ticket, or a warning, or a kick in the goolies.
Yes, it does. But for whatever reason, “gift” as a verb appears to have been rarely used in the US until very recently (at least in my experience and the experience of others I’ve heard comment on it), when all of a sudden such usage could be seen or heard all over the place. So under those circumstances, it not only sounds like a new usage, but it sounds a lot like business-speak or something akin to it. Despite the long-precedent of “gift” as a verb elsewhere, here it sounds like the verbing Calvin liked.
English is supposed to be doubleplus good, because it has a large vocabulary, with many related words. Thus, for give, grant, vouchsafe, present, accord, gift, ply, heap, dole, award, allot, etc. Of course, they have different shades of meaning.
It seems there was yet another mandatory course I missed out on. Also, both children went to university in the UK within the last 3 years. Neither child was taught Academic English. In fact, I don't know of anyone in my children's cohort who've done one. So, given that, why?
It seems there was yet another mandatory course I missed out on. Also, both children went to university in the UK within the last 3 years. Neither child was taught Academic English. In fact, I don't know of anyone in my children's cohort who've done one. So, given that, why?
Hey, I can only try to help by linking to the article. I can’t tell you more—I wasn’t specifically trained in it. My undergrad degree is in music, and after that I dealt with legal writing, not academic. I can only say that my impression is that in post-grad academic work in the US, consistency of style in writing seems to be Highly Valued.
Comments
Oh right, so the person above insisting that they are right even though others, including people with multiple degrees (I have three) and people who are professional writers, keep saying that the grammar rule isn't relevant to them is a snob for reasons other than your education system that you say teaches the notion of a "standard English".
Right, gotcha.
I think all educational systems teach something that’s of the mold “standard language L” as that’s probably the only way to teach language to youngins.
Yeah and the main assumption being thrown around here is that North American grammar represents correct Standard English.
Can you seriously not hear how that sounds to anyone else?
I don't have a particular affection for our education system, but I have yet to meet anyone who went to a state school who believes that there is a single correct way to use English.
Some clearly only speak and read one form. Others who have had more exposure to different forms are proficient in more than one
What possible value is there in thinking that "Me and Thomas" is bad English whereas "Thomas and me" or "Thomas and I" is good?
I have never met anyone who would stop for a single second to think about it, unless they were trying to write for a specific audience where that was not the norm.
That's probably true. Presumably, snobbery stems from attitudes and values in society at large, or certain sections. But this can be refracted into schools, so my school definitely did this, and told kids with regional accents/dialects that they were substandard. Mind you, this was 50 years ago, so hopefully things have changed. I couldn't comment on US schools.
Horse hockey. You learned to speak, didn't you? Further, you learned this vital skillset long before you ever set foot in any school. How did you learn this? By copying the speech practices of your discourse community (likely your immediate family & friends). Those speech practices, however regarded by other discourse communities, maintained consistent internal practices and patterns (=their operational rules or grammar or usage). It's the consistency over time which makes these patterns and practices mutually intelligible among the speakers in the discourse community. You were taught, on the fly and willy-nilly, maybe, but taught nevertheless, the rules of grammar which apply to the language used by your discourse community.
Learning to read introduces most of us to a new, possibly different, discourse community. More accurately, it may introduce us to several, or even many, such communities, and the more widely we read, the more exposure and variety we absorb. Some learners will accept and embrace all this variety; other learners will reject it.
What this sometimes boils down to is this: to what extent are an individual's speech patterns tied in to his/her identity? I've had students who regard grammar instruction as a kind of invasive "takeover" of their cultural being. Though they might not be able to articulate this, speaking / writing according to the "rules" of a different discourse community feels (choose one) like they're being inauthentic, untrue to themselves, or "acting" like someone they're not; or it feels like a kind of betrayal of their "tribe" -- the current discourse community of friends, or the family in which they grew up, or the class they perceive themselves as belonging to. This is why I always present the rules required in academic contexts as a sort of "new dialect" to add to their existing skills and NOT as a replacement for their existing skills.
Not quite. The main assumption that seems to underlie some posts here is that what is considered standard for written English in the US, particularly when it comes to compound nouns that include pronouns, is identical to what is considered standard elsewhere in the Anglosphere. It may be a fine distinction, but I’m sure that with your three degrees you can parse it. It’s not an assumption that we’re right and others are wrong. It’s the assumption that the rules and expectations here are the same as the rules and expectations elsewhere, that we do things the way everyone does. It’s a faulty assumption, I would say (and this thread demonstrates it to be so), but also a fairly common one with regard to all kinds of things, not just language.
And here, it seems to me, you’re doing precisely what you excoriate others for doing. You’re presenting what you’re used to as the norm, from which it is pointless at best and snobbery at worst to deviate. Your experience is now the rule to measure others by.
Bless your heart.
I don't believe there is any such thing as "correct English" and I've said that multiple times now. I have also said that people tend to learn to change the way they express themselves to suit different audiences.
How you get from that idea that I'm somehow presenting a "norm" (other than somehow presenting a "multiple variations of English are the norm" norm) is beyond my understanding.
I'm not ruling anything. I'm perfectly happy to accept that there is an academic norm that students need to learn in order to be accepted in that culture.
But that's not "correct English". How hard is this really to understand?
And this: suggests you are measuring things by your own experience.
If that’s not the case, then fine.
So how is this suddenly about usage that I'm dictating? In fact the reverse. Someone else is trying to tell me how English should be correctly used in books that I read.
In actual fact, I don't know what the correct version should be, what I know is the usage I perceive and I accept the things said above by a published author.
I don't understand why you don't.
Each side of what? One person in a different country is telling someone else that the line taken by his publisher on a grammatical point is wrong.
Unless the first person is actually the publisher in question, they are either calling the second a liar or that they are misguided about the instructions from the publisher.
It is acceptable grammar in novels published in British English. One can continue arguing and decrying everyone else's intelligence or one can simply accept that you are wrong.
But I may not bother responding to any of your posts going forward, or maybe even reading them. The sputtering outrage is wearing thin.
Rightiho then. Off you toddle.
That’s a rather lot of vitriol for pointing out that both Ross and Doc Tor are published authors. One says one usage, the other says a different usage; those are the sides I was referring to.
I also don’t know what I’m wrong about as I didn’t suggest anything and had been inclined to see things your way. However, I agree with Nick. Your frothing outrage is really offputting.
:rolleyes: Yes, and I have said all along that dialogue in fiction doesn't have to follow accepted rules. Please learn to read for comprehension, should such a concept not be offensive to people in your country.
*bzzzz* Pedant alert!
I'm absolutely certain that you knew exactly what I meant - that I was never formally taught grammar at school - and you've deliberately twisted that to make out that I'm either stupid or lying.
So, slow golf clap for you. Upthread someone quoted a linguistics professor who baldly stated that native speakers know all the grammar they need by the time they're seven. I'm with them. No point at all in examining it. Just let us use it to communicate.
On the contrary. I am making three points:
1. Neither teaching nor learning is confined to school. Nearly all the most crucially important skills learned by humans are learned before and outside of school. Language is one of these. Yes, I know what you meant. But you DID learn, it appears, several sets of "rules." The fact Mr Fudgefield or Sister Mary Joseph was not among your instructors in these matters is irrelevant.
2. All this perfluffle over "what is correct" is entirely dependent on context and audience. If, among the folks you interact with, "me and Tom" is accepted usage and "Tom and I" is not -- and those are the folks you want to engage with -- go with "me and Tom." If you write characters in novels who talk this way, proofreaders will not correct this usage, because it ISN"T WRONG in that context.
If you and a colleague send a write-up of some study or experiment to an academic journal in which you claim, "Me and Dr. Jones wish to draw attention to . . ." some editor or proofreader will likely either change this or request that the principle author do so.
3. Academic usage -- what we learn (or don't) in school is only one context, one discourse
community (which, like the others, has its own "rules"). Because you were an early and voracious and receptive reader, you learned, absorbed, were taught, what you needed to know to write your works. You plainly have at your disposal the tools to communicate effectively in multiple discourse communities.
You seem determined to deny that you have this capacity; I can't imagine why.
'I seen him do it,' would not have been allowed on a page or in a conversation with teachers. 'He done it', ditto. 'I was sat on the floor' or 'she was stood on the box' would've got the red pencil, along with, 'me and him'. But I don't remember ever being taught these things, specifically, as lessons, though it's possible it came under general blackboard teaching. Even punctuation was a bit of a mystery. I do remember learning the difference between an adjective, a verb and a noun. But still don't understand the fuss over a split infinitive, and I know that my sermonising - in grammatic terms - must cause great pain to the teachers in the congregation, and those raised on observing the rules!
I do remember my father checking out a letter I was writing one day, and telling me that 'yous' was not the plural of you. And I was twelve at the time. In dialect, it was totally acceptable in casual conversation. But I must have never have had to write it down, applied in that way before!
Someone (forgive me for not remembering who!) is correct in saying that this is probably the origin of the "correct/incorrect" shorthand used by people discussing American English usage. We all had basically the same lessons across the country, although for some of us it involved learning a new paradigm to add to the one we used at home. Code switching is a real thing, and an okay thing, and all depends on knowing one's audience.
But within the realm of standard American English usage there is indeed a "correct" and "incorrect," because this is a sort of lingua franca used mainly in writing, especially academic, scientific, professional, and so forth. It is possible to get something "wrong" if you are using a local usage when you ought to be using the standard expression (given the constraints of your writing situation). It would be like me using an SQL coding expression in the midst of a bunch of C# coding. If it's not a quotation or inset, the computer (= reader) is going to stumble over it.
There are also those folks in any discourse community and any setting who think faster than they write, and accidentally produce text that is not "correct" for any paradigm. I used to see them all the time in remedial English classes. Half a sentence would have vanished into the ether, leaving only its sandals behind--and a very confused reader. My goal was to get these people to slow their roll enough to get the whole thing down.
By the way, on sentence diagramming (which I learned in 9th grade, with the mysterious encouragement: "It will be good for you some day":) --I did in fact find the perfect use for it, which was helping a classful of preseminary guys dissect their koine Greek exercises and figure out where the subject and verb were, and etc. They were awed and amazed. I had to laugh. It made me feel like a wizard, and brought life back to the old connection between grammar and Grammarye.
Also, Blahblah, cool your jets. You're embarrassing yourself.
(Eta - I have several scientific papers to my name. No one taught me 'academic English' either. What the hell is that even?)
This post doesn't say anything. Do you have a point or position you wish to advance or defend?
Oh, it was just mindless vehemence. I'm sorry, other people were making logical points and discussing content. How foolish of me to think you were also.
Like most other things on this thread, it is curious - but in this case that matches both my thinking and general usage.
I would say, "I let the dog out." Simple, understandable and concise,
Way up thread you said you had "gifted" someone with season tickets instead of, "given" them the tickets and for that I would like to run you off my lawn with a sawed off shot gun.
Arf arf ksnip ksnip
Yes, it does. But for whatever reason, “gift” as a verb appears to have been rarely used in the US until very recently (at least in my experience and the experience of others I’ve heard comment on it), when all of a sudden such usage could be seen or heard all over the place. So under those circumstances, it not only sounds like a new usage, but it sounds a lot like business-speak or something akin to it. Despite the long-precedent of “gift” as a verb elsewhere, here it sounds like the verbing Calvin liked.
The wife and me prefer who.
It seems there was yet another mandatory course I missed out on. Also, both children went to university in the UK within the last 3 years. Neither child was taught Academic English. In fact, I don't know of anyone in my children's cohort who've done one. So, given that, why?