Why Grammar Matters: A Place To Discuss Matters Of Grammar

[RubyWoo72]

They have a tough road to hoe.

Oh man. Have I been saying this phrase incorrectly? I always thought it was a "tough ROW to hoe," as in when someone's trying to plant rows of corn or something, and there's a patch of bad soil that makes it hard as hell to use a hoe.

Or does it mean that Working Girls picked a particularly crowded/ desolate stretch of road on which to ply their trade?

I's confused. Lol!

Edited July 28, 2014 by RubyWoo72

[Bort]

Yeah, I don't mind the things that seem to be a language evolution but then there are the things that a lot of people do that are just plain wrong. Case in point: could of. OMG, I feel like I see red when I see the word "of" used as a verb. Drives. Me. CRAZY.

[RubyWoo72]

Maybe this one's more of a diction issue, rather than grammar, but I often hear young women on tv say "dinnint" instead of "didn't" and it drives me crazy. Same with the pronunciation (not proNOUNciation) of the word "couldn't".

[Ohwell]

Here's another one:  Using "then" rather than "than." 

 

 

Edited July 28, 2014 by Ohwell

[ABay]

What bothers me about could of, should of, would of, and for all intensive purposes is that they imply, to me, the users have never read a damn book in their blighted lives. They seem like mistakes made by people who have only heard the phrases and never read them.

[Lnmop]

I realize I might be alone in this in this thread but language changes, grammar rules change and there is nothing we can do about it. Once a language doesn't change anymore, it's dead.

But it does change, as evidenced by new words being added to the dictionary every year. Technological advances alone have resulted in a new vocabulary. That's different than bastardizing the English language.

[DittyDotDot]

Oh man. Have I been saying this phrase incorrectly? I always thought it was a "tough ROW to hoe," as in when someone's trying to plant rows of corn or something, and there's a patch of bad soil that makes it hard as hell to use a hoe.

Or does it mean that Working Girls picked a particularly crowded/ desolate stretch of road on which to ply their trade?

I's confused. Lol!

 

No, you're right, it should be "tough row to hoe". Some people misrepresent it as road, which makes me giggle.

[RubyWoo72]

Because if they were laying, there'd be eggs there when they got up.

Quite possible, if you've ever seen Monsters inside Me. But eggs on this show usually writhe instead of hatch.

And @Sandman87, I just realized that that portion of your post was meant to be tongue and cheek--just kidding--tongue-in-cheek and you did, in fact, know the correct idiom. I got scared for a minute and thought I'd been making the same mistake for all these years :)

[fastiller]

No, you're right, it should be "tough row to hoe". Some people misrepresent it as road, which makes me giggle.

What about a 'tough roe to hoe?' - fish eggs that are difficult to move around?

[RubyWoo72]

What about a 'tough roe to hoe?' - fish eggs that are difficult to move around?

Or a "tough road o' ho"--maybe an unpaved portion of a Red Light district?

[DittyDotDot]

What about a 'tough roe to hoe?' - fish eggs that are difficult to move around?

 

And...

 

Or a "tough road o' ho"--maybe an unpaved portion of a Red Light district?

 

Now I'm really giggling!

[Bort]

What bothers me about could of, should of, would of, and for all intensive purposes is that they imply, to me, the users have never read a damn book in their blighted lives. They seem like mistakes made by people who have only heard the phrases and never read them.

Or they just flat out didn't listen in English class. I remember being taught this in 11th grade -- quite specifically, because I was totally sitting there with my jaw hanging open when the teacher started in on it because it had never, NEVER occurred to me to use "of" as a verb and I couldn't believe we were having a lesson on it. How naïve I was.

[RubyWoo72]

How about this one: I'm watching something right now with closed-captioning and someone said, "What about THE PERSON who didn't bring a date with THEM?" I hear that type of blunder all the time.

[Aquarius]

One thing that bugs me is "it bugs."  It's becoming very common now.

[candall]

Miss Henry is smiling now. : )

I'm going to go out on a limb here and speculate that Miss Henry would share my dismay that children will no longer be taught cursive writing. 

 

How will they write their thank you notes?

[Bort]

Email.

I don't bemoan the death of cursive writing. I haven't used it since sometime in junior high when they stopped making me write it. I don't use it. Ever. I don't even remember how.

[AimingforYoko]

I've said it before, but Susanna Thompson gave the best TV grammar lesson not part of Schoolhouse Rock, as Queen Rose on Kings:

"Clothes are hung, Valets are hanged."

[Sandman87]

I realize I might be alone in this in this thread but language changes, grammar rules change and there is nothing we can do about it. Once a language doesn't change anymore, it's dead.

You have successfully proven to me that living languages are inferior to dead languages.

 

 

I'm going to go out on a limb here and speculate that Miss Henry would share my dismay that children will no longer be taught cursive writing.

Maybe I'm too demanding, but I don't think children should be allowed to curse, not even in writing.

 

...including tests on those suspect rods and bolts, which have clocked in at $20 million - and counting.

Clocked in at $20 million? Oh, the pain...the pain...

[Ohwell]

I'm going to go out on a limb here and speculate that Miss Henry would share my dismay that children will no longer be taught cursive writing.

 

How will they write their thank you notes?

She would not be amused.  

 

Unfortunately, kids will just send texts as thank you notes.  Oh well, I guess I'm supposed to be grateful that they send the notes at all. 

 

I'm still proud of my handwriting though and I usually write something, jot down notes, at least once a day, even if it's just for the hell of it.     

[Lnmop]

I'm going to go out on a limb here and speculate that Miss Henry would share my dismay that children will no longer be taught cursive writing.

How will they write their thank you notes?

ARRRRGH! How will they have a signature!?!?!? Losing the ability to write cursive is a sign of the laziness, the downfall of our society. I have sworn to teach my grandchildren to write in cursive.

[Bort]

ARRRRGH! How will they have a signature!?!?!? Losing the ability to write cursive is a sign of the laziness, the downfall of our society. I have sworn to teach my grandchildren to write in cursive.

They'll have an organized scribble just like everybody else does.

[DittyDotDot]

How will they write their thank you notes?

 

My grandmother would have loved you!  Me, on the other hand, she just wanted to slap upside the head.

[Kromm]

I realize I might be alone in this in this thread 

Upthread:

 

The ones that don't bug me much are the ones where common usage has so overwhelmingly changed, for so long, that it seems peevish to be the lone hold out.  Fewer vs. less is a pretty good example.  It's not like one word means the opposite of the other (like "literally" vs. "figuratively").  They mean the same thing, and it's just a matter of accepted usage which is correct.  And that kind of thing DOES change over time.

There are a few likes on the post, so that leads me to think there are a few of us who's thoughts parallel yours.

 

 

 

but language changes, grammar rules change and there is nothing we can do about it. Once a language doesn't change anymore, it's dead. If English hadn't changed or any of the other Indo-European languages, we would all be speaking Indo-European.

I don't mind people having pet peeves, but as long as a language is in use, the rules will change.

A language is a precise as a speaker. If one criticizes the use, you are criticizing the speaker. A lot social discrimination is based on the perception that a certain use is "worse" than another and thus the person is. Such as African American English. Or Newfoundland English in Canada. Or Swabian in Germany. Trust me, this idea that language deteriorates is as old as human kind. It really doesn't.

English has been losing its subject-verb agreement since the days of Old English. It's just something that continues. In comparison to many languages, it's already very restricted. Trust me, languages work well without it (Mandarin) or with very elaborate systems (Inuktitut or Russian).

Related verb conjugation even more so.

The social discrimination aspect is undeniably true (although to be dead honest every time I hear the pronunciation "axe" for "ask" I can't help but wince anyway).  

 

For me this all comes down to practicality.  Returning to "few or less", you'd figuratively (see what I did there?) be fighting most of society to insist on correcting this use.  It's an impractical struggle.  Whereas something like "numberspeak" is a completely reasonable thing to fight.  "H8tr" and all of it's similar uses deserve to die a painful death.  Their excuse for existence lies in texting and now twitter character limits.  Those are transitory things at best (even if they've been around now for a few decades in total between the two).  

 

If we want to police grammar and pronunciation in a "training" stage of our lives, that's fair.  People should understand a baseline.  But life will get in the way eventually.  And that baseline will (and probably should) change a few times per century.  People should not be getting the same grammar lessons their grandparents did.

[Lnmop]

Not to be on anyone's case, but another peeve is "who's vs. whose".

[Kromm]

Not to be on anyone's case, but another peeve is "who's vs. whose".

Yeah, I've likely gotten that one wrong for decades.  Vaguely I seem to recall it now as "who has" vs. "who does this belong to" but I had to sit and think about it for about a minute.

That's a far more specific error than "few vs. less", I agree.  Apostrophe S is a fairly consistent rule.  It's just the "whose" part that I forgot about (frankly that the word even existed).

[Demented Daisy]

One that really annoys me is "how come" instead of "why"  -- it's not incorrect, per se, but it sounds terrible.  (That's another one, now that I think about it.  I hear people pronounce "per se" as "purse" all too frequently.)

[RubyWoo72]

@Kromm, I see I was too late. Lol.

[Demented Daisy]

re:  who's vs. whose

 

I remember because I love Whose Line is it Anyway? -- and I think of "who's" as "who is".

[Kromm]

@Kromm, I see I was too late. Lol.

Apostrophe S is one where I think it's consistently wrong, and I actually do get why people care, although there's a part of me that thinks that the very fact that the dilemma even exists is a sign of how messed up and illogical this language is in the first place.  With "who's"/"whose" at least it kind of has the rationale that they seem like totally different words.  "Its"/"It's" is both more and less forgivable at the same time in different ways.  It doesn't look at all like a different word, and yet it's also the one that people call out so often that everyone should know it by now.

 

I'd call out extra hard its' though.  No such word.  In fact, the whole practice of people putting apostrophes AFTER words for no discernible reason (besides legit cases, I mean) is something I've noticed has reached almost epic proportions.

re:  who's vs. whose

 

I remember because I love Whose Line is it Anyway? -- and I think of "who's" as "who is".

Yeah, it's one of those cases where I've heard the show name a million times, but for some reason never internalized the existence of that particular word to my own speech.  It's not a case of not having something in your vocabulary sometimes, it's a matter of habit I guess.

 

Oddly enough, "whom" is another word that probably applies to for a lot of us.  I'm sure we all know it, we just forget it even exists (or think it sounds pretentious sounding and shy away from it).

[Demented Daisy]

"Whom" makes me think of Keeping Up Appearances.

 

"The Bucket residence, the lady of the house speaking.  You are whom?  Actually, I think that should be who.  You are who?"

 

Unless I am absolutely certain it is correct, I do not use "whom".  

Edited July 29, 2014 by Demented Daisy

[Kromm]

"Whom" makes me think of Keeping Up Appearances.

 

"The Bucket residence, the lady of the house speaking.  You are whom?  Actually, I think that should be who.  You are who?"

 

Unless I am absolutely certain it is correct, I do not use "whom".  

I suppose "whomever" is totally out of the question then?

[Demented Daisy]

Not sure about that one.  I can't think of an occurrence when I would have used it.  Can you give an example?  All I can think of is something like, "Whomever this belongs to, please pick it up at the Lost and Found."  But I'm not entirely sure that's correct.

[Kromm]

Not sure about that one.  I can't think of an occurrence when I would have used it.  Can you give an example?  All I can think of is something like, "Whomever this belongs to, please pick it up at the Lost and Found."  But I'm not entirely sure that's correct.

Well the words "whoever" and "whomever" both exist.  

 

I found this very useful advice about it a minute ago...

 

[Demented Daisy]

Sound advice.

[Brandi Maxxxx]

I suppose "whomever" is totally out of the question then?

It's a made-up word used to trick students! (That's a line from The Office. I made the same reference back on TWoP and not everybody got it.)

[DittyDotDot]

@Kromm, or as we say here in the office...when in doubt, leave it out.

[Kromm]

"Whom" makes me think of Keeping Up Appearances.

 

"The Bucket residence, the lady of the house speaking.  You are whom?  Actually, I think that should be who.  You are who?"

I know the whole routine is a joke, but I wonder if the answer is that neither is correct.  Can't say I'm 100% on that though.  If that sentence is incorrect, it's for reasons beyond the mere choice between "who" and "whom".

 

Typically I think people would ask "Who is it?" or because it's telephone specific, if the intent is to take a message, "Who shall I say is calling" (and not "whom shall I say is calling"--which I know for sure is wrong).  Apparently the rule has something to do with if you can answer the question with "He/She" vs. "Him/Her" ("He is calling" would answer "Who" clearly, whereas "Him is calling" in answer to "Whom" just sounds silly).  Whereas if you answer the famous Hemingway phrase "for whom the bell tolls", you'd clearly answer "it tolls for him".

Edited July 29, 2014 by Kromm

[Demented Daisy]

I wonder if the answer is that neither is correct.

 

I have no idea.  It may be cultural, as well.  The Queen's English and all that.

 

Which reminds me -- I bug my mother every time I say, "if you would".  She insists that I should say "if you will", but it's a verbal tic I picked up while living in England.

 

ETA

 

Whereas if you answer the famous Hemingway phrase "for whom the bell tolls", you'd clearly answer "it tolls for him".

 

 

Well, that's what John Donne said.  ;-)

Edited July 29, 2014 by Demented Daisy

[Kromm]

Wasn't Donne's version of the phrase actually different from Hemingway's?  Dammit now I have to go into either dusty corners of my mind or look it up!

 

EDIT - Yeah, just looked it up. Hemingway rewrote "for whom this bell tolls".  I wonder if there was a rationale beyond making it his own.

Edited July 29, 2014 by Kromm

[ParadoxLost]

Haha, no worries. And I feel like I should clarify one point. I've never been big on adopting a 100% prescriptivist mindset, because that's how language stagnates and dies. Google tells me that about 3 out of 4 people prefer to use "fortay." At that rate, you could argue that "fortay" is indeed an acceptable variation of the word (although "fort" still isn't wrong). And I can buy that; to reiterate, it wouldn't be the first time we've bastardized French words in the English language, heh. It's just something about that particular word being "mispronounced" (put in scare quotes) that gets under my skin. I guess it's because the "fortay" pronunciation is another word on its own, i.e. the Italian musical term, and that's what my mind always jumps to whenever someone says it. (I know other homophones exist! I don't know why this bugs me so much!)

 

I remember learning in grammar school that "fortay" was the incorrect pronunciation; however, the correct pronunciation "fawrt" is so universally deemed as incorrect that I either avoid using the word or purposefully say it incorrectly.  I know, I'm contributing to the dumbing down of America. I apologize.

 

Is it a crime against grammar to speak in internet slang?  If it isn't, it should be.  That's my P O V.  You can't say point of view?  Sounding out lol is getting on my nerves as well.

 

Writing in a grammar thread is intimidating.  All my errors were intentional.

Edited July 29, 2014 by ParadoxLost

[Lnmop]

A panda walks into a diner. He orders a sandwich, consumes it, then pulls out a gun, fires twice into the ceiling and heads to the door. As he prepares to exit, the waitress asks him what that was about. He throws her a dictionary and says "look it up". She opens the dictionary to "panda" where it says "eats shoots and leaves".

THAT'S why punctuation is important.

[OSM Mom]

Can we do pronunciation peeves in this thread too?

[Bort]

A panda walks into a diner. He orders a sandwich, consumes it, then pulls out a gun, fires twice into the ceiling and heads to the door. As he prepares to exit, the waitress asks him what that was about. He throws her a dictionary and says "look it up". She opens the dictionary to "panda" where it says "eats shoots and leaves".

THAT'S why punctuation is important.

Reminds me of this:

Although this one cracks me up the most:

[Cobalt Stargazer]

I know the whole routine is a joke, but I wonder if the answer is that neither is correct.  Can't say I'm 100% on that though.  If that sentence is incorrect, it's for reasons beyond the mere choice between "who" and "whom".

This reminds me of Grease 2 (don't judge me) when Maxwell Caulfield's character corrects Michelle Pfeiffer's and says that its 'whom' and not 'who'. She says, 'To who, to whom. To you, that's whom."

[walnutqueen]

My hopes for an awesome reality show were dashed by the lack of an apostrophe.   I wasn't looking at the screen when Bravo ran promos for a show I THOUGHT was "Courtney Love's Dallas".  Imagine my bitter disappointment!  :-)

[Demented Daisy]

Wasn't Donne's version of the phrase actually different from Hemingway's?  Dammit now I have to go into either dusty corners of my mind or look it up!

 

 

Knee-jerk reaction on my part.  My British Lit teacher made us memorize part of Donne's Meditation XVII:

 

No man is an island, entire of itself; every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main. If a clod be washed away by the sea, Europe is the less, as well as if a promontory were, as well as if a manor of thy friend's or of thine own were: any man's death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind, and therefore never send to know for whom the bells tolls; it tolls for thee.

 

 

20 years later, the only part I remembered was "it tolls for thee" -- so I had to look it up, as well.  Sorry about that.

 

ETA  At the beginning of the Meditation, Donne does use the phrase "it tolls for him".

Edited July 29, 2014 by Demented Daisy

[The Crazed Spruce]

This thread has veered epically off-topic.  Try to steer it back towards television, or we're gonna have to move this thread to a different section.

 

(Yes, I said "gonna".  Deal with it. :) )

[Kromm]

I vaguely remember this starting with something about Dr. Phil and Nancy Grace. But despite both of them acting like they are "experts" on things, we all know they are in fact both dumb-asses, so I don't know why anyone would expect proper grammar or word use out of either of them.

[Kromm]

Oh, here's something fairly TV-centric. The rise of Hashtagspeak.  Sure it's all about Twitter. But it took TV to convince the average person that they should ridiculously try and use Hashtags as parts of normal sentences. See, I'm not even talking about Carson Daily or Ryan Seacrest tossing out Hashtags after every singing performance, or American Ninja Warrior showing contrived on-screen Hashtags for every quirky contestant.  I'm talking about people using Hashtags as exclamations.  "Hashtag Omigod!" or "Hashtag ICantbebothered!" or "Hashtag Overit!"  

 

Well... Hashtag... Makesmeangry!

I doubt teens spontaneously started doing this in schools everywhere. It took a bunch of idiots on reality shows to make this a "thing", I bet. 

Edited July 29, 2014 by Kromm

[The Crazed Spruce]

By the way, if you want a place to *ahem* "calmly discuss" any grammatical issues you may find outside of television, feel free to start a thread over in our Everything Else section. :)