While I’m aware that our language is constantly changing and understand that intellectually, I have a great deal of trouble with it emotionally. As a whippersnapper I was put through the paces of English grammar and usage by a teacher of the old school…no, that’s not right…he was of the older school, and I am of the old school.
If you’re younger than I am – and I’m not saying – then perhaps your heart might twitch upon hearing any of the following:
Between you and I…
You going out with me makes me angry…
Like, we were studying, you know, and, like, his father really got….
If I was you, I wouldn’t do that.
These errors are all grammatical, and the type of error is described at the bottom of this brief homily.
What’s got my blood moving today is the rather curious way we become lemmings of usage and by doing so separate a word or a phrase from actual thought. Here are some examples.
You go, girl.
Don’t go there.
She has issues.
Aw, go (blank) yourself.
The first appears to have been assimilated into our language from a subculture, and it appears to be a statement of approval for having done something wondrous, unlikely, or contrary to character.
The second constrains discussion so that a sensitive area is declared to be out of bounds by the speaker.
The third appears to have the same effect as its predecessor, except that now another person’s situation is almost, but not quite, out of bounds.
The fourth phrase and its innumerable variations can be heard almost anywhere these days and reminds us how any word can lose shock value unless you hear it/them in the company of a child or a sweet old lady, in which event you are…well, don’t go there, because even thinking what I’m thinking gives me more issues than I can handle just now.
Don’t be diffident…try out new words and phrases, vary your vocabulary, create new words.
Last year I came up with sphinctitude and its adjectival and adverbial forms, sphinctitudinous and sphinctitudinously. The noun is a combination of sphincter and attitude, and I’ll leave it to you to define it. I also came up with drivelous and drivelousness, but I can’t find my copy of the Oxford Universal to see if it’s a new word. No matter, I’ve had fun just playing with the language.
As we all should. If you come up with anything new
The grammatical errors above are:
1. Pronoun object of preposition should be in objective case, therefore “me.”
2. “Going” is a gerund (verbal noun) so you should be in the possessive form “your.”
3. This is an excellent example of a simple sentence with interruptions for both continuation and emphasis.
4. Condition contrary to fact takes the subjunctive. In this case, “were.” But compare to “If the train was late – and it was – you would have been late.”
Between you and I…
You going out with me makes me angry…
Like, we were studying, you know, and, like, his father really got….
If I was you, I wouldn’t do that.
These errors are all grammatical, and the type of error is described at the bottom of this brief homily.
What’s got my blood moving today is the rather curious way we become lemmings of usage and by doing so separate a word or a phrase from actual thought. Here are some examples.
You go, girl.
Don’t go there.
She has issues.
Aw, go (blank) yourself.
The first appears to have been assimilated into our language from a subculture, and it appears to be a statement of approval for having done something wondrous, unlikely, or contrary to character.
The second constrains discussion so that a sensitive area is declared to be out of bounds by the speaker.
The third appears to have the same effect as its predecessor, except that now another person’s situation is almost, but not quite, out of bounds.
The fourth phrase and its innumerable variations can be heard almost anywhere these days and reminds us how any word can lose shock value unless you hear it/them in the company of a child or a sweet old lady, in which event you are…well, don’t go there, because even thinking what I’m thinking gives me more issues than I can handle just now.
Don’t be diffident…try out new words and phrases, vary your vocabulary, create new words.
Last year I came up with sphinctitude and its adjectival and adverbial forms, sphinctitudinous and sphinctitudinously. The noun is a combination of sphincter and attitude, and I’ll leave it to you to define it. I also came up with drivelous and drivelousness, but I can’t find my copy of the Oxford Universal to see if it’s a new word. No matter, I’ve had fun just playing with the language.
As we all should. If you come up with anything new
The grammatical errors above are:
1. Pronoun object of preposition should be in objective case, therefore “me.”
2. “Going” is a gerund (verbal noun) so you should be in the possessive form “your.”
3. This is an excellent example of a simple sentence with interruptions for both continuation and emphasis.
4. Condition contrary to fact takes the subjunctive. In this case, “were.” But compare to “If the train was late – and it was – you would have been late.”
