"I Judge You When You Use Poor Grammar" - NY Times- Page 4

[Calvin]

Posted: 11/1/07 at 10:59am

Actually, Kringas, it's in a film, not in an AP story, so it's correct. And, if the AP ever writes about "Bridget Jones's Diary," it has to write it that way, because it's part of a title (even though my Firefox spellcheck is now scolding me for having written "Jones's"). It's kind of like theater/theatre: AP style is to always use theater, unless it's part of a proper name that uses theatre.

The New York Times, which has it's own style, actually used to be (and may still be) much more convoluted when it comes to the singular proper noun ending in s rule. The basic is to use s' or s's depending on how it's pronounced. So, if you say "Bridget Jones-es Diary" or "Phyllis-es post," you'd use s's. For others, like, "The Golden Girls scriptwriters," you don't say "Golden Girls-es," so you'd just use s'. And then there's a bunch of other exceptions, like if there are preceding syllables with an "s" sound, like Kansas' laws or Arkansas' cities.

I read recently that the apostrophe might just disappear from the written word eventually anyways. Er, anyway.

[Wanna Be A Foster]

Posted: 11/1/07 at 11:04am

OK, I hereby nominate Calvin for Grammar Whore President.

[Calvin]

Posted: 11/1/07 at 11:08am

Gah, no! I make far too many embarassing typos. I mean, embarrasing typos. Or is that embarrassing?

[Phyllis Rogers Stone]

Posted: 11/1/07 at 11:13am

Everyone does. It happens. It's just willful ignorance that gets to me.

I prefer to think of you as the Grammar Duchess.

[doodlenyc]

Posted: 11/1/07 at 11:14am

you might as well except it.

[p.s.]

Posted: 11/1/07 at 12:24pm

The New York Times, which has it's own style, actually used to be (and may still be) much more convoluted when it comes to the singular proper noun ending in s rule. The basic is to use s' or s's depending on how it's pronounced. So, if you say "Bridget Jones-es Diary" or "Phyllis-es post," you'd use s's. For others, like, "The Golden Girls scriptwriters," you don't say "Golden Girls-es," so you'd just use s'.

Number A: I guess you meant its .


Number B: It depends on what the meaning of the word "The" is.

You might say the following:

Bob and Rob, the Grease scriptwriters, are good script writers.
Bob and Rob, Grease's scriptwriters, are good script writers.

Bill and Jill, the Curtains scriptwriters, are good script writers.
Bill and Jill, Curtains' scriptwriters, are good script writers.

Paul and Saul, the The Golden Girls scriptwriters, are good script writers.
Paul and Saul, The Golden Girls' scriptwriters, are good script writers.


p.s. Talking about being judged on your use of grammar:

"It depends on what the meaning of the word 'is' is. If the--if he--if 'is' means is and never has been, that is not--that is one thing. If it means there is none, that was a completely true statement....Now, if someone had asked me on that day, are you having any kind of sexual relations with Ms. Lewinsky, that is, asked me a question in the present tense, I would have said no. And it would have been completely true."

[Calvin]

Posted: 11/1/07 at 12:33pm

Of course I did. Christ, I never said I was impervious to making typos. Quite the opposite. Some people have a very phonetic way of thinking and are more prone to typos with homonyms.
Updated On: 11/1/07 at 12:33 PM

[touchmeinthemorning]

Posted: 11/1/07 at 12:44pm

or with homo nymphs.

[Phyllis Rogers Stone]

Posted: 11/1/07 at 12:46pm

I would say neither "Bob and Rob, the Grease scriptwriters, are good script writers" nor "Bob and Rob, Grease's scriptwriters, are good script writers." I think repeating the phrase script writers (whether as one word or two) is clumsy and redundant.

Updated On: 11/1/07 at 12:46 PM

[Calvin]

Posted: 11/1/07 at 12:50pm

Actually, I wouldn't call anyone associated with "Grease" a good scriptwriter, but that's just me.

Homo nymphs do cause typos. Especially when they're Fey.

[p.s.]

Posted: 11/1/07 at 1:23pm

Number C:

I would say neither "Bob and Rob, the Grease scriptwriters, are good script writers" nor "Bob and Rob, Grease's scriptwriters, are good script writers." I think repeating the phrase script writers (whether as one word or two) is clumsy and redundant.

I completely agree, totally.


Number D:

You might say the following:

I wasn't talking about you. I wasn't talking about I me myself (???), either.


p.s. I could/should have said: One might say ...

[ShbrtAlley44]

Posted: 11/1/07 at 1:32pm

An inspiration from the Exorcist thread: When one wishes to say whether or not a movie "fazed" them, they should not use the word "phase," which instead refers to a stage in a process of development. The correct word in this case is "faze," as in "The movie didn't faze me at all." (By the way, I just saw that Rath actually mentioned this mistake earlier in the thread, so I'm just reiterating.)

Don't even get me started on "...if I would of..." It's "If I had," and even if the former were correct, it should be "...if I would have..."


ETA: P.S. - "NUMBER" A? Since when are letters numbers?
Updated On: 11/1/07 at 01:32 PM

[Calvin]

Posted: 11/1/07 at 1:33pm

I need Lisa Simpson's grammar robot, Linguo!

Lisa: Just testing.
Linguo: Sentence fragment.
Lisa: "Sentence fragment" is also a sentence fragment.

[~FloweryFriend~]

Posted: 11/1/07 at 2:55pm

The "s" problem is precisely while I will never name a child James, Carys, or anything else ending in "s". Just easier if no one has to worry about it.

[Calvin]

Posted: 11/1/07 at 3:00pm

ETA: P.S. - "NUMBER" A? Since when are letters numbers?

If I put a scientific calculator into a base-12 number system, it uses "A" and "B" to represent the "numerals" for the digits equivalent to 10 and 11 in our usual base-10 system. Like 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, A, B, and then 10 (actually 12 in base-10), 11 (13), 12 (14), etc. up to 1A (actually 22) and 1B (actually 23), then repeating to 20, which is actually 24.

Augh! Now its it's moved to math!

[p.s.]

Posted: 11/1/07 at 3:28pm

If I put a scientific calculator into a base-12 number system, it uses "A" and "B" to represent the "numerals" for the digits equivalent to 10 and 11 in our usual base-10 system. Like 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, A, B, and then 10 (actually 12 in base-10), 11 (13), 12 (14), etc. up to 1A (actually 22) and 1B (actually 23), then repeating to 20, which is actually 24.

When I learned base-12 in high school (without scientific calculators) the teacher let the class name the extra digits. They became known as "zyfleck" and "oogle".


p.s.

"NUMBER" A? Since when are letters numbers?

Number E = M x C squared ?

e = 2.71828183 ?

Updated On: 11/1/07 at 03:28 PM

[ShbrtAlley44]

Posted: 11/1/07 at 3:31pm

But in your case, you're just making a list. I mean in that context, why are letters numbers? Letters can STAND for numbers, but if you're just calling something "Number A," that doesn't really make much sense.

[Calvin]

Posted: 11/1/07 at 3:35pm

They actually taught that in your high school? Wow! I just sort of figured it out myself playing with the calculator while the precal teacher was yammering on about cosines for the thousandth time. Yet they had plenty of time to teach us about imaginary numbers, for which I have never figured out any use.

We did do binary systems in our computer classes, for obvious reasons. That was fun to watch the ones who thought they were just there for an easy A. "What the hell are you talking about? Two is 10? Five is 101? I just want to play 'Oregon Trail.'"

[ShbrtAlley44]

Posted: 11/1/07 at 3:51pm

They don't have a use. They're imaginary. HA!

[p.s.]

Posted: 11/1/07 at 7:52pm

... if you're just calling something "Number A," that doesn't really make much sense.

That was the point.

You know such as like people who start listing examples, so they say:

1.__________One (as a cardinal number)

2nd. _______Second (an ordinal number) But they more often say "secondly"

and "C". (suddenly they switch to letters, for no good reason)


p.s. I can't think of a forth example.

[miss pennywise]

Posted: 11/1/07 at 10:35pm

After years and years of being frustrated by the rampant disregard for the English language, I have lowered my expectations considerably.

Now I'd be happy if people would just stop using the word jive when they mean jibe.

Is THAT too much to ask?

[touchmeinthemorning]

Posted: 11/2/07 at 10:04am

my new favorite:

the head of our department here at my company (a senior VP of a fortune 50 company) says "nibble" instead of "nimble"...and he rarely if ever gets "there, their, they're" correct.

[Calvin]

Posted: 11/2/07 at 10:15am

p.s., I love it when the subway conductor announces the "One-Oh-Third Street" stop.

Actually, I don't love it, because that means I'm stuck on a local train.

[Rathnait62]

Posted: 11/2/07 at 10:40am

Please be patient, Calvin!

[Calvin]

Posted: 11/2/07 at 11:23am

Thank me for my patience, dammit!

Here's a momento from that journey.