We are indeed in the midst of an invasion of language zombies! The ignorant twit who started the horrendous misuse of the reflexive pronoun "myself" in place of the correct object pronoun "me," should be flogged with a grammar textbook. He probably thought it made his speech sound erudite, cultured, and sophisticated, above the hoi polloi. Nope. Just made him and all the nincompoops who followed suit sound stupid. If you are one who misuses this pronoun, let me explain: You (subject) may give the money (direct object) to me (indirect object-receiver of the object of the action), but you may not give the money to myself. Only I am able to give the money to myself. You must give the money to yourself. Get it? It's not that difficult. Oh, and if you do have some money, you are most welcome to give it to me.
I see multitudes of misused words and misspellings in the comments sections of online articles and news reports. Most of these problems stem from poor pronunciation. I have told students for years that they can spell most words correctly if they pronounce them correctly. Two problems I see often are the use of "of" for "have" and the use of "then" for "than." For example: "He should of voted for the bill," instead of, "He should have (or should've) voted for the bill." And, "He is taller then me," instead of, "He is taller than me." Both of these errors are the result of negligent pronunciation.
I understand that language is not stable, that languages change over time and that vowel sounds shift and consonants become faint; but it seems to me that in this age of mass communication there should be a much slower shift and more stabilization. When we constantly hear the lazy-mouthed talking heads in all facets of the media flatten the long vowel sound into a short vowel sound such as "fill" for "feel," "sell" for "sale/sail," "mill" for "meal," and "fell" for "fail," etcetera, we subconsciously adopt the same mispronunciation. It's an epidemic of viral lazy-mouth. I want to wash my mouth with soap and hit my head with rocks when I catch myself (correct usage) flattening a long vowel. Oops, I just heard three students and a teacher with lazy-mouth! Maybe I should throw rocks at their heads to keep them away from my infection prone subconscious. The language zombies are everywhere. There is no escape. Resistance is futile.
Showing posts with label Grammar. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Grammar. Show all posts
Wednesday, October 2, 2013
The Invasion of the Language Zombies, Part 1
Noel Coward said, “I like long walks, especially when they are taken by people who annoy me.” Unfortunately, I am unable to influence all the incompetent speakers and writers of English, the language zombies, to take a long walk and stop inflicting their substandard usage on me and the language deprived rising generation. We are confronted daily by illiterate grammar and syntax in newspapers, letters, posts, e-mails, tweets, ubiquitous text jargon, readers' comments online, television, film, modern "literature," etcetera, et al., ad infinitum, ad nauseum.
There was a time in my teaching career when one could advise students struggling to choose the correct verb form in a sentence they were writing to say the sentence out loud. Once they heard themselves say the sentence they could with few failures select the correct form. Because they rarely hear or read correctly spoken or written English, students cannot use that trick today.
While we do teach implicit vocabulary in English language arts classes, we no longer formally teach grammar and syntax on a regular basis. Language conventions are given short shrift. Students are supposed to pick up correct usage in speaking and writing by osmosis from reading. They are certainly not "picking it up" from reading social media messages from peers who are just as illiterate as they are. And then there is the teacher in faculty meeting a few weeks ago who, in a discussion of tardy problems, said, "Students are still moving slowly in the halls even after the bell has rang." AAIIIEEEEE! That hurts my ears as horribly as the proverbial fingernails scraping the chalkboard. It's RUNG, not rang; has RUNG = auxiliary verb + past participle! It is not that difficult. No mental osmosis going to transpire there.
(I know everyone, even educated, intelligent people, makes an occasional mistake when he or she is speaking and sorting multiple thoughts at the same time. A slip or two is forgivable. I, even I, have made a few grammar and punctuation mistakes, typos, misspeaks, and actual misspellings in my 66 years. But, I do own a dictionary, several, and I do proofread 99% of what I write before I publish. [That includes texts, tweets, and e-mails!] Is it too much to ask that others do the same?)
Then there is the flagrant and mass mispronunciation of words. One that is especially noxious is the verb "harass" with the noun form "harassment." People see the a double s, and seemingly loving to say the "a" word as much as possible, put the emphasis on the second syllable instead of the first where it belongs. My school district requires that all teachers view a policy presentation at the beginning of each year. One module of the presentation is on forms of harassment. The narrator must have said "harASS" and "harASSment" twenty times. Doesn't anyone have a dictionary? Just Google the word. There will be a dictionary listing showing the diacritical markings to help you correctly pronounce the word. If that is too difficult, there is a little speaker icon, which when you click on the icon, the nice computer will pronounce it for you. It's not that difficult.
I shall not even try to eulogize the wonderful subjunctive of "to be." It has been bludgeoned to death and sucked dry by the language zombies. Would that I were eloquent enough to raise it from the bone yard. But, alas, if I were to do so, it would wander a stranger to all save me. Maybe I should just take a long walk with a medicinal dose of Bach.
There was a time in my teaching career when one could advise students struggling to choose the correct verb form in a sentence they were writing to say the sentence out loud. Once they heard themselves say the sentence they could with few failures select the correct form. Because they rarely hear or read correctly spoken or written English, students cannot use that trick today.
While we do teach implicit vocabulary in English language arts classes, we no longer formally teach grammar and syntax on a regular basis. Language conventions are given short shrift. Students are supposed to pick up correct usage in speaking and writing by osmosis from reading. They are certainly not "picking it up" from reading social media messages from peers who are just as illiterate as they are. And then there is the teacher in faculty meeting a few weeks ago who, in a discussion of tardy problems, said, "Students are still moving slowly in the halls even after the bell has rang." AAIIIEEEEE! That hurts my ears as horribly as the proverbial fingernails scraping the chalkboard. It's RUNG, not rang; has RUNG = auxiliary verb + past participle! It is not that difficult. No mental osmosis going to transpire there.
(I know everyone, even educated, intelligent people, makes an occasional mistake when he or she is speaking and sorting multiple thoughts at the same time. A slip or two is forgivable. I, even I, have made a few grammar and punctuation mistakes, typos, misspeaks, and actual misspellings in my 66 years. But, I do own a dictionary, several, and I do proofread 99% of what I write before I publish. [That includes texts, tweets, and e-mails!] Is it too much to ask that others do the same?)
Then there is the flagrant and mass mispronunciation of words. One that is especially noxious is the verb "harass" with the noun form "harassment." People see the a double s, and seemingly loving to say the "a" word as much as possible, put the emphasis on the second syllable instead of the first where it belongs. My school district requires that all teachers view a policy presentation at the beginning of each year. One module of the presentation is on forms of harassment. The narrator must have said "harASS" and "harASSment" twenty times. Doesn't anyone have a dictionary? Just Google the word. There will be a dictionary listing showing the diacritical markings to help you correctly pronounce the word. If that is too difficult, there is a little speaker icon, which when you click on the icon, the nice computer will pronounce it for you. It's not that difficult.
ha·rass·ment
həˈrasm(ə)nt,ˈharəsm(ə)nt/
noun
noun: harassment; plural noun: harassments
- 1.aggressive pressure or intimidation."they face daily harassment by the police"
synonyms: persecution, intimidation, pressure, force, coercion;
I shall not even try to eulogize the wonderful subjunctive of "to be." It has been bludgeoned to death and sucked dry by the language zombies. Would that I were eloquent enough to raise it from the bone yard. But, alas, if I were to do so, it would wander a stranger to all save me. Maybe I should just take a long walk with a medicinal dose of Bach.
Monday, October 24, 2011
Pet Peeves with American Speakers of English
This is one of my "pet peeves," i.e. the lousy pronunciation and deplorable grammar of American speakers of English. It is not isolated among the young and illiterate, but is rampant in those who are supposedly well educated and should know better. The flattening out of diphthongs, sliding vowels and vowel pairs is epidemic in American speakers, and to hear such lazy pronunciation drives me crazy. Just ask my wife. I hope it is just laziness and not out right ignorance. My great fear is that being forced to hear incorrect language I may begin to speak the same way. I hear this in the speech of students, their parents, newscasters, advertisers, politicians, and broadcasters ad infinitum. Examples of this vocal crime: pronouncing "feel" as "fill," "meal" as "mill," "pail/pale" as "pell," "sail/sale" as "sell," and too many others to list.
Perhaps fifteen years ago, I saw a sign posted on a huge pile of dirt which said, "Dirt for sell." The writer's incorrect pronunciation of the word "sale" had led to his misspelling of the word "sale!" I see this phenomenon quite often in children and adults. They mispronounce and therefore misspell. I have seen four times in the newspaper this week the incorrect spelling of "than" as "then," as in "more then" or "less then" instead of "more/less than." Are there no proofreaders anymore?
The death of grammar is accelerating because grammar is no longer emphasized or even taught in school language arts classes. Supposedly, children will pick up correct grammar if they read a lot of books. Unfortunately, too many of the books children and young adults are reading have egregious grammar problems on top off the atrocious grammar they hear every day. There is the age old problem of "who/whom" and "can/may" and, of course, subject/verb agreement problems, but in the last few years there has been epidemic of the infamous use of the reflexive personal pronoun "myself" in place of the correct and simple subject or object personal pronouns "I" or "me." Some nincompoop must have thought using "myself" sounded upper class and started the corruption rolling. Now everyone from the President of the United States to the language arts teacher uses that corruption. Hearing that abomination is like ice picks jammed in my ears. I want to scream at everyone who blathers that ridiculous affectation.
But the true dagger in my heart is the death of the subjunctive case of "to be." It is a lost cause. Too few English speakers and writers use it any more even if they know what it is and how to use it. But if I were king, and I wish I were, I would drub grammar and elocution into every man, woman, and child so I might save my poor assaulted eyes and ears from seeing and hearing the murder of the English language one mispronounced word, one poorly constructed phrase, one run on or fragmented sentence at a time.
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