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karatemanjohnny · 29th January 2004

I actually like rants like these. First, I'd like to say that there are different criteria I apply to different social situations. I'm not as strict here as I would be grading a paper or proofreading a business proposal.

Here are a few comments of mine, but then I've gotta sleep.

[Again, my standard disclaimer: I'm not assuming you don't know any of this. For all I know, you could be very intelligent - a multi-ethnic language specialist with advanced degrees in several langauges, who could blow away my knowledge about this stuff. I'm not trying to step on anyone's toes.]

"to" versus "too" - too means "as well" or "in addition to" (using 'to' in a synonomous phrase for 'too' - tricky/bad)

"schemas" just sounds so wrong. I know it's fine, but I just like the sound of "schemata" more.

I don't like it when people say "logic" or "logically speaking," but don't mean actual logic, like the basic inductive, abductive, and deductive argument styles.

I don't like when people say things like they are relative truths, when they aren't. For example: "For me, I think 'speling" is spelled wrong. But maybe for you it's fine." I would say to that person: "It's not 'for you.' There's a standard way we spell the word and that's the 'correct' way. Save your BS politically over-correct statements for someone else. It's actually literally psychotic to be a relativist about most domains in life - we need to rely on absolute truths.

I don't like Americans getting pissy about American versus other spellings of words. Such as the "o" versus the "ou." Favorite versus Favourite.

I don't like when British get pissy about Americans butchering their language.

Also, American English is incorporating words from other cultures as well, given the vast number of cultures present here. I see it as a different language. We are creating a new language. Linguists and philosophers have a lot of ideas about how langauge is constantly changing.

If someone makes up a word, and you understand them, then there's successful communication. Even the intonation/pitch of your voice can be HUGE clues. Hence all the "e-conflicts" where people don't realize sarcasm and stuff like that.

Right there was an example. I said "e-conflicts." I looked that up on dictionary.com and there was no listing, but I bet most of you knew exactly what I meant. There wasn't much ambiguity there.

Spell checkers don't grammatical errors. None of these would be detected and your pet peeves would still be here.
These would all pass the spell checker:

to/too
than/then
their/there
where/wear

There are a lot of trends that shift the emphasis from content to grammar and such. Some teachers think it's more important that you get the list of words spelled correctly than understand what each of them means. The best solution is to have both. We need people who are sticklers for grammar, otherwise the number of misunderstandings would just go up and up.

A lot of fields in academia use words that are specific to their subject matter. These words are often obscure and not recognized by a spell checker. You can get spell checking dictionaries to use for different subjects, but that's a pain.

We need to keep in mind that the goal here (at least for me, in this setting of an online forum) is successful communication and exchange of ideas. I welcome speakers from other countries.

One final note is that there is a lot of culturalism takes place when people speak in langauges they don't know well. If someone speaks to me in broken English and I know they are struggling, I have to make sure I realize they aren't necessarily as intelligent as the equivalent American student who speaks at their level. If someone comes to me and speaks at a 2nd grade American student level of English, I can't assume they aren't intelligent. If I tried to talk to them in Spanish (which I do), I bet I would sound like a 2nd grader also. But when I speak my native American English, I sound more educated. So, we have to be aware of that.

[By the way, culturalism, another -ism word like racism or sexism, pretty much means what you might have thought it meant - basically, one culture views itself as better than another by default. The word wasn't listed on dictionary.com, but you may have understood it anyway.]

I think that's all I want to say about this - I probably won't post much more, if at all, in this particular thread. I want to get back to the audio stuff!

Also .... are my posts too long?

29th January 2004	#26
karatemanjohnny Gear nut Joined: Jan 2004 Location: Maryland, USA Posts: 126	I actually like rants like these. First, I'd like to say that there are different criteria I apply to different social situations. I'm not as strict here as I would be grading a paper or proofreading a business proposal. Here are a few comments of mine, but then I've gotta sleep. [Again, my standard disclaimer: I'm not assuming you don't know any of this. For all I know, you could be very intelligent - a multi-ethnic language specialist with advanced degrees in several langauges, who could blow away my knowledge about this stuff. I'm not trying to step on anyone's toes.] "to" versus "too" - too means "as well" or "in addition to" (using 'to' in a synonomous phrase for 'too' - tricky/bad) "schemas" just sounds so wrong. I know it's fine, but I just like the sound of "schemata" more. I don't like it when people say "logic" or "logically speaking," but don't mean actual logic, like the basic inductive, abductive, and deductive argument styles. I don't like when people say things like they are relative truths, when they aren't. For example: "For me, I think 'speling" is spelled wrong. But maybe for you it's fine." I would say to that person: "It's not 'for you.' There's a standard way we spell the word and that's the 'correct' way. Save your BS politically over-correct statements for someone else. It's actually literally psychotic to be a relativist about most domains in life - we need to rely on absolute truths. I don't like Americans getting pissy about American versus other spellings of words. Such as the "o" versus the "ou." Favorite versus Favourite. I don't like when British get pissy about Americans butchering their language. Also, American English is incorporating words from other cultures as well, given the vast number of cultures present here. I see it as a different language. We are creating a new language. Linguists and philosophers have a lot of ideas about how langauge is constantly changing. If someone makes up a word, and you understand them, then there's successful communication. Even the intonation/pitch of your voice can be HUGE clues. Hence all the "e-conflicts" where people don't realize sarcasm and stuff like that. Right there was an example. I said "e-conflicts." I looked that up on dictionary.com and there was no listing, but I bet most of you knew exactly what I meant. There wasn't much ambiguity there. Spell checkers don't grammatical errors. None of these would be detected and your pet peeves would still be here. These would all pass the spell checker: to/too than/then their/there where/wear There are a lot of trends that shift the emphasis from content to grammar and such. Some teachers think it's more important that you get the list of words spelled correctly than understand what each of them means. The best solution is to have both. We need people who are sticklers for grammar, otherwise the number of misunderstandings would just go up and up. A lot of fields in academia use words that are specific to their subject matter. These words are often obscure and not recognized by a spell checker. You can get spell checking dictionaries to use for different subjects, but that's a pain. We need to keep in mind that the goal here (at least for me, in this setting of an online forum) is successful communication and exchange of ideas. I welcome speakers from other countries. One final note is that there is a lot of culturalism takes place when people speak in langauges they don't know well. If someone speaks to me in broken English and I know they are struggling, I have to make sure I realize they aren't necessarily as intelligent as the equivalent American student who speaks at their level. If someone comes to me and speaks at a 2nd grade American student level of English, I can't assume they aren't intelligent. If I tried to talk to them in Spanish (which I do), I bet I would sound like a 2nd grader also. But when I speak my native American English, I sound more educated. So, we have to be aware of that. [By the way, culturalism, another -ism word like racism or sexism, pretty much means what you might have thought it meant - basically, one culture views itself as better than another by default. The word wasn't listed on dictionary.com, but you may have understood it anyway.] I think that's all I want to say about this - I probably won't post much more, if at all, in this particular thread. I want to get back to the audio stuff! Also .... are my posts too long?