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Re: Decline of Language
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there's never a point where using one instead of the other changes what you mean, so just mentally substitute the correct one stopped reading there |
Re: Decline of Language
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Re: Decline of Language
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For example, "I don't know nothin'". In the literal interpretation, it's a double negative, which means the person saying it actually does know something, but is understood as "I know nothing" because of talking styles. |
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Actually, it makes the understanding harder than if they talked correctly. We need a rich language to correctly express things in the most accurate way possible, the deterioration of that abundance lead to difficulties to correctly put into words anything that has a little depth. |
Re: Decline of Language
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Also for the record, "the deterioration of that abundance lead to difficulties to correctly put into words anything that has a little depth" is ridiculously hard to read mostly because you screwed up lead(s) and you used "abundance" as the subject of a sentence which turned it into an abstract mess. So it turns out that things like verb conjugation actually are important; on the other hand, getting mad about homophony isn't. Quote:
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Re: Decline of Language
I Like How Everyone's Trying Really Hard To Type Properly In This Thread.
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Re: Decline of Language
The usage of "there is" over "there are" in everyday conversation is more irritating, I'd say. It's a more common violation in spoken language because people tend to have less time to think about what they're saying, but it's as if they're hardly thinking. The same goes for "there was" and "there were," "there has been" and "there have been," et cetera.
Another irritating mistake is "definately" versus "definitely," which makes little sense because when I say "definitely" I don't hear anything close to an "a" in there. Unfortunately English is so common that we shan't (sha'n't if you're hardcore) have to worry about preserving our language anytime soon. |
Re: Decline of Language
when it comes to definitely people tend to spell the word how the sound it out which more often than not its nat
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Re: Decline of Language
Okay, so obviously there's no immediate crisis of "zomg we don't has smart enuf ppl to flip bergers at teh burger king." That's not exactly what I intended to ask about. I'm also not talking about accidental typos. In fact, for the thread title I actually meant to type "The Decline of Language." To add one more exception, people who don't speak English natively are also excused.
As a few have pointed out, the ignorance I'm referring to is, for the most part, committed unknowingly. We could go on all day about which words and phrases are confused, misspelled, and misused much more commonly than they should be. Actually I came across this video the other day that seems to poke fun at this issue. However, I'm much more interested in a trend I've noticed and one that is now visible even in this thread. Why do people suddenly become agitated whenever poor grammar is pointed out? Is it really too much to ask that native speakers of a language actually understand that language? |
Re: Decline of Language
People typically hate to have their erroneous actions be acknowledged. If you point out something wrong that a person behind the wheel does, for example, they're probably going to laugh it off and say "I know" or get pissed off at you for being a purported "know-it-all." They may knowingly go over the speed limit, or unknowingly violate the seemingly lesser-known right-of-way rule in a parking lot, et cetera, but as long as it doesn't affect anybody then they likely aren't going to feel affected by it themselves.
Implicitly, the same could be said for language. They may knowingly abbreviate words on social media sites for brevity and convenience, yet perhaps unknowingly misuse "your" and "you're" because they never understood the difference in school. I'm notorious for pointing out mistakes that people make. The two most common responses are the elongated response of acknowledgement and irritation ("I knoooooooow") and the frustrated response of irritation ("you're a(n) [insert meaningless yet abhorrent phrase here]"). In fact, if I'm not proofreading a written work that is meant to be submitted for grading, I don't think anyone has ever thanked me for correcting their improper usage. If they have, it was laden with sarcasm. Maybe it's ignorance, or laziness, or downright obduracy. We always seem to be looking for a quicker, more concise way of doing things, and chopping up the English language somehow made its way onto that ever-growing list. |
Re: Decline of Language
I don't have a problem with bad english in an informal anonymous internet way, but when it comes to formal conversation and real life you should know how to spell and use proper grammar. The only way for someone to not know the difference between "affect" and "effect" is if they didn't learn it. To me this indicates an education problem.
I used to not know how to spell "definitely" but now I remember it by breaking it into these three parts de-finite-ly or de-fini-tely The first one has the word "Finite" in it, which is how I remember. |
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Re: Decline of Language
Personally, I feel less likely to be annoyed by spelling errors and such than I am with grammar errors. When people use "u" instead of "you", and other text shorthand, I get kind of annoyed because it is one of those things that definitely will become a habit, and typing the extra two letters isn't taking up much more time to type if you know how to type. I feel it's easier to type out the word because the shorthand text speaking almost seems like another language to me, and I would have to kind of think about it... which means I'll be taking more time to type out sentences.
The real problem, however, is when there are huge grammatical errors that make statements and stuff highly ambiguous and really hard to understand. I see it a lot on the Internet around here, but I don't think it's that much higher now than it was in the past. I think mostly the trend of spelling and other grammatical errors comes from a sense of conformity when you go onto the Internet. I know when I first joined I didn't spell correctly or use correct grammar mostly intentionally. The Internet was a weird place to me and I felt weird typing out words that others didn't type out, and not using acronyms popular on the Internet. Using the shorthand, for me, was actually a little bit helpful when I first got onto the Internet because I didn't actually know how to type, so I had a little bit of an excuse. That's what I think... |
Re: Decline of Language
its not the decline of language, is the decline of the education system (public) and the rise of the aristocrat.
its also the decline of public concern for morals and the rise of what could be a polluted society. thinking is being replaced by concerns of the self; a rise in the ego; where the only person who matters is "I". that being said, if you can take time out of your day to stop, relax, and think about things outside your daily routine or life, a tip of my hat to you sir/madam. |
Re: Decline of Language
I really do love correct grammar and spelling. It seems as though to this day, that people who know English but speak other languages better have a better sense of Englis grammar than the English people themselves!
I have a theory as to why this is true. when you get taught a foreign language, you learn it wih all the correct grammatical rules, and to learn a second language is hard enough, so you do not have the time to "modify" it for efficiency: you simply remember the rules, until they're in your head for life. But when people speak they're own language, they know it too well. They can think of ways to talk to people faster, and even twist the rules a bit just so that they sound "cooler", such as by saying "there ain't nothing you can do about it", but contrary to the implied meaning of the sentence, the actual meaning is positive Meaning "there is something you can do about it". This usually affects the younger generation because they are generally lazy, but the trend catches on, and it has an effect on everyone else, including the adults, who therefore start using "slang" until there are a picky few (such as me, and the Topic starter) left who want to speak properly. This theory also covers why decline in the use of punctuation occurs: punctuation is seen as suc a small matter of insignificance that people are too lazy to simply put a dot next to the sentence they write, or a question mark, or *insert punctuation here*, you get the picture. |
Re: Decline of Language
I don't see a huge problem with text-speak and that sort of stuff, because we have always found ways to abbreviate and simplify things for the sake of composition. It's natural to want to compose faster, because otherwise your mind will go ahead of your typing/writing and then you have the possibility of omitting something or some other error like that. I don't see why people are persnickety about that sort of thing, because I think that most people have the ability (assuming they are taught well in school, which is a bit of a dubious assumption currently but I don't think is too idealistic) to turn off that instinct. Just like I use profanity in my everyday speaking and use a little bit of an accent and a lot of slang, but I can turn that all off in situations where propriety is a little more of an issue.
There's nothing wrong with slang. That's how new languages are born. But I think (and this is the responsibility of schools, students, and parents) that everyone should have a solid understanding of proper written English (or whatever language) so that they are able to write intelligently, comfortably, and convincingly in their own voice, because it's really easy to tell when you read something by someone who doesn't have that skill in composition. |
Re: Decline of Language
Personally, I never understood mixing up 'your' and 'you're' except to be cute online
Then again, I adapt grammar to suit my tone. I hardly ever use commas where they should be because I hardly ever pause when I'm speaking. If there's a break in my speech I'll include a comma but otherwise I see it as plodding and extraneous. The most important thing is to be understood and that generally means avoiding esoteric vocabulary and giving some pity punctuation once in a while It's all a question of tone, anyway. Hell, I'll coin words if it suits my need--language is by no means meant to be stagnant. And typing differently gives different tones, just as inflection does the same when speaking. tl;dr Typing with correct grammar and polysyllabic expressions immediately gives the impression that you're serious. typin like this tells people you dont give two shits |
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