KCRag Forum

chrizow wrote: what abuses?

Why must this be specifically itemized? An abuse equals any misuse of the language- a failure to use proper grammar in almost any situation.

i'm just trying to get a feel for what sort of travesties you are referring to.  i'm not really defending poor grammar or dismissing it as a sign of change so much as articulating my belief that "improper grammar" is nothing new and nothing to worry about.  it might be annoying, and it might close certain doors in our culture for those who use improper grammar, but it's not degrading the language.  i think that language is stronger than that, mostly because language, like all extensions of human culture, is completely made-up.  there aren't some objective "rules" floating around in the atmosphere like atomic particles and we're flouting them through ignorance or laziness.  the rules are constantly shifting.  this isn't an "excuse" for improper grammar, it's my way of saying there is no such thing because the "rules of grammar" are never fixed or anchored.  while there are certainly prevailing cultural preference at any given time, there is nothing to suggest that one cultural preference is any better than another. 

the "proper" grammar you are using right now is VERY different from proper grammar from past decades, let alone centuries.  what would you say to Ben Franklin (or Shakespeare or whoever) calling the way you speak or write "lazy" or "ignorant?"  the rules of grammar are only codes of behavior in a given context, and do not, in my opinion, deserve the sort of dogmatic reverence you are affording them.

Maybe this is where we're headed...

bahua wrote: I'm talking about dismissing abuses of our language, derived from laziness and ignorance, as "signs of change."

chrizow wrote: fair enough.  i just fail to see how we're doing *anything* to "the language" these days that countless generations of other humans have not done to their own language.  what exactly are you even talking about, anyway?  maybe an example would help. 

you two get a room.

AllThingsKC wrote: Maybe this is where we're headed...

Looks lie the author did not look at the type that he was setting. Or he was so afraid of the bombs going off that he did not care.

AllThingsKC wrote: Maybe this is where we're headed...

If that's where we are headed, I hope I get taken out by the bombs. 

anniewarbucks wrote: Looks lie the author did not look at the type that he was setting. Or he was so afraid of the bombs going off that he did not care.

You say odd things at times. 

I know . I guess it comes from growing up with two very odd brothers.