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People don't seem to like this comment, but that is a great link. Browsing around the site, I found this list of common English language errors: http://public.w

People don't seem to like this comment, but that is a great link. Browsing around the site, I found this list of common English language errors: http://public.wsu.edu/~brians/errors/errors.html http://public.wsu.edu/~brians/errors/errors.html Really interesting. Thanks for sharing.

3131s 10y ago
Most of those are made up prescriptive guidelines, mixed in with some common misspellings. One grumpy person does not get to decide how the rest of us choose to use and evolve language. The "forceful" / "forcible" example is particularly inane and pedantic but hardly the worst on that page. I'll continue to say "being that", "ice tea", "center around", etc. as I please. In linguistics the illustrative analogy is that prescriptivism is akin to an anthropologist entering into a foreign culture and rather than simply observing, they instruct the members of this culture on how to cook, dress, cut their hair, etc. Most modern dictionaries (including the Oxford English dictionary) take a descriptive approach to the study of language.
- defined 10y ago
  > I'll continue to say... as I please. By that argument, we should all just be able to say and write whatever we want however we want to, even if it's technically or factually incorrect, like Humpty Dumpty or Donald Trump. Why bother hewing to "elitist" rules of grammar and accepted spellings, being that it's just prescriptivism? How does one decide objectively if something is just plain wrong, or merely prescriptive? Case in point: "premises". So many people treat this singular noun as a plural and use horrors like "on-premise", which is so utterly wrong that it is painful for me to look at. What's worse is that "premise" is a real word and an entirely different thing and is most definitely not the singular of "premises". This word came about (as many English words do) as a corruption of the Latin "praemissus", meaning something like "the aforementioned", and was used often in legal agreements for properties, and so became a word in itself that meant "the property". Now we are corrupting it yet again, this time without the excuse of it being a different language, on the basis that "I'll say it however I please." People I have mentioned this to have told me that it is so difficult to get people to use the right word that they've just gone with "on-prem". Now readers can take this comment as the rant of a "grammar nazi" or a pedant, but it wasn't meant that way, and I'll respond in advance with this: why is it not ok to identify something that is wrong? Because it's mere nitpicking? Maybe so - but that's how matters devolve, over the decades, back to widespread ignorance and intolerance: one little oversight at a time. Sorry, I didn't mean to get on the soapbox - sometimes it's just frustrating for those of us who are perhaps overly detail-oriented. But the world needs "pedantic" people like us more than it likes to admit.
  - peteretep 10y ago
    > write whatever we want > however we want to You have conflated two separate things. > being that it's just > prescriptivism The irony of course being that "being that" in the way you've used it is one of the examples of "incorrect English" given by the op. And you're using it to support the idea that these things are important... > This word came about ... as a > corruption ... without the excuse > of it being a different language You have some unorthodox ideas about how language came into being.
    - defined 10y ago
      Point taken, I made a mistake, but I think you're so focused on picking apart the comment that you've ignored the meat of it. That's ok, I said my piece and expected it to be downvoted - and it was.
      - deleted 10y ago
        [deleted]
      - 3131s 10y ago
        I'll upvote you (although technically HN doesn't like meta-commentary about upvotes / downvotes) because you made your point well. I don't have an issue with every "error" on that page and I have no problem with style guidelines for writing, but the problem comes when the prescriptivists think that logic is on their side when they opine on subjective stylistic and dialectic issues. "Ice tea" is a perfect example. The author of that site argues that "iced tea is not literally made of ice, it simply is 'iced': has ice put into it.". Apparently he is unaware of English's enormous fondness for attributive nouns. By his reasoning, we should all be saying "appled pie", or "apple-infused pie", or something crazy like that. I also have a more general problem with prescriptivism because frequently it is used to justify a certain type of racist and classist thought.
        hueving 10y ago
        Apple pie is not the same thing as "ice tea". Apple is describing the type of pie. "ice" is not a type of tea.
- Clubber 10y ago
  That's on fleek, whatever the hell that means.
- xelxebar 10y ago
  Prescriptivism is dumb. I think everyone here gets that. However, I like tools in my arsenal that enable me to express myself precisely. Prescriptivist rants often open my eyes to subtle shades of possible meaning that I otherwise would not have seen.
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]

3131s 10y ago

Most of those are made up prescriptive guidelines, mixed in with some common misspellings. One grumpy person does not get to decide how the rest of us choose to use and evolve language. The "forceful" / "forcible" example is particularly inane and pedantic but hardly the worst on that page. I'll continue to say "being that", "ice tea", "center around", etc. as I please. In linguistics the illustrative analogy is that prescriptivism is akin to an anthropologist entering into a foreign culture and rather than simply observing, they instruct the members of this culture on how to cook, dress, cut their hair, etc. Most modern dictionaries (including the Oxford English dictionary) take a descriptive approach to the study of language.

defined 10y ago
> I'll continue to say... as I please. By that argument, we should all just be able to say and write whatever we want however we want to, even if it's technically or factually incorrect, like Humpty Dumpty or Donald Trump. Why bother hewing to "elitist" rules of grammar and accepted spellings, being that it's just prescriptivism? How does one decide objectively if something is just plain wrong, or merely prescriptive? Case in point: "premises". So many people treat this singular noun as a plural and use horrors like "on-premise", which is so utterly wrong that it is painful for me to look at. What's worse is that "premise" is a real word and an entirely different thing and is most definitely not the singular of "premises". This word came about (as many English words do) as a corruption of the Latin "praemissus", meaning something like "the aforementioned", and was used often in legal agreements for properties, and so became a word in itself that meant "the property". Now we are corrupting it yet again, this time without the excuse of it being a different language, on the basis that "I'll say it however I please." People I have mentioned this to have told me that it is so difficult to get people to use the right word that they've just gone with "on-prem". Now readers can take this comment as the rant of a "grammar nazi" or a pedant, but it wasn't meant that way, and I'll respond in advance with this: why is it not ok to identify something that is wrong? Because it's mere nitpicking? Maybe so - but that's how matters devolve, over the decades, back to widespread ignorance and intolerance: one little oversight at a time. Sorry, I didn't mean to get on the soapbox - sometimes it's just frustrating for those of us who are perhaps overly detail-oriented. But the world needs "pedantic" people like us more than it likes to admit.
- peteretep 10y ago
  > write whatever we want > however we want to You have conflated two separate things. > being that it's just > prescriptivism The irony of course being that "being that" in the way you've used it is one of the examples of "incorrect English" given by the op. And you're using it to support the idea that these things are important... > This word came about ... as a > corruption ... without the excuse > of it being a different language You have some unorthodox ideas about how language came into being.
  - defined 10y ago
    Point taken, I made a mistake, but I think you're so focused on picking apart the comment that you've ignored the meat of it. That's ok, I said my piece and expected it to be downvoted - and it was.
    - deleted 10y ago
      [deleted]
    - 3131s 10y ago
      I'll upvote you (although technically HN doesn't like meta-commentary about upvotes / downvotes) because you made your point well. I don't have an issue with every "error" on that page and I have no problem with style guidelines for writing, but the problem comes when the prescriptivists think that logic is on their side when they opine on subjective stylistic and dialectic issues. "Ice tea" is a perfect example. The author of that site argues that "iced tea is not literally made of ice, it simply is 'iced': has ice put into it.". Apparently he is unaware of English's enormous fondness for attributive nouns. By his reasoning, we should all be saying "appled pie", or "apple-infused pie", or something crazy like that. I also have a more general problem with prescriptivism because frequently it is used to justify a certain type of racist and classist thought.
      - hueving 10y ago
        Apple pie is not the same thing as "ice tea". Apple is describing the type of pie. "ice" is not a type of tea.
Clubber 10y ago
That's on fleek, whatever the hell that means.
xelxebar 10y ago
Prescriptivism is dumb. I think everyone here gets that. However, I like tools in my arsenal that enable me to express myself precisely. Prescriptivist rants often open my eyes to subtle shades of possible meaning that I otherwise would not have seen.
deleted 10y ago
[deleted]