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As a non-native speaker of English, I have been wondering how much signal it would be appropriate for me to infer from the kind of sloppy grammar that is typica
by sampo 14y ago
As a non-native speaker of English, I have been wondering how much signal it would be appropriate for me to infer from the kind of sloppy grammar that is typical only for native speakers of English? [1]
I learned English at school as a second language, and we would always start with the written form, and then learn how to pronounce. So my "hash table" is primarily organized based on the written form, and it would be impossible for me to mix "two" and "too", "they're" or "their" or "there", or "its" and "it's" [2]. I hadn't even realized that "too" and "two" are pronounced the same, before a native speaker pointed it out to me, as my hash table doesn't support that kind of searches.
Also my native language (Finnish) uses a (nearly) phonetic writing, so phonetic misspelling of words is mainly restricted to people with no high school level of education, and who didn't do that well in primary school either.
I do, like the writer of the liked article, get that feeling of sloppiness, when I see those spelling or grammar mistakes in English text, but I don't really know how much signal it would be appropriate for me to infer from them?
I probably should not use as harsh standards as I do with Finnish, since those misspellings seem relatively common in English in the web.
[1] Well, typical of people who learned spoken English before written English, but in the modern world this pretty much coincides with native speakers.
[2] Well, "it's" and "its" is maybe a border case, maybe not totally impossible to mix those two, just very unlikely.
- einhverfr 14y agoThis is interesting. On the other hand, I would like to know since Finnish as a language fascinates me: How common are noun-case errors among people who have a high school education? I mean something like using the elative case when the ablative might be more appropriate?
- sampo 14y agoHow common are noun-case errors among people who have a high school education? I mean something like using the elative case when the ablative might be more appropriate? Nonexistent. I don't think even preschool children ever mix those. I don't have kids, so I can't say how it is with the kids who are just learning to speak. Also in English, you don't see people mixing "into" and "onto" even remotely as often as the mistakes the linked article talked about.
- pka 14y agoAbsolutely agree. I would never be able to take anybody seriously (in terms of hiring them) who can't spell or get basic grammar right in my native tongue, but this tends to be quite common in written English. How much can one infer from the fact that a native speaker mixes up "they're" and "their"?
- deleted 14y ago[deleted]
- HeyLaughingBoy 14y agoMy gut tells me (there's a scientific statement, if ever there was one!) that it correlates mainly to people who haven't read much in print. Print publications tend to be edited better than online ones. Unfortunately, bad spelling is reinforced by spending a lot of time online and being exposed to misspellings that are not corrected. As a child I didn't have access to TV, so I read everything in sight and I read constantly. The end result is I have a particularly sensitive eye for spelling and grammar mistakes. I find the misuse of, e.g., "loose" instead of "lose," to be tremendously irritating. The people I know who read a lot simply don't make trivial mistakes like that unless they're in a hurry and mistype. Is it sloppy? I would say it's sloppy if writing is a large part of your job. Otherwise, it's mainly an indicator of someone who doesn't read print very much. It is also getting worse at an increasing rate. I remember when mispelled words and bad grammar in reputable magazines and journals was rare, now it's almost expected that anything I read will have a few.
- olivier1664 14y agoDon't forget dyslexic guy: it makes your indicator wrong. According a fast google research, it's 5% of people.