Is it just me, or was it a bad week for grammar? (Just me??)
It all started near the beginning of the week when I went to my doctor. She has a new assistant. Now I don’t mind if someone working in a medical environment has a big old tattoo (really, I don’t like them, but I am used to it); long thick, big gel nails with one sparkly one (I don’t mind gel nails or colored polish – I have had such nails myself — but when they are long and thick and not nicely rounded and clean looking, I don’t think they belong in a medical environment); and bad grammar to boot. She was very nice and these things wouldn’t have bothered me if she had been competent and hadn’t torn both my ear canals while “power washing” my ears (ever had that done?). So back to the grammar: first was the “have came.” Then was the double negative: “I don’t want no one to slip on that floor.” Grammar isn’t everything, but when other things are going on too, bad grammar doesn’t help.
Then, of course, there is the usual “I feel badly,” instead of “I feel bad” that everyone says (including a politician very high up). And then there was the person on cable news who said, “. . .the amount of people running,” instead of “the number of people running.”
Then came the most surprising of all. On a radio show I heard someone who I thought was well spoken. He has become known through his political tweets. I had never noticed anything wrong with his grammar until this week when I heard him say “have tooken.” What????? He also said”could of” that same day. And “like myself” instead of “like me,” but that one isn’t so bad.
The last faux pas I would like to mention is the “I” instead of “me,” which I keep silent about when my friends say it. I know that when you are talking, you don’t stop to take the other person out to see if it makes sense (He gave it to Pete and I; He gave it to I), so just remember — if you might be guilty of this — if you are using “to” or “for” or “with” or “by,” it’s me, not I.
PS: This blog post contained a typo and a grammar mistake, both of which I have just corrected. Thanks for keeping me honest and correct. I guess it was a bad week for MY grammar too!
Yup, I know I was supposed to talk about nouns today as the first post in the parts of speech series, but I just had to vent.
Another one that seems to be gaining in ‘popularity’ (in UK, at least) is the word electric used as a noun, as in:
I’ve just received my electric bill (I wonder where one would plug it in!)
… or …
She had her electric disconnected (does an ‘electric disconnected’ have a plug?)
I just heard it on the BBC!!!!!!
Hmmm. Electric is a noun, but I see that electricity should have been instead, which is also a noun. Or in the case of electric bill (electricity bill), an adjective.
Hi, Arlene! How wonderful it is to hear/read someone who knows about these matters expressing disgust or, at least, concern about people ruining grammar. And the list of examples goes on…
Haven’t written for a long time. Hope we keep on communicating well…
Kind regards
Alejandra
Teacher of English
Secondary school
Argentina
Thank you so much for the comment; I am happy to know that people besides me care about grammar too! But then you are an English teacher too! Keep up the good fight.
Yes, it is most disheartening when you hear bad grammar, especially from people on TV. I heard a glaring error yesterday on the Food Channel. It was the celebrity baker, Buddy Vilastro, who has this awful show. He might bake well but his English and the way he speaks sounds like one of those gangster guys from the back alley somewhere in New York.
Yesterday on his show he said “Me and my associates decided ( or think)…” The comment was made in reference to one of the baker’s who was competing on his pathetic show.
Well, thank goodness I don’t know of that show! Argh!!!!!!
Every week’s a bad week. I’ve dumped a couple of podcasts because I got tired of hearing “like” and “actually” and “so” (at the beginning of a sentence). So, there’s like another one that I can’t actually remember now.
Let me know if you remember that other one; I am sure it annoys me too!!! Like, so? Thanks for the comment.
“On a radio show I heard someone whom I thought was well spoken.” Should be “who”; “I thought he was well spoken.”
Thank you. A couple of you caught me on that one. I am duly mortified. I thought about it when I was about to write it, and said to myself: I thought whom was well spoken. Obviously, I should have continued to think there and say, “I thought she was well spoken.” I know better than that, and I apologize profusely.
I believe “whom ” should be used only if it follows a preposition: to whom, for whom, by whom, etc.
“Whom” is used when it is an object: either direct, indirect, or object of a preposition. So you are correct in that you use “whom” after by, for, with, etc., because prepositions. But “whom” is also correct here, where it is a direct object of “invite.” “Whom did you invite to the dance?”
I seem to spend my life with my teeth on edge, Arlene
BTW: What’s a ‘medial’ environment? 🙂
Oh, no….a typo! Medical. I meant medical. I could blame the fact that I am waiting for new computer glasses, but . . .
I heard someone whom I thought was well spoken
I’d have used “who” here. If we split the sentences joined by the relative pronoun we get
I heard someone. I thought (that) HE was well spoken.
So, as the pronoun is replacing the nominative/subjective form of the personal pronoun, surely we need the nominative /subjective form of the relative pronoun?
One of the complex situations where we tend to be guided by what “sounds right”.
You are right. See my reply to Pamela. I am mortified, and I apologize for the goof.
Agree and agree and agree, Certainly a bad week! And no, I have never had my ears “power washed” .
Thanks for the comment. They aren’t really supposed to power wash them!
I’m glad you vented.
Loved this piece.
And…if you’re referring to a certain someone who said, “I felt badly…” instead of “bad,” I really don’t think that very high up politician feels “bad” about anything!
You are absolutely right — and of course you got the politician right!
“Is it just me?”
Wouldn’t the picky correct way be “Is it just I?’ Yet if you said that, I’d go “Huh?” and have to think about it, and would miss your next few sentences.
Yes, the correct way to say it is ,”Is it just I,” but that just sounds too weird even for me to use. However, I do say, “This is she,” if I ever answer the phone (I think a lot of people do that one right). And I would maybe say ,” Not I.” However, “Just I” sounds ridiculous to me, correct as it might be.
i sort of know where you’re coming from. I’m sort of upset by everyone using sort of instead of being definite about what they are saying. I sort of heard it in so many radio broadcasts recently that I sort of use it myself.
REALLY. It is upsetting that so much bad grammar is being used today. I sometimes wonder if I am wrong since I don’t say “sort of” or “there is lots of people” who use bad grammar. What is happening to our language? Have we neglected to teach our students how important grammar can be in precise communication? I know language grows, but backwards????
Yes, apparently it is growing backwards. Having been a teacher, I don’t think grammar is being taught enough, or it is being taught the wrong way, or it certainly isn’t being stressed enough. One thing, as an English teacher, that I know is that we had discussions about stressing that good grammar extended to other subjects besides English! Thanks for the comment — sort of 🙂
Oh, haven’t you heard? Because “language changes” — the OM mantra of academic linguists — we mustn’t ever correct a perceived substandard usage. Usage changes over time, so we have to let the language change, and not dare to correct anything. (Once the linguists started taking over the English language arts curricula in the late ’60s, it was downhill.)
Funny — you don’t see the _linguists_ committing this sort of error. No, they just leave it to everyone else.
Right you are! Thanks for the insightful comment, Steve!
You have had a bad week. “I don’t think they belong in a medial environment.” Just breath and let that “c” slide into the word “medial”; you’ll feel much better. It must be the heat. 🙂
I wish I could blame the heat, but I just think I will blame my typing and my apparently lack of enough proofreading. Thanks for the correction. My blog program no longer has a spell check function. However, it wouldn’t have found medial anyway, since it is a word.
Well said, Arlene! Bad grammar makes bad situations worse.
Exactly! Thanks for the comment.
Hello Arlene,
I think there is a grammar error in this article. I think it is wrong to say “I heard someone WHOM I thought was well spoken.” Maybe this was a slip of the finger and is just a typo? I believe the right word is “who” since she is the subject of the verb phrase “was well spoken.” If you take out the who and use a preposition it would be, “ I heard someone [and] I thought she was well spoken,” or “I heard someone [and] she was well spoken.”
Am I right on this??
Hope all’s well with you. I hope we can meet for a chat before you move to Florida. I continue to admire and enjoy your weekly articles.
All the best, Bruce Blakely.
You think correctly. It is wrong, and a couple of other people caught me, so see my response to Pamela above. It was not a slip of the finger or a typo. It was the heat!! No, it was a blatant goof. I actually thought about it, and didn’t think enough because I know better. I will do better from now on. I promise. Sure, just send me an e-mail if you would like to meet before I head for the other coast. That would be nice. Long time, no see.