Beautiful English

[Tonyblack]

Then you have the incorrect use of 'who's' and 'whose' - 'its' and 'it's'. There's 'their', 'there' and they're' - which are often used incorreectly.

But that's just bad spelling. It's like if I spell "dyslexia" wrongly.

If you are referring to my incorrect spelling of 'incorrectly' then it was a slip of the finger rather than a spelling mistake.

[Jan Van Quirm]

.... Only a few hundred years ago there weren't any standard English spellings. If you've ever read any old books in English you'll quickly realise that the writers more or less made things up as they went along.

English people emigrated to the New World and they took these spellings with them. So American English is not wrong and the people using it are not lazy (as I have seen some people claim) they are merely using the English that they took with them to America. One could argue that in some cases their English is more like traditional English than modern British English is....

Even (or especially) Shakespeare's spelling of his own name varied wildly (note use of apostrophe ) and so I've not really got any issue with things like color. In most cases anyway the 'wrong' English is generally more logical or at least phonetic, so you can understand how the colonial emigrants took what was their understanding of the spelling and when met with the mish-mash of other nation's migrants, persisted with losing the 'u' in labor, flavor, savor etc and other unsaid pronunciation like 'gh' - so 'plough' becomes 'plow' etc. True, words like 'nite' or 'lite' are more perturbing, but at least they're easier to spell...

It's sillier things that get my goat - like 'gotten' as Straw Walker says which is sloppy I think but expressions like (someone's) 'in back' instead of 'in the back' or 'out the back' or even 'for sure' instead of 'certainly' do irritate...

Less annoying 'gaffes' to my mind - and because it's funny too of course - is how the same word can mean something completely different. So stuff like fanny can be cheeky or really quite rude depending on which side of the Atlantic you say it. And bum too of course Suspenders/braces can be hilarious depending on who says it - soda a delight or nightmare on the tongue and eraser/rubber a positive outrage if used in the wrong place or time...

Language is a such a fascinatingly strange thing and how it's spoken is even more interesting - so I'm talking accents now. Like with urban Boston English you can hear twangs of Irish sometimes and in the Bahamas there's a kind of Westcountry burr going in there a little. Australian accents sound like Cockney to me especially in NSW and a definite Dutch element and sometimes an stiff upper lip drawl in the South African patois too.

And how many accents we have going in the UK is really astonishing considering what a small country geographically we are. The 'Oxbridge' or BBC accent famously was not a natural accent at all but started out as an in-joke in Regency times in high society and in the Universities so the 'toffs' started to sound different from the lower classes More alarming is TV's influence especially in the South East way beyond the Home Counties and Southern areas with the original accents gradually assuming a faux London accent... As for modern techno-babble in colonial languages especially Indian-derived ones - it's quite amusing to hear a torrent of Hindi or Urdu and then mobile or PC, DVD or even hair straighteners being laced into the conversation

[Tiffany]

Your & you're is often written/typed wrongly too.

Look after your money.
You're ( you are) a bit late.

Man without woman, is nothing. Poohcarrot

[Tiffany]

The other thing I hate is textspeak typed on forums. Some people are just too lazy to type the words properly. On a forum it really isn't necessary to do it. Fine if you want to write a book on your phone message. Personally I don't, I message in normal text. OK, it probably costs more, but at least the recipient can understand it.

[Tonyblack]

I also text message using proper words. I don't care if it costs more, I can't bring myself to use l33t or textspeak.

Good lord! I just found a Google search engine for l33ters.

[LadyL]

The other thing I hate is textspeak typed on forums. Some people are just too lazy to type the words properly. On a forum it really isn't necessary to do it. Fine if you want to write a book on your phone message. Personally I don't, I message in normal text. OK, it probably costs more, but at least the recipient can understand it.

I agree with you Tiffany, especially as a non-native-writer I try to type the words properly

but spoiled by spending hours on MSN or ICQ I got at least used to some common abbreviations meanwhile.

And I admit, Im definitely toooo lazy to type the english " ´ " all the time

[Straw Walker]

I also text message using proper words. I don't care if it costs more, I can't bring myself to use l33t or textspeak.

Good lord! I just found a Google search engine for l33ters.

Oh dear, was that really in English? I'd need the resources of Bletchley Park to decipher that.

[Tiffany]

The other thing I hate is textspeak typed on forums. Some people are just too lazy to type the words properly. On a forum it really isn't necessary to do it. Fine if you want to write a book on your phone message. Personally I don't, I message in normal text. OK, it probably costs more, but at least the recipient can understand it.

I agree with you Tiffany, especially as a non-native-writer I try to type the words properly

but spoiled by spending hours on MSN or ICQ I got at least used to some common abbreviations meanwhile.

And I admit, Im definitely toooo lazy to type the english " ´ " all the time

I use plain English on msn too, all my pals do, but we are not youngsters

[Dotsie]

I'll admit to being the sort of person who itches to correct signs with spelling mistakes or errant apostrophes, but that's because people should check before they go sticking them up! On forums, it doesn't bother me at all. We all type quickly, and there's no spell checker, but the enjoyment is all about the content of the message anyway.

On American spellings - interestingly, in science we have a universal language. (It's English, which is lucky for me, because I go to conferences in different countries & I don't have to learn the language to understand the lectures.) But some American spellings have been adopted into this universal language (sulfur is one), and some are English (such as Aluminium).

I have absolutely no problem with different American spellings. Languages evolve, that's all there is to it, and to slag off the most powerful nation in the world over a couple of missing "u"s is a bit childish. And it's only natural that we should adopt some Americanisations, since we have a lot of American television programs over here. In the evolution of the genome, different species develop when individuals of one species are separated, eg by continental drift. But if they meet again before they are too different, there will be some mixing of characteristics, just like in American English & our own variety.

[Tonyblack]

It does get funny when Sharlene refers to her handbag as her purse and her purse as her wallet.

As to posts on the board here or other boards - there's a big difference between people who try hard to get things right but have trouble with spelling or typing - and it's another thing when people post in shorthand. Some shorthand such as LOL, PMSL and IYKWIM have become acceptable om message boards, but that doesn't always mean people will know what you mean if you use them. It took me ages to work out what 'LOL' meant.

When posting on a message board it's important, I think, to try and remember that although you may know what you mean, it doesn't mean others will.

[poohbcarrot]

IYKWIM??

[Tonyblack]

IYKWIM??

If You Know What I Mean - which kind of proves the point that not everyone knows these things.

[Jan Van Quirm]

ROTFLMAO (Roll On The Floor Laughing My Arse Off - the 'The' is optional too which didn't exactly help - was one I found very hard to work (figure ) out.

I've always had trouble with acronyms to the point of hatred (but that was at work). So with a central government IT background it got to be pretty annoying as they are of course necessary (well justified anyway) in computing and other industries these days, but it really got to me when I read a paper on procedural 'protocols' for minutes and meeting records and it kept going on about TLAs and FLAs - I was like what the f*ck? Can you guess what they stood for?

TLA = 3 letter acronyms...
Even worse were the FLAs - same principle except they could be 4 or 5 letter acronyms.

The world went mad long ago but then we always knew our so-called social leaders got there first...

[Straw Walker]

When I started this thread, I was asking which words or phrases members liked or disliked and it's been interesting to see some examples.

I still think 'get' is an ugly word. I agree it's short and to the point but it can often be replaced by something better. Receive, incur, obtain, and buy are some examples which are often more precise. 'I went to the shop to get some sweets'. Did you steal them or buy them?

I am currently trying to dissuade my Grandson from everyday use of text speak. I know 15 year old boys are notoriously monosyllabic, but TY for thank you and LOL when I tell my latest funny story are just a step too far. Or perhaps my jokes are just not funny?

I like the comments about punctuation and use of the apostrophe, something that often makes me pause and think. Has its and it's been mentioned as a common mistake?

Jan mentioned 'Bum' in the context of English and American usage. If a word could be visually onomatopoeic?

[Jan Van Quirm]

Well both versions are pretty stinky too I love words that 'paint' pictures