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I tell you, that will, I fear, become Standard English within twenty years.
go and look up "should of", "would of" and "could of" on G. Frightening stats.
I am actually an English teacher abroad so this subject is close to my heart. I see things on forums on a daily basis which my First Certificate students would shudder at.
another fave: "I work on my site everyday."
agh!
and my personal favourite ... are in place of our! Yeeesh!
If you go through the long Google update posts, you'll find hundreds more! :)
We will probably have to agree to differ and to join forces to defend the breach of such monstrosities as Marcia has elucidated ..
BTW ..Marcia ..there is also popsicle :)
Essex boy is to be exonerated from our reprobation on the grounds he is young and from Essex and therefore suffers the dual adverse effects of post 70's education and environmental influences ..and bad posture contracted during the driving of reliant robins [auta5p.car.cz]..yes that really is what passed for a car in the UK ..and yes ..only ( fools and horses ) and the inhabitants of Eastern Great Britain ( and apparently eastern European "hot rodders" ;))) could regard them with affection ..;)
With regard to the fora here ..it is interesting to note that whilst most posters who would claim english as their first language actually post relatively coherently ..the titles of threads frequently contain the most elementary errors ..
However ,
There is another forum I visit wearing one of my other "artistic hats" with primarily American posters where the level of english evidenced by those under the age of 50 is so bad one is forced to assume that they find their way across country by memory as they cannot possibly expect the road signs to be written in the manner they themselves think the words such as the names of their own home towns are spelt..their job descriptions are "admins" and "tech support" or "management" ..and yet the level of english is that of a child of 7 years old in the 1960's in an average primary school ..
The same applies to most communications I receive from the UK ..and France ..in fact one is forced to admit that the most accurate use of language is frequently reserved to the email spammers ..they at least "know" when they miss spell , or use a word out of all context ..
unlike much of the web ..
Read the adsense or the update fora here ..in the main semi literates writing about how they can pay peanuts for articles to make a dollar per day for their "relavant sites" ..that "shoold be on numbah wun" ..
my remarks on the adsense and update threads were typed without having seen Liane's comment ..they do have to constitute the zone where a verb , noun or just coherency would fear to tread ..let alone rationality of any sort ..I have to confess all those bridges and the bleating there sometimes is just more than I can resist before the first shards of sunlight force me away
[edited by: Leosghost at 11:34 pm (utc) on Dec. 21, 2005]
The former is natural ..the latter demeans the user and the listener or reader ..
And most importantly is bad for communication of ideas and concepts , feelings etc ..
Bad communication induces missunderstandings , and can in extremis lead to disputes and even wars ..
Where I live now ..France , the situation is worse the language is artificially ossified in the name of national and cultural identity ..and the consequent pendulum swing by the young who wish their language to "live " a little has resulted in linguistic barbarism where many can no longer understand the "patois" used by those who live 200 kms away from them even if sent as SMS ( here known as "textos" ) ..as a result of being too rigid on the one hand and just lazy on the other ..their language will die within 2 or 3 centuries inspite of the frenzied jingoistic efforts of their cynical politicians to confuse language and identity and worth .
Said politicians speak for the most part very good english ..however they disparage this language at every opportunity to their own people as the "invader" and destroyer of their culture ..they make damn sure their own kids are fluent english speakers too .
"you should of known better"
I tell you, that will, I fear, become Standard English within twenty years.
That's probably because the spoken usage is often contracted as should've, etc. I see it a lot too. Hmmm.... "alot" instead of "a lot" is another.
Actually the use of the apostrophe in the possessive sense to which I was referring was in Marcia's or oneguy's or Lawman's etc ..although the contraction of "it has" is in fact making a contraction of a possessive .."has" being an indicator of possession.
lol... now you're just confusing me. I suppose you are right about the indicator of possession.
This is somewhat within the realms of arguing over...
That's why we're in foo. We'd be headed to an english grammar/spelling forum if we were too worried about it. :)
I don't think any of the english spelling or grammar stuff bothers me much. I just sail right through it. Seeing someone call another a "looser" is usually funny to me because of the context.