30 Things to tell a Grammar Snob

I love language. I love good grammar. I tell my friends off when they get it wrong. I don't always get it right. They jump on me when I err!! Lol! I don't think being a posh politician or middle class makes anyone inherently good at grammar. They just think they are. There is a time for creativity and a time for accuracy. Some would say in order to break the rules well, you need to know what they are to begin with. For me, when grammar is used incorrectly it is like a discordant chime. Sometimes it jars, but sometimes it works (see Les Dawson and a piano) I get grammar. I don't get maths. Some people are the other way round. I am never seriously grumpy about grammar - but I do occasionally get exasperated by it.
Excellent blog. I agree and disagree in equal measure. I sincerely hope no-one causes you a nervous tummy ache over it. Their responses should be as well thought out and politely expressed as your post... *smileyface*

Thank you Matt for this. For me, you are talking lots of sense.

I agree, and as a recently published author I had trouble with copy editing; mostly over my obsession with semicolons. Also like you, I can carry on a conversation in German for hours and Arabic for a bit, but give me a grammar test and I'd fall on my face.
In all seriousness the written and spoken words are art and art is imperfect, it's crafted and molded and it evolves.
I will stand for wandering sentences, double negatives, problematic punctuation, many grammatical reaches, and even to where the end of the sentence might be. However, if I hear someone else say "my sister and me went to school" or for those who think "I" is always correct a "my sister and I were in school today" or "we been good" "he didn't tell me nothing" and many other egregious fax pas in language spoken in school or professional settings the my brain will explode as far as this sentence.
Maybe it's because it's standardized now, but I took grammar tests in school. I think children in an English speaking school should know the rules and how to follow them; but it doesn't mean they can't break them from time to time for fun.

No. 25 is yummy, Matt.

When was it ever "incorrect" to start a sentence with 'and" or "but"? No authority has ever considered it "incorrect". What do you mean that "English language was not always fixed"? It is no more fixed now than it has ever been in the past. A living language is always in flux, and while there are always rules accepted by a consensus of users there are a number -- 15 or 20 or so that date from the time people attempted to impose the rules of Latin on English that are bogus rules. That you should never split infinitives, or never strand prepositions are two such bogus rules. I agree with the general trend of what you're saying and applaud it, but your knowledge of language and grammar leaves a little to be desired. Isn't, for example, all language still dialect? I think most linguists would argue it is. Yes, the fundamentalist prescriptivists are an enormous pain in the butt who do more harm to language than good, but it's a pity you didn't do a little more research yourself, perhaps. Still, I think you are on the side of the angels, and don't want to discourage you. There are a number of sites and books that I think you may like, but I won't post them here now.

I mostly agree. But 18. Evolution happens through mistakes is only part of the story. First there are mistakes, then there is survival of the fittest.

English is a beautiful language because of the tension between the creative mistake-maker and the grammar pedant. The latter helps ensure nothing ugly becomes permanent.

For me, grammar is about preserving the beauty of the language for that allows us subtlety in communication. But you're right: it shouldn't be used to make people feel stupid.

No.11
I would argue that you cannot quantify idiosyncrasy...

1. Yes.

2. Yes, it does, but only in combination with other methods. On its own, it’s useless.

3. OK

4. True, but you do want to be understood. Some grammatical “rules” breaking as such order word make may hard to understand you’re saying what. And if you go to a market trader and say, “tomorrow save oranges some please me for you can?”, you will probably receive a blank stare. If you then explain yourself by saying “Surely you know that language is in a permanent state of flux and these grammatical rules have been arbitrarily imposed on the creativity of English speakers?” it won’t help you much. He'll just tell you to off piss.

5. Perhaps, but when you’re a genius you’re allowed a little slack. The rest of us are socially obliged to conform - life would be bloody hard work if we were all as creative and subtle as Shakespeare.

6. Prescriptive grammar, certainly with regard to other languages, is much older than that.

7. It depends what I’ve got wrong and whether I think the other person is right.

8. The problem here is what language really is. We use it for communication, yes, but it doesn’t just communicate nicely packaged ideas about how we think the world is. When we speak we also transmit how we see our social status and identity and others also draw conclusions about us according to the way we speak (or write). We say “I did that” or “I done that” partly because of the social group we wish to identify with. In the social group of “middle-class professionals”, which writers and many of their readers tend to hail from, the second option is frowned upon. This is arbitrary, but you either accept it or face the disapproval of the majority of the members of that social group, with the consequences that that brings with it.

9. Why stop with apostrophes? Why not commas? Spaces? Capital letters? They are all arbitrary conventions, but, on the whole, they do seem to help the reader understand the text. In most western written genres at least, the emphasis is on the writer to make reading as pleasurable and straightforward as possible. In long sentences especially, a lack of punctuation can cause serious comprehension problems.

10. Generally I try to avoid using it in the singular. There’s no doubt English is not perfect: sometimes a set of pronouns and a demonstrative adjective with which to refer to a third person without having to specify his/her/their sex would be very handy.

11. Of course) and it, will doubtless change again( but having a standard! to aim at help’s understanding and – avoids ¿unnecessary? distractions

12. No arguments. They were a pain.

13. It’s a question of style.

14. Maybe. The rule isn’t that difficult though - the arithmetic a market trader needs to use is far more taxing.

15. It depends how you judge it. Many, many more people are able to write successfully now in English, due to the fact that many more people have been taught to read and write. Dictionaries have formed part of that process.

16. No, you’re right: that is rude and unhelpful. She freely admits that she is perhaps overly obsessive. Some parts of her book are very, very funny though.

17. I’m with you on that one.

18. OK.

19. Surely that’s never been the aim of any such textbook?

20. The problem is writing. Speech comes relatively easy to use, but writing is a hard-won skill, of which punctuation is only one part. Spelling is another part and, yes, the rules are arbitrary. You are free to disobey them, but others may not understand what you mean.

21. True. There’s the old adage of “a language is a dialect with an army and a navy” – the point being that the difference between them is merely a political one. The problem, again, is that if you want to communicate with different people from outside you village or region, then you have to do so in a way that they will understand. We have “English” for this purpose – it’s far from perfect but how would you go about improving it? There’s nothing particularly special about English grammar, spelling and punctuation, but if you stray from the standard, I may not know what you mean. Think about how lawyers can argue over the meaning of single word, or where a comma is. It might seem trivial, but a decision one way or the other could send someone to prison or suffer a huge fine. Precision can matter.

22. It’s a classic problem, but again, it goes back to identity. Which social group do you wish to form part of? If you want to be part of a particular group, the easiest way is to assimilate: to do what they do, language included. You may be able to do this while retaining some individuality, but too much and you won’t be accepted. Harsh, but that’s the way humans roll.

23. Of course, which is why prescriptive grammatical rules change. 50 years ago, you could not have got away with using “who” instead of “whom” in a newspaper. Now, it’s more acceptable, but only because it’s become widespread. It’s quite democratic really, although, within this system, some are more equal (or more prestigious) than others.

24. “We're heading back to hieroglyphics.” Is this a good thing? How do you pronounce an emoticon? I see status updates on Facebook that I barely understand because they are so garbled. That could lead to some social fragmentation – if I can’t understand you, maybe I’ll just ignore you.

25. “Ordinary language has no exact logic” – P.F. Strawson, the language philosopher. The thing is not everyone would agree that language has no logic – Chomsky, for one.

26. I agree totally that learning a language, whether it’s your own or a foreign language, is about far, far more than just grammar. Yet the idea that you could learn a foreign language well without considering its grammar is utterly naive, because it’s as much a part of it as its pronunciation or vocabulary.

27. Definitely. Split infinitives are a load of rubbish, but don’t lump together some of the wrong-headed ideas about grammar with the stuff that’s useful. No one form is “better” in an absolute sense, but if you use a language in way that significantly diverges from how other people use it, maybe you’re not speaking the same language after all.

28. Hmm. As I say, invent your own grammar. Be a bold cook, make something radically different and see how far you get.

29. People have always complained about language use and they always will. The conflict between language variation and change and the standard, parts of which inevitably fossilize, will always be with us. Possibly in the future “innit” will be standard (or the prestige variant, if you like), but teenagers will say “inyi” instead. Then some old codger called Matt will complain that things ain’t like they used to be.

30. Again, sometimes precision matters. Just one letter can make all the difference. Isn’t the distinction between “I have few problems with this” and “I have a few problems with this” a useful one? If you use one when you mean the other, should I tell you or let you blunder on into social oblivion?

Having successfully missed grammar during my formative education; I am unsure if I should feel bereft or enlightened (maybe bother feelings are the same).

Lacking any English qualification of value, I write for my living and have enjoyed the royalty payments of some thirteen books so far.

Do I make grammar mistakes, yes, often. But, (breaking one of your suggested rules) I seem to succeed in getting the point across and being asked back for more.

It does seem that the grammar snob has some personal and repressed issues from their own educational experience. Maybe secretly they wish to misplace their apostrophe but something deep and dark inside prevents them.

Well done: you've just made accuracy redundant. Why not have a go at teachers for bothering trying to teach anything while you're at it? I'm totally offended by your comments and extremely disheartened. Is this your way of saying your grasp on written English is pitiful? NO excuses after the years of free education you receive. A moral and social obligation to learn how to write properly is everyone's. How you must love illiteracy.

Brilliant! What bloody good sense. However, I teach young wanna-be writers - and their lack of grammar does means I often really don't understand what they are getting at (they are scared of paragraphs in case they get them wrong!). Can we have rules learned, so they can then be broken with style?

Well said! And you are not alone:

Higgledy-piggledy
Emily Dickinson
Liked to use dashes
Instead of full stops.

Nowadays, faced with such
Idiosyncrasy,
Critics and editors
Send for the cops.

~ Wendy Cope

There ought to be a Godwin's Law about invoking Shakespeare to argue against standardised grammar.

Also "Language should feel fun"?

Who could disagree with all the points you made there? But that's the weakness in your argument. You set up 30 Aunt Sallys which you easily knock down. What about a nod to the fact that some so called "pedants" just don't like to see others making mistakes and want to save them from further embarrassment? If I saw you with your flies undone on your way to meeting the Queen should I say nothing for fear of embarrassing you?