The Demise of The King's English

The St. Pete Times had an interesting article about the Death of the English Language in yesterday’s paper, by Gene Weingarten. It was very funny.

Regarding the death of English, most people seemed unconcerned. Anthony Incognito, an average man in the street, said, “Between you and I, I could care less.”

Weingarten cites other examples of poor usage and blatant mistakes. He even criticizes something I thought was a definite improvement: the use of "alot" as a word describing an amount. He feels that newspapers should definitely use spell-checkers, especially ones which can detect that the word "pronounciation" is misspelled. He says it has been misspelled in several newspapers, including the Boston Globe and St. Paul Pioneer Press, as well as the Contra Costa, where it appears in a column apologizing for previous misspellings of the word!

Thanks, Gene, I'm LOL. Oops, is that correct?

I find it very ironic, that in the same newspaper, on the same day, I find a book review, of a new book, entitled, The Glamour of Grammar, a Guide to the Magic and Mystery of Practical English, by Roy Peter Clark.

The author believes that the English language is magic, and that the words, grammar and glamour, both come from the same root. He also points out that "spell," can refer to the letters in a word, as well as to an enchantment.

I only read half the review and I want to go out and buy this book!

Coincidentally, I have also discovered a blog which highlights the agony and the ecstacy of words and language. It is called Throw Grammar from the Train. This is a BLOG of NOTE on blogger. I am so priveleged to share the same virtual space with this writer who claims she is a "nitpicker." (Jan Freeman.)

It will probably soon show up on my blog as one of the blogs I follow.

I used to say, so many books, so little time, now I can also add, so many blogs, so little storage space on my computer!

I guess the thing is, that we don't speak the King's English in America, which is actually just the US portion of the North American continent, anyway. The King is dead and English is very much alive and constantly evolving! Long live the grammarians!

To Be or not to Besmirch

I have been giving this a lot of thought. You see, Besmirch and Smirch are synonyms, yet smirch is a transitive verb. So that means that you can besmirch someone, but not smirch them. Of course, after you besmirch them they can say they have been smirched, or even besmirched.

Makes perfect sense, right?! (stop smirking!)

Your Invitation

I cannot keep quiet about this. I saw a sign today that said:

Your invited!

This abuse of grammar must stop! This sign was probably written by a student in high school, but I saw the same thing on a flyer which my son brought home from school, which I assume was typed by his teacher. She should know better. How can she teach grammar to my son if she doesn't know this should say,
You're invited,
which means you are invited. "Your" is a possessive pronoun. I don't own an "invited." I actually couldn't, as it is a verb, not a noun!!!!!

So please use the correct grammar on your invitations.

Thank you!

Homer Simpson

Someone sent me the following link: http://grammar.about.com/od/rhetoricstyle/a/homerhet.htm
I’m into grammar, but I was completely overwhelmed by all the terminology. The author is more than an expert on grammar. He writes about style, too. Not fashion, but style as it applies to prose and poetry. Wow! I'm floored. Ican't belive Homer Simpson can be used as an example for certain parts of speech. He's not a good role model. But that's me being judgmental.