Apostrophe amusement …

Candidates for the therapy of  GRAMMARHOLICS (not so) ANONYMOUS … ? Virtual meetings are available regularly!

Be sure to visit our friends over at Apostrophe Abuse, Apostrophe Catastrophes, Apostrophism, and, of course, Apostrophe Police, …

Read Full Post »

On the radio …

Listen here … The Grammar Police on You Are What You Speak

This week, we had the honor of participating in a radio feature on the national morning radio show, The Takeaway (produced by Public Radio International, WNYC, the BBC, WGBH Boston, and The New York Times). What fun!

The request was for an interview, “… to discuss your issues with language usage and misusage. Should we be trying to stop the world’s grammatical errors? Or should we accept the various misuses as part of our evolving language?”

In addition, Robert Lane Greene, author of “You Are What You Speak,” was the second guest. In his opinion, language policing is often just about supporting class, ethnic and national prejudices. 

Check it out … and, thanks for listening!

Listen here … The Grammar Police on You Are What You Speak

P.S. This book is now required reading for our GrammarGuard and recommended reading for our GrammarGuild and other followers.

P.P.S. Click here to read about what started the feud with Hanes …

Read Full Post »

GRAMMARHOLICS (not so) ANONYMOUS …

Have you been to a meeting lately?

THE TWELVE STEPS OF GRAMMARHOLICS (not so) ANONYMOUS

1. We admitted we were powerless over proper grammar—that our grammar had become unmanageable.

2. Came to believe that a grammar greater than that which we use ourselves could restore us to proper usage.

3. Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the use of proper grammar as we learned it.

4. Made a searching and fearless oral, verbal, and written inventory of our grammar.

5. Admitted to the Grammar Police, to ourselves, and to a grammar school teacher the exact nature of our misusage.

6. Were entirely ready to have proper grammar remove all these defects of usage.

7. Humbly asked for proper grammar to remove our shortcomings.

8. Made a list of all grammar rules we had broken, and became willing to make corrections to them all.

9. Made direct corrections to such grammar rules wherever possible, except when to do so would perpetuate a miscommunication of them or others.

10. Continued to take an personal inventory of our grammar and when we were wrong promptly admitted it.

11. Sought through sentence structure and punctuation to improve our conscious contact with proper grammar, as we learned it, seeking only for knowledge of grammar’s will for us and the proper usage to carry that out.

12. Having had a grammatical awakening as the result of these Steps, we tried to carry this message to grammarholics, and to practice these principles in all our communications.

One day at a time …

Copyright © 2010 Grammar Police a.k.a. GrammarCops

Read Full Post »

A note to Felicity …

Dear Felicity,

Please see our post: I is not an object …

You have provided several examples to ask your one question. This makes the answer more complex than the one word responses you received on the Web site.

What you ask is, effectively, which should be used as a subject, I or me? “Betty and I (subject) are going out.” is correct here. “Betty and me are going out.” is incorrect. It is not surprising to us that you have heard incorrect usage on TV. We could likely make a living correcting grammatical misuse on TV.

Now, when you move on to your … “Or join Betty and me.” you have changed the question … this is correct because, as we mentioned in our earlier post, “I is not an object …” In this case, me is correctly used as an object.

BTW, we recommend spell checking the title of your post: “… English/grammer”

Thank you for your (unknowing) contribution to our blog.

Sincerely,

GrammarCops

Read Full Post »

R U sure your you’re is pure?

Our unplanned Grammar Goof theme-of-the-day emerged from these observations:

 In a banker’s response to a customer successfully accessing Internet Banking: “I’m glad to hear that your in.” Should be: you’re.

 In a Twitter reply: “Your quite welcome …” Should be: You’re.

In a Facebook Wall message: “Excited your on facebook.” Should be: you’re.

In another Facebook Wall comment: “… your awesome and I am proud to be …” Should be: you’re.

Thanks to Nancy Wombat for this entry:

Should be your.

And, thanks to a homeseller in Missouri for (unknowingly) contributing to this post …

Should be you’re.

Here are the rules …

your. pronoun.

• (a form of the possessive case of you used as an attributive adjective): Your jacket is in that closet. I like your idea. Compare yours. 
• one’s (used to indicate that one belonging to oneself or to any person): The consulate is your best source of information. As you go down the hill, the library is on your left.  
• (used informally to indicate all members of a group, occupation, etc., or things of a particular type): Take your factory worker, for instance. Your power brakes don’t need that much servicing.  

you’re.

• contraction of you are: You’re certain that’s right?
   

BTW (by the way), in Textspeak …

• UR = your
• U R (with a space) = you are or you’re
• R U (with space) = are you?

Sources: dictionary.com, Flickr, Facebook, Twitter

Read Full Post »

Neogrammaticalism …

This week, on Twitter, we corrected a tweet …

from:

“Proper grammar and punctuation is a turn on.”

to:

@GrammarCops: Proper grammar and punctuation ARE a turn on 🙂

This led to an interesting Twitter conversation with one of our Followers (Tweeps). It went something like this …

@mergyeugnau: But where is the punctuation at the end of that sentence? *heartbroken* 

@GrammarCops: Isn’t the 🙂 acceptable Twitter punctuation? Just like some dot an i with a heart  … can’t we use a 🙂 as a period? Reprieve?

@mergyeugnau: I will accept it as your custom in the future. What is the equivalent of a neologism – a neoregulism perhaps?

@GrammarCops: NEOPUNCTISM

@mergyeugnau:  I think that ‘neopunctism’ is the correct word for a subset of grammatical ‘neoregulisms’ that is specific to punctuation.

We just wanted to share with you this excellent example of neologism, and introduce you to a few neowords of the day:

neologism. noun.

• a new word, meaning, usage, or phrase.
• the introduction or use of new words or new senses of existing words.
• a new doctrine, esp. a new interpretation of sacred writings.
• Psychiatry. a new word, often consisting of a combination of other words, that is understood only by the speaker: occurring most often in the speech of schizophrenics.

neoregulism. noun.

• a new law, rule, or other order prescribed by authority (such as Grammar Police a.k.a. GrammarCops, their Deputies and/or Twitter Followers), esp. to regulate grammar or conduct.
• the introduction or use of new regulations or the state of being neoregulated.
• Thanks to @mergyeugnau

neopunctism. noun.

• a new punctuation mark or punctuation usage.
• the introduction or use of new punctuation or new senses of existing punctuation.
• a new precept, esp. a new interpretation of sacred punctuation.
• Twittery. a new punctuation mark or usage, often consisting of a combination of other punctuation marks, that may only be understood only by the Twitterer: occurring most often in the text of schizophrenic Twitterers.

Sources: Twitter (esp. @mergyeugnau and @GrammarCops), dictionary.com

Read Full Post »

Phishy grammar …

Got this spam/phishing email a few weeks ago about unusual bank activity and a possible suspension of a bank account … yeah, right.

Anyway, the email is in need of the Grammar Police and Comma Clout, so here goes …

“Dear Bank Customer_ ,

Because of unusual number of invalid login attempts on your account, we had to believe that, their might be some security problem on your account…”

Comma Clout needed:

• 1.remove the space before the comma in the greeting: “Dear Bank Customer,”
• 2.remove the comma before the incorrectly-used “their” in the first sentence: “… we had to believe that …”

Grammar Policing needed:

• “their” should be “there:” “… we had to believe that there might be …”

See the Grammar Police blog post: “There you have it … ” for more on There vs. Their (and They’re).

Read Full Post »

Cast(ed) away …

UPDATE: We read a tweet today (on Twitter) that led to this update/re-post …

“Keep reading ‘I casted on # stitches’. Makes me cranky. Past tense is ‘I cast on..’  Isn’t it? Or did my mother, the Grammar Queen, fail me?”

No, your mom, the Grammar Queen did not fail you!

==========================================

The idea for this post was cast in a sales meeting …

The sales reps, without exception, compared their last period’s results to what they had “forecasted.”

How do you feel when you hear fingernails scrape down a chalkboard? Want to see a grammarian cringe?

This post is not meant to be a full lesson on regular and irregular verbs and formation of all the tenses, but merely a focused rant on a couple of contemporary offenses involving the word “cast,” namely, “forecast” and “broadcast.”

Bear with us …

… an angler’s line was never casted

… she never casted her eyes in his direction

… Samantha never casted a spell upon Darrin

… actors are never casted for their roles, and

… the artist never casted a mold.

Agreed?

Why, then, would one refer to their last month’s sales projections as having been forecasted, or last week’s episode as having been broadcasted? We don’t get it!

So, go forth, heed this warning, forecast great results and broadcast fantastic entertainment, just, please, don’t let us catch you in possession of or using the ~ed, having forecasted or broadcasted, unless you want to be cast in the GrammarGallows.

Read Full Post »

To Observe and Correct

That’s why we’re here …

Read Full Post »

GrammarGauge

Read Full Post »