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Hackers, Spelling, and Grammar?
Strom Carlson asks: "Over the last few years, I've noticed that a surprisingly large number of native English speakers, who are otherwise very technically competent, seem to lack strong English skills. Mostly, this seems to manifest itself as varying degrees of poor spelling and grammar: 'definately' instead of 'definitely'; 'should of' instead of 'should have'; and I even see the names of products and companies misspelled from time to time. It baffles me that a culture so obsessed with technical knowledge and accuracy can demonstrate such little attention to detail when it comes to communicating that knowledge with others, and it baffles me even more that many people become enraged when you attempt to help them correct and learn from their mistakes. Do hackers and geeks just not care about communicating effectively? Do they not realize that a mediocre command of written English makes them appear less intelligent? Am I missing something here?"
Can...open...worms... everywhere.
I for one cannot agree with you enough here, Strom. Sadly, the epidemic of poor spelling/grammar is not confined to the tech world, but is pervasive throughout just about every aspect of American culture. I was raised and educated to believe that spelling and grammar counted...that the coherent presentation of your information was at least as important as the information itself. I don't know exactly when we as a society decided that coherence was no longer important...sometime in the mid-eighties, I'd guess.
I will agree with you, however, that this problem is especially apparent in the tech world. I've known many techs that not only didn't care about the rules of the English language, they actually regarded their ignorance of such rules as a perverse badge of honor, as if mastering the intricacies of the language was somehow beneath them. I've always found it intriguing that a programmer who could master several arcane computer languages (especially since computers are notably intolerant of errors), could fail so utterly to master his own native human language.
____
~ |rip/\/\aster /\/\onkey
Definately.
"Simplify, simplify, simplify!" Thoreau
As someone who is constantly picked on by these people, I can say that more than often, they are rude, have very little to add to any discussion, other than showing off their impressive command of the English language. I'd be more receptive if some of them made their response to the thread at hand, and did a BTW, but that's not what happens. Usually they are just have one line response that is rude, and often picking on one or two 'mistakes', and always critical of one's intelligence. I've said it before, but it's not the diction that matters, but the message. Good grammer is only helpful to get a message across. I'm not writing a fucking paper, it's an response in a damn forum.
Yes, good humor, understanding, and basic people skills.The force that blew the Big Bang continues to accelerate.
Hands up if you read through the paragraphs several times trying to find a mistake!
Technical precision requirement on programming language and human language is very different, for I am (and maybe many others are) extremely lazy and just want to get things done with as little effort as possible.
So if "return true;" works but not "ret tru", then I'm forced to use "return true;" every time.
However, if "alot" works as good as "a lot", I can use whatever comes to up mind at time of typing. When I was in highschool, few of us liked to say "os cof" in place of "of course" and it didn't affect our communication at all.
I think the main difference between a native English speaker and a foreign English user is the former heard a word before he learnt to write it, while the latter tends to learn to write and speak at the same time.
I'm shocked to see natives using "its good", "don't go their", these are mistakes that no foreigners will make.
I'm not sure why this has anything to do with hackers or geeks specificially. Racers, police and builders are all technically competent yet they can still make these kind of mistakes.
Rock that crushes, Paper & Scissors that don't matter.
Talk about your flamebate!
I watched C-beams glitter in the dark near the Tannhauser gate.
At georgia tech there is a road named Ferst street. Naturally the running joke is that they misspelled First Street.
HuKt aWn FoNix WerKt fer mE.
Seriously though, I think being taught phonix(sp? lol) as a child really hendered my spelling capabilities because so many words are spelled in ways they shouldn't...
The above sentence made me cry.
Video Phone Blogs send video messages straight to the web.
I tihnk taht seplnilg rellay deosnt matetr at all. For exmalpe, I bet taht you can raed tihs precfcetly fnie.
I bieelve it was proevn that as lnog as the frist and lsat lettres do not chnage, our brians can aoutomtacalily rearragne tehm and we have full comhenpresion.
I cnnaot fnid the lnik rgiht now but I am srue taht tihs was psoted on salhsodt a few mnoths ago.
Bet this
You know, the thing about that is... proper spelling and grammar make the writer look more "grown up". A tpyo or two are one thing, but if the grammar and spelling are at an eighth-grade level, I tend to assume that the writer is in the eighth grade. I'm always on the side of the grammar nazis on slashdot (even when they get me) because really poor grammar (from an otherwise obvious native English speaker) tend to make me discount the opinion of the poster. Although the grammar nazi victim may not think this is fair, I know I'm not alone... and you'd think that the poster would want to improve his/her writing skills just to make his/her opinions, thoughts, rantings, etc. more valuable to others.
Proud neuron in the Slashdot hivemind since 2002.
Actually, you are wrong.
"should of" is not the common usage.
"should've" is the common usage - which is a contraction of "should have"
However, some people, having only heard "should've" and mis-heard it as "should of", think that "should of" is the common usage.
www.eFax.com are spammers
(i.e. A report for work)
;-) (Sorry to pick on you.)
e g.html, or http://ancienthistory.about.com/od/abbreviations/f /ievseg.htm. (Note the use of "e.g." for "for example.")
Here's another thing that bothers me about common usage.
The abbreviation "i.e." does not mean "for example."
Repeat after me:
The abbreviation "i.e." does not mean "for example."
The abbreviation "i.e." does not mean "for example."
The abbreviation "i.e." does not mean "for example."
The abbreviation to use if you mean "for example" is "e.g.". The abbreviation "i.e." stands for (the Latin of) "that is."
I.e., "i.e." is used when you are rephrasing, clarifying, etc. what was already said. The sentence "i.e. A report for work", if taken literally, means that the only documents that matter to you are reports for work.
For more information, see, e.g., http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/8707/52862, http://www.planetoid.org/grammar_for_geeks/ie_vs_
(Sorry, I go on this rant periodically. Don't take it personally.)
I'm an American, but I also happen to speak fluent Russian, and lived in Russia for a number of years. I can say that, generally speaking, Russians are wonderfully anal-retentive about their language. They would correct my mistakes without a second thought, which helped me learn to speak well pretty quickly.
...And as far as I know, there is no governing body controlling the Russian language. Its speakers just appreciate it.
I knew one teenage girl while I was there was from Belarus, and her family spoke Belarussian at home, so her Russian was less than perfect - it was probably the quivalent of some backwoods "hick" English. She too was constantly corrected by her peers until she fixed her mistakes.
"I dislike the French because because they do not speak English, but I abhor the Americans because they speak English badly."
-Winston Churchill.
Aide-toi, le Ciel t'aidera - Jeanne D'Arc.
If someone's written work is devoid of some common rules of grammar and usage, does it matter if you completely and unambiguously understand what they are saying/writing?
Well, the first problem is that you are begging the question: why do you think it is possible to write clearly and unambiguously without recourse to conventional spelling, grammar, and usage? I think this is a highly doubtful proposition, because even clear and correct writing is often ambiguous. When I do understand bad writing, it is because I am smarter and have worked harder than the person who wrote it (remember, we are talking about native speakers, not geniuses who don't know the language.) Then too, bad writing is rude because it conveys the implicit message that time you save in writing is worth more than time I save in reading. But why do you think I should bother to read something you can't be bothered to write?
I think you are also mistaken in assuming that the only drawback of bad writing is that other people can't understand you. Literacy is a system, and if you are a bad writer you are unlikely to be a very good reader. Consider the locution I employed in my first paragraph: "begging the question." This phrase derives from a meaning of "begging" that is no longer current, namely "taking for granted." Because this is an antiquated meaning, many people interpret the phrase as "begging for the question." What's wrong with that? After all, language is continuously changing. Certainly. But if you don't even know the old meaning, and make a point of refusing to learn it, you have cut yourself off from the writings of earlier generations; writings that in many cases are more interesting than what you have to say now (that, after all, is why they have been preserved.) For my part, I believe that most people who misuse phrases like this do so in ignorance and are tacitly acknowledging my point: they have adopted the phrase, without understanding it, in hopes that by emulating better writing, their own will be more favourably received.
"The good reader is a rarer swan than the good writer."
Rosencrantz: Do you think Death could possibly be a boat?
Guildenstern: No, no, no... Death is "not." Death isn't. Take my meaning? Death is the ultimate negative. Not-being. You can't not be on a boat.
Rosencrantz: I've frequently not been on boats.
Guildenstern: No, no... What you've been is not on boats.
-Tom Stoppard, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are dead.
Aide-toi, le Ciel t'aidera - Jeanne D'Arc.
I agree!! For example, in Year 1 that useless letter "c" would be dropped to be replased either by "k" or "s", and likewise "x" would no longer be part of the alphabet. The only kase in which "c" would be retained would be the "ch" formation, which will be dealt with later. Year 2 might reform "w" spelling, so that "which" and "one" would take the same konsonant, wile Year 3 might well abolish "y" replasing it with "i" and Iear 4 might fiks the "g/j" anomali wonse and for all. Jenerally, then, the improvement would kontinue iear bai iear with Iear 5 doing awai with useless double konsonants, and Iears 6-12 or so modifaiing vowlz and the rimeining voist and unvoist konsonants. Bai Iear 15 or sou, it wud fainali bi posibl tu meik ius ov thi ridandant letez "c", "y" and "x" -- bai now jast a memori in the maindz ov ould doderez -- tu riplais "ch", "sh", and "th" rispektivli. Fainali, xen, aafte sam 20 iers ov orxogrefkl riform, wi wud hev a lojikl, kohirnt speling in ius xrewawt xe Ingliy-spiking werld. -Mark Twain
Sure, Slashdot is a conversational forum, and people write "from the hip" without absolute consideration to their spelling. But come on
How am I supposed to take anything someone says seriously, when their text is riddled with grammatical errors that my 14 year old nephew mastered years ago.
Native English speakers who can't express themselves without making childish mistakes like that, just appear thick! And it devalues anything of real importance they may have to say.
Have you also considered that if you practice spelling correctly all the time, then you're less likely to screw up when it really matters?
According to your own argument , minimizing a person's intellect based on their tendency to minimize another person's intellect is therefore also a form of racism, and you too are guilty of tying two unrelated concepts together to diminish a person's worth.
So, either you're wrong, a racist, or a hypocrite.
Could you clarify for us by letting us know which?
Based on your numerous spelling and grammar errors, I'm gleefully jumping on your minimization bandwagon and am guessing that you're merely wrong (which means neither of us are therefore necessarily racist! yay!) though I haven't ruled out hypocrite yet.
Oh, and Russian language is in fact regulated, by the Russian Academy of Sciences.
The parent is Mark Twain's proposal for the improvement of english spelling. Link
Pax tecum.
~Idarubicin
The Mark Twain quote reminded me of the following, printed in my high school yearbook and probably inspired by it: The Great European Dream The European Union commissioners have announced that agreement has been reached to adopt English as the preferred language for European communications, rather than German, which was the other possibility. As part of the negotiations, the British government conceded that English spelling had some room for improvement and has accepted a five-year phased plan for what will be known as EuroEnglish. In the first year, "s" will be used instead of the soft "c." Sertainly, sivil servants will resieve this news with joy. Also, the hard "c" will be replaced with "k." Not only will this klear up konfusion, but typewriters kan have one less letter. There will be growing publik enthusiasm in the sekond year, when the troublesome "ph" will be replaced by "f." This will make words like "fotograf" 20 per sent shorter. In the third year, publik akseptanse of the new spelling kan be expekted to reach the stage where more komplikated changes are possible. Governments will enkorage the removal of double letters, which have always ben a dterent to akurate speling. Also, al wil agre that the horible mes of silent "e"s in the languag is disgrasful, and they would go. By the fourth year, peopl wil be reseptiv to steps such as replasing "th" by "z" and "w" by "v." During ze fifz year, ze unesesary "o" kan be dropd from vords kontaining "ou," and similar changes vud of kors be aplid to ozer kombinations of leters. After zis fifz yer, ve vil hav a reli sensibl riten styl. Zer vil be no mor trubls or difikultis and evrivun vil find it ezi to understand ech ozer. Ze drem vil finali kum tru.
In order to understand English spelling, you first need to understand English (assembly of Japanese motorcycle requires great peace of mind).
All words in English are derived from words in other languages. The way words are spelt in English is determined by the language they came from, so when you learn a new word, you need to learn its etymology. Fortunately, this is in the dictionary (The Oxford University dictionary. Others don't count).
Unfortunately, the etymology is not entirely correct in many cases - most etymologists know their Latin, Greek, and French, and can read German text books, but know nothing of Arabic or Chinese or various Indian, and possibly African languages that may have been the origins of common English words, so they are rarely credited. Nothing is perfect except God.
Why is the preterite of run ran, yet the preterite of shun is shunned?I do not know the actual answer to this question, but there are normally two explanations for this, both working together. The change of vowel sound: run->ran is generally derived from Arabic, while the change of ending is a European (Greek, Latin) technique. The reason the difference is retained is generally to maximise the linguistic difference from words which might be confused in the same context. Context being both gramatical (similar positions in a sentence), and semantic (words with similar meaning). It may also be that this is specific to certain environments: the similarity might only occur in a classroom, printing house, or some other significant work environment. It might be to make the word easily distinguished from background noise in an environment where it was common.
English has developed in a darwinian manner, and the fact that you cannot tell the spelling from your local pronounciation is not necessarily a snag. Your accent is likely very different to mine. Within my family, we pronounce "there", "their" and "the're" recognisably differently. My wife's family pronouce "ear" and "hair" indistingushably.
I once worked on a speech synthesiser using a National Semis phonym based synthesiser chip. Unfortunately, although the users could easily tell which parts were programmed by me (with a Cambride accent) and which by my colleague (With a Newcastle accent) no one could understand what the damn thing was actually saying.
The problem is more complex than you think: People actually recognise English words by different features in different places. Yoruba speakers are used to a pitch language, and will always pronounce English words with the same pitch setting. They readily understand each other speaking English, but often find it hard to recognise English spoken by English people who use changes in pitch for emphasis.
Before the Internet was common, we had Fidonet. We found out on Fidonet that: If you obey the established spelling rules, people who are not native english speakers have a chance of understanding what you mean, even if they have to look up every word in the dictionary. If you don't, and try to write phonetically, then people outside your local area won't have a clue what you are talking about.
Sent from my ASR33 using ASCII
No, the spelling is NOT arbitrary. I don't know how many times I have to point this out in my life as a linguist. An arbitrary system is one like Japanese kanji, which have no phonetic component whatsoever. The fact that I can throw a word at you that you've never seen, like, for example, "orthography," and you can read it and pronounce it correctly is proof positive of this. The fact that the spoken==>written relationship is not as strong, however, is not proof of arbitrariness. It indicates something else--something people have already discussed here without realizing it (in discussions of the multitudinous influences on the development of English), and that is the concept of morphology.
/g/ followed by an /I/. The sound no longer exists in English.
Words usually do not exist all by themselves but are members of a "word family" (and yes that is the technical term). Word families are made up of forms of the same word which feature little to no extra learning burden to master given knowledge of one of the other forms. These relationships are best represented by fixed spelling of the morphemes, even when there are pronunciation differences.
Something like Japanese (kanji, not the hiragana and katakana syllabaries) or Chinese puts all their eggs in the morphology basket, and none in the phonetic. Words are comprised of morphemes which are represented by particular graphemes (kanji/hanzi). This is great once you learn all the morpheme/grapheme pairs, but at 15,000 for Chinese, the system requires a large initial investment of time and cognitive burden.
English splits the difference between a morpheme-centric and phonetic orthographic system, wherein spellings of morphemes are relatively regular, but they are also phonetic enough that anyone with a basic understanding of the phoneme-grapheme pairings of the English use of the Roman alphabet can at least make an excellent guess at the pronunciation.
And to the many lazy and weak-minded individuals who whine about how everything should be phonetic, I would like to point out that there is an entire alphabet designed for this: the International Phonetic Alphabet. Learn this and try reading some text in it. See if it's really easier. A morpheme-centered orthographic system allows for faster processing of text because it allows the reader to bypass the sound production phase entirely, linking written words directly to their meanings (resident in the brain).
So stop whining, whiners, and learn the system. It's just a system to aid in the transfer of information. It's there to help you, not keep you down, man.
And BTW, although Noah Webster gave birth to the modern science of lexicography, dictionaries did indeed exist before his tome. They were used as spelling lists, mostly. The phase in which the English didn't care about spelling to which you are referring was up to the introduction of the printing press. Once more reading material was available to the masses it was very rightly decided that spelling should be standardized throughout the industry (he wrote with the arguably NON-standard, American spelling of "standardised). Furthermore, the "gh" that's left over in many words, including "knight" was a voiced velar fricative, not a
The easy way to think about it is to consider "his, hers, its". When using "it's" you should be able to replace it with "it is", "it has" or similar and the sentence should still make sense.
its == 1 word
it's == 2 words
If you're unsure about which to use, see if "it is" works in the same place. If it doesn't, you should probably be using "its".It's a fairly simple construct, but I've seen English teachers get it wrong, and worse, teach the exact opposite.
It does seem to break the general rule of "an apostrophe indicates possession", but it's easy to think of "its" as a more specific rule that should supersede the use of "it's", if you're so inclined.
On a completely different note, does anyone find themselves previewing maybe a dozen times when posting about spelling or grammar? (And probably missing a half-dozen errors?)
Just to clear this up, the general rule is actually "When you leave a letter out, put in an apostrophe". This explains everything, including "it's", "won't", and the like.
The posessive is a leftover from the days when English had more noun declensions. For example, we still have "I", "me", and "my" as examples of the Nominative (Subject), Accusative (Object), and Genitive (Possessive) cases. Currently, a person's name would be represented as eg. "John", "John", "John's". But at one time, the Genitive case had an "i" in it, so it would've been "John", "John", "Johnis". You still occasionally see this in old place names. For example, the Spotswood hotel near here has embedded into its concrete "Spottiswoode".
People who prefer to avoid language history usually remember the apostrophe indication posessive as a secondary rule to the one about a letter being left out.
Hey ... you sound like you know what you're talking about. No fair.
The real Captain Avatar is a fictional character, so I suppose he doesn't mind if I impersonate him.
This article (PDF) suggests that the genitive ending was -es in Old English, and -ies or -ys in Middle English, and that the apostrophe was introduced as a replacement for omitted vowels.
However, he also describes an alternative view: that the apostrophe was originally used because of the mistaken assumption that the genitive ending was already a contraction of "his". Apparently even Shakespeare made this mistake...