apostrophes,misused,grammar,possessive,omissions,not,plural Steve's Grammatical Observations: The Misuse of Apostrophe's
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oops.
Apostrophes are only used for contractions! They are in place of letters that are no longer pronounced in the spoken language.
For example, the possessive used to be explicit. For example, "Bob's car" used to be "Bob his car". The apostrophe is used in place of the "hi" because we no longer pronounce those letters in modern English. The feminine form got dropped completely, in case you are curious.
This explains the problem with "it's" and "its". We used to say something like "The wagon its wheel came off." Shortened, that would be "Its wheel came off." There's no contraction there, it's just assumed that you know what "it" is. And from there you can see the only proper use of the apostrophe is when you are contracting "it is".
"The wagon isn't here. Its wheel came off. It's in the shop."
See? Not possessive, just contraction.
Don't get me started on "your" and "you're".
Also, I've heard a slightly different explanation of our use of apostrophes for possessives. I agree that it had to do with a contraction of an old form, but rather than a contraction of the possessive, it was an elision of part of an obsolete genitive case ending.
E.g.: "cartes wheel" eventually became "cart's wheel" as the use of inflected endings declined in English. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apostrophe_(mark)#Possessive_apostrophe
One final thing: Considering I began typing this comment to show my disapproval for this video's rant, I feel that I may have nullified my own argument by going on and on like I have ended up doing. I apologize.
Thanks for clearing that up. And those Wikipedia grammar entries are pretty detailed!
You're (there's a good apostrophe right as I'm typing this) welcome.
Boy. He didn't even say anything about the position of the apostrophe in plural possessives, nor possessive "its" which doesn't use an apostrophe.
And he didn't get into pluralized abbreviations "CD's, DVD's, etc..." which I presume is still technically wrong but more accepted.
If you don't know whether you should be using an apostrophe don't use it.
I was actually tempted to downvote this. I've never felt that way about a video before tonight. This is a first. Listen, I'm a language student; I know how much time you have to spend memorizing all those arcane rules. But, people getting pissed about grammar irks me.
Yea, it's like people who are really anal about using all of mathematics' rules correctly.
;-)
Juz becus langwich is evulvin doesn't not meen anything cans.
Language is evolving you guy's.
ARGH! MY BRAIN! (clutches at skull)
It's nice to see someone being as OCD about the English language as I am in my head whenever I encounter someone making an obvious mistake.
He should do one on 'their, they're, there' and 'your, you're.' Those really bug me as well.
Some other things with regard to syntactically valid punctuation that bother me are commas at the end of a list with three items and punctuation within quotation marks.
When someone lists 3 or more items, they separate each item with a comma except before the last. For example:
> The cow ate hay, grass and wheat.
That sentence would much better be written:
> The cow ate hay, grass, and wheat.
Why? I'll tell you why. It's confusing because some of the items in your list could include "and" within them. For example:
> The cow ate fish and chips, steak and spaghetti and meatballs.
It's still acceptable syntax to use all the commas, but it's also valid to exclude the last one, and nowadays most people seem to do the latter.
The punctuation in quotation marks thing is bothersome because you should be allowed to validly emphasize your statement without making it appear that your emphasis is part of the quote. For example, you'd have to write:
> Did you hear Obama scream, "We're going to the mattresses?!"
That makes it look like Obama is asking a question. It'd be clearer to write:
> Did you hear Obama scream, "We're going to the mattresses!"?
Sure it doesn't look as pretty but it's a lot less ambiguous.
About lists, I find it makes things much more clear to always use a comma between items. Sometimes I go crazy and use semicolons when there are items in the list that need to have commas within them.
"Nother" is not a word, folks.
In that vein, it is easy to see why people would extend its use towards separating an unfamiliar noun from the modifier that makes it plural. It keeps the name intact and separate from the modifiers. Per habit I don't like the use of apostrahpes in plurals, but there doesn't seem to be a good reason to oppose it unless it causes ambiguity. I don't know of any situation where you can substitute a plural noun for a posessive noun, without making any other changes to the sentence, and retain grammatical correctness and reasonable meaning.
And along those lines, anal grammar rules remind me of hamming codes... The redundancy is not entirely useless. It can be beneficial in detecting or correcting errors in transmission. So go ahead and follow rules of grammar.
lucky760: It's not a true word, per se, but usually, when written, it's spelled with an apostrophe: 'nother. That is to say, it's slang. It's like saying "hey, y'all wanna come down an' hang out with the fellas?" Some of those aren't words either, but it's a means of stitching verbal accent into written form. However, using it in that way also violates the sentence structure, since you can't really say "a whole another story" without looking like a wiener.
budzos: oh man; I should have seen that coming. I'm so with you there.
There's an enormous difference between saying "a whole nother" and saying "an' hang out." In the former, if what you claim is true, that "nother" is short for "another", you'd be saying "a whole another" which is obviously a slap in the face of the English language.
Using a word that doesn't exist can't always just be explained away as slang, however comforted you feel by doing so.
"However, using it in that way also violates the sentence structure, since you can't really say 'a whole another story' without looking like a wiener."
Basically, we agree.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eats_shoots_and_leaves
I don't want any explanations. I just want to keep hating it.
Edit: I just read lucky's post. Such kinship.
I was actually tempted to downvote this. I've never felt that way about a video before tonight. This is a first. Listen, I'm a language student; I know how much time you have to spend memorizing all those arcane rules. But, people getting pissed about grammar irks me.
Also, I've heard a slightly different explanation of our use of apostrophes for possessives. I agree that it had to do with a contraction of an old form, but rather than a contraction of the possessive, it was an elision of part of an obsolete genitive case ending.
E.g.: "cartes wheel" eventually became "cart's wheel" as the use of inflected endings declined in English. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apostrophe_(mark)#Possessive_apostrophe
One final thing: Considering I began typing this comment to show my disapproval for this video's rant, I feel that I may have nullified my own argument by going on and on like I have ended up doing. I apologize.
just don't apostrophize or proselytize.
On another subject:
mine
yours
his
hers
its
ours
theirs
WHY IS THAT SO DIFFICULT?
Uh, yes, they do. People who don't read much do it all the time. Are you for real!?
Trust me, I can discern the difference between hearing "could've" which is correct, and hearing "could of" which gives me douche chills. Stupid people do it CONSTANTLY.
You make no sense. If they write "could of" why would they use a contraction of "could have" when they speak? They write it and say it the same way, because they are fucking illiterate.
While we're at it, how about people who say "I SEEN that yesterday"? Ugh, it's such a turn-off.
Other then that I use it properly for the most part, even when to properly address a name, which I find a great many people get wrong.
Uh, yes, they do. People who don't read much do it all the time. Are you for real!?
Trust me, I can discern the difference between hearing "could've" which is correct, and hearing "could of" which gives me douche chills. Stupid people do it CONSTANTLY.
You make no sense. If they write "could of" why would they use a contraction of "could have" when they speak? They write it and say it the same way, because they are fucking illiterate.
While we're at it, how about people who say "I SEEN that yesterday"? Ugh, it's such a turn-off.
Perhaps you can give an example? Just because somebody puts a bit more emphasis on the "uh" between "could" and "ve" doesn't mean they actually think they are saying "of". I think you're being overly critical of an accent. What region are you hearing this in?
(See? There again is that punctuation inside quotes thing that bugs me so much.)
jwray: Ouch. Your post really bothers me with the extreme amount of misspellings. No offense, but when discussing things such as grammar, you should try to make sure you're following the rules yourself.
Every word in that post is spelled correctly. The spellchecker turns up nothing. Produce a specific example if there's really a problem.
And... I'll start paragraphs with "And" and abuse ellipsis if I please.
Every word in that post is spelled correctly. The spellchecker turns up nothing. Produce a specific example [edited].
apostraphe -> apostrophe
posessive -> possessive
I am from Canada, right around Toronto. I'm not hearing accents. I'm not hearing people say "could've" and imagining it's "could of". I'm hearing people clearly and distinctly pronounce it as two words. Stupid fucking people say it. WHY ARE YOU DENYING IT!?!?!?!?!!?!
I was arguing with someone on Monday, basically someone I've decided to cut out of my life, and they were leaving me voicemails saying I "could of" done this and I "should of" said that, and it could not of been more definitely true that he was saying "COULD OF", not "could've". I'VE BEEN HEARING IT FOR TWENTY-FIVE YEARS YOU F***.
I've also seen "all intents and purposes" written as "all intensive purposes".
Ahh, the internet! it's so intense!
The one that gets my biscuit burnin' is when people say, "the 90's." It's 90s.
No, it's actually '90s. But it's perfectly acceptable to not use one when you should have.
Gramma has been established over time and has evolved like all good languages word meanings change over time as the protocal of language changes . gramma will be the same who cares if people start using it difrently ore doing random ass shit so long as its understandable and convays the data that the person had in mind to comunicate it dosent matter if they wrote pritty dog shit images.
the histroy of english language and how it has changed should be presurved and to know how people have used language and what the avrage and formaly acepted ways of doing things are should be rmeberd and understood, however when it comes to down and dirty conversatoin , who gives a fuck , if the other person dosent understand ore the person convaying the piont relises th eother person dosent understand then it can be clarified , thankfully we dont live in a world where it takes 10 pigeons and 2 months to send a letter to sumone 400 miles away.
I see (and hear, who'da thunk people say what they write?) "for all intensive purposes" all the time.
Somebody wrote that in a mass email at work recently. I couldn't believe it.