Maybe 'H's (or possibly "H"s) is a better alternative to H's - personally I would use Hs.
Abuse of language
- Thread starter JohnW2
- Start date
Dunno - as I said, Hs just does not feel/look right to me, not the least because it is not obviously 'pronounceable' - at least an apostrophe indicates the need to insert a 'vowel sound' between the H and the s - i.e. " H-es " (which is how one would presumably pronounce it, no matter how it was written) - although I accept that your suggestions are other possible approaches.
Kind Regards, John
McDonald's or McDonalds?
The fast food people?
McDonald's, if the signs are anything to go by, which would be quite correct.
Interestingly Spanish doesn't use apostrophes but has similar problems with written accents which cause all types of problems and debate. They eventually decided that in some cases where people were ignoring the rules they would allow either the correct version or the more commonly used one. When I taught there pupils were not allowed to write 'solo' if they meant 'only', as this means 'alone' (Solo en Casa = Home Alone). The word for 'only' = 'sólo', (which I still use) but the vast majority wouldn't put the accent on the o. This omission is allowed now. An example of usage trumping grammatical accuracy.
Just off to the butcher's now. Sorry, butchers' as there are two of them. Sorry, we all write butchers anyway, don't we?
Just off to the butcher's now. Sorry, butchers' as there are two of them. Sorry, we all write butchers anyway, don't we?
Indeed, and that appears to be the 'reality' that EFLI seems to be passionately opposed to. If evolved 'common usage' (even if documented in dictionaries) differs from 'grammatical accuracy', he seems to regard that as simply an 'incorrect' evolution of language (usually 'due to ignorance') which should be opposed, and ideally supressed/prevented. ... hence all these debates/arguments with him (often on Friday evenings, so you might not have long to wait for more
).Kind Regards, John
The most famous one from Spanish is 'vamos', which I think most people know means 'let's go'. But 'let's do something' is grammatically the first person plural of the present subjunctive = 'vayamos'. In this case the written form has morphed by following the pronunciation (when said quickly) which then sounds like a very similar word from another (more familiar) tense. But this is now totally accepted by the organisation that monitors standards of language in Spain and you would be considered really pedantic and silly if you used the subjunctive.
It';s just occurred to me that my 'not being alone' presumably must have extended to my very traditionalist/strict English teachers, otherwise those arguments I had with them would never have happened.
Had they simply said that I we shouldn't put an apostrophe in (possessive) " Its " because 'that was wrong', because the word in question (being it a 'possessive pronoun' or possessive determiner'!) was defined as not having an apostrophe then I would have had nothing to argue about - the English language is full of (often fairly illogical) rules and conventions which one simply has to learn and 'accept'.
However, that is not what my teachers said - rather, as I have explained, they said that we should not put an apostrophe in the word because it would then be confused with the contraction that meant "it is". To me, that implied (and still does) that they thought (seemingly incorrectly!) that were it not for this potential confusion with "it is", the possessive form would have had an apostrophe (i.e " it's" ). Consistent with that suspicion is the fact that I don't recall having similarly been taught not to put an apostrophe in the possessive) " her's " (which is why I suspect I have been writing that for all of my life!).
Kind Regards, John
It depends what you are talking about.
I do not know what the accent does in the Spanish accent example. I could detect no difference in Google Translate speech so I don't know how important it is considered but it is at least officially considered.
Anyway, surely you must agree that some things - words not just the apostrophe abbreviations - must be forever simply wrong.
You seem to treat it as too silly an example when I mention it - but it is no different really - but what if, due to unbelievable stupidity some people on a reality programme, did start calling an ant a giraffe and it caught on with the public. Would the fact that this became commonplace ever replace the official definition and references in relevant scientific fields.
How did words come to mean the complete opposite of their original meaning?
I do not know what the accent does in the Spanish accent example. I could detect no difference in Google Translate speech so I don't know how important it is considered but it is at least officially considered.
Anyway, surely you must agree that some things - words not just the apostrophe abbreviations - must be forever simply wrong.
You seem to treat it as too silly an example when I mention it - but it is no different really - but what if, due to unbelievable stupidity some people on a reality programme, did start calling an ant a giraffe and it caught on with the public. Would the fact that this became commonplace ever replace the official definition and references in relevant scientific fields.
How did words come to mean the complete opposite of their original meaning?
One odf the issues (problems?) is that, unlike languages like French and Spanish, there is not really any formal 'guardian of the English language' - the 'Oxford Dictionary' being what most people probably look to as the nearest equivalent - although some criticise all dictionaries for 'giving in' to evolution of language which they regard as 'incorrect'!
Unlike the situation with some other languages, the subjective mood seems to be largely 'dead' in English - or, at least, in many/most cases indistinguishable from the indicative. A few things have remained for the pedantic - e.g. teacher's and parents used to (and might still) take us to task for saying things like "If I was ...." (rather than "If I were ...").
Kind Regards, John
You are disqualified.
On a simpler example - would spiders ever be reclassified as insects simply because the majority of the population referred to them as such?
Given that, despite your views, all languages evolve, I'm not sure that one can really say that anything would "forever simply be wrong". I imagine, for example, that there are people who, in the distant past, would liked to have said that about some things which are today regarded as completely 'right'.
I regard that example as silly only because it substitutes a word ('giraffe') which already has an established meaning (and which continues to be needed with that 'established meaning'), hence creating a ridiculous ambiguity.
If the people on the reality programme started calling ants something different (but not an existing word for something else) then, if it 'caught on with the public' and eventually came to be in very widespread use (with diminishing, eventually virtually no, use of "ant") then, despite your dislike, the new word would probably come to 'replace the official definition' - that's how evolution of language works.
I'm sure that if I had a think, I could come up with a good few words that have totally changed during my lifetime in that sort of fashion - as you say, inevitably started by someone being 'incorrect' but, if it 'catches on' to adequate extent, becomes 'the norm'.
We actually have an example 'close to home', which also includes the silliness (due to ambiguity with a word with a previously-established meaning!), in terms of lamp/lightbulb. If, 50 or so years ago, you had asked for a "lamp" to put into the pendant hanging from your ceiling, I think you would have been just plain wrong', and few people would have understood what you meant. Some people then started calling them "lamps", rather than "lightbulbs". This has gradually (albeit slowly) 'caught on' and I do not doubt that, whatever I may think, the day will come when no-one even knows what a "lightbulb is/was" - just as they will not know what "ant" meant a few generations earlier if the insects in questions had been called "oobyjubies" for decades or centuries.
The nature of evolution of language is such that anything is possible - even that.
Kind Regards, John
Good grief, why did I type that - I suppose it's all the talk about apostrophes
Obviously just an unintended typo, not a deliberate misuse of an apostrophe!Kind Regards, John
'God save our gracious queen, long live our noble queen' is the most frequently seen example of two subjunctives used together correctly by the majority of speakers. 'If I were you' is probably the most frequently ignored. (According to some academic whose name I've forgotten.)
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