The Word Nerd

[Jim Kelly]

For awhile now, I've been wanting to do a topic on spelling, grammar, syntax, connotations and so on. But I didn't want to seem like I'm being Mr. Know It All. I don't know it all and I'm often asking myself what's the right spelling or how should this properly be written. It's a thing that bugs me a lot. I spend so much time going over my posts, trying not to make mistakes. And if I spot a mistake later on, I feel terrible about it.

Let's start with an easy word problem that I sometimes fall into and I see others wrestling with, as well. When to use "then" and when to use "than."

Back at the dawn of time, when I was in high school, I did computing. And back then we had to make flow charts for the programs we were writing and we had to make a big stack of computer cards, which our teacher would then take to the big computer somewhere else in the city--and a day or two later, we'd get the print-out of our program back and see what stupid mistakes we made in our program.

So one fundamental program for all computing is "if ... then ..." And you see that "then" produces a result. "Than," on the other hand, is a comparative. "This ... is bigger than that ..." Here I always think of the signs < (less than) and > (greater than). You can have sentences that use both, such as "If Bobby is taller than Tommy then Bobby should pick the apples from the top of the tree." This can be expressed in a computer program like so:

If B1 > T1 then B picks x from y; where B1=the height of Bobby, T1=the height of Tommy, B=Bobby, x=apples and y=the top of the tree

So they are very different words, yet almost the same in spelling--and many of us will pronounce the words the same (except maybe when we're trying to put some stress on the word).

Here's an example from a post I saw--but I've changed words that might identify which post it was, because we're not here to shame people:

"The lack of respect for Nick Charles is likely more to do with Nick being more out of date then the rest of the detectives then with him being less intelligent."

This is wrong, but why is it wrong? This is something we have to puzzle out to see why the spelling is wrong. In fact, the spelling is wrong because both times we're using "than" to make comparisons. The tip-off is the use of "more" and "less." Nick Charles is more out of date than the others and less intelligent than the others. The lack of respect is more to do with the former than the latter.

Of course, since we're on our devices and we might not have time to make sure the spelling is right, it's bound to happen that there's lot of mistakes in our posts. Nevertheless, purely because I'm a word nerd, when I stumble across such errors then I'm always working out what the error is and how it should be corrected.

edit: Even after going over this post a few times, I still made little mistakes that I had to correct.

[Tuck]

Any time you're about to write or say "______ and I", drop the ______ in your head and use that word when you add the _____ in.

I feel like this is because they drill "_____ and I" into your head as a kid because we all say, "me and my dad went fishing". And people just put it in their brain in a file that says, "never 'and me', always 'and I'".

[Jim Kelly]

To me, it doesn't make sense to use me because it's an object pronoun, so you can't use it as a subject pronoun. Of course, a lot people say "me and my dad" and it's gotten to the point where it's so common that we just accept it. Since I've been trying to learn German for many years (as well as other languages like Hungarian), remembering what form of the pronoun is the object, indirect object or subject is very important--and if I have to keep that straight in my head, then it's useful to remember how it works in proper English.

[Tuck]

Of course, a lot people say "me and my dad" and it's gotten to the point where it's so common that we just accept it.

Which is why it doesn't bother me.

The "_____ and I" thing feels like it's a more recent thing that is people trying to "correct" their grammar, but end up doing the opposite. Or at least it's recent enough that it hits my ear wrong.

[MajorHoy]

It can be difficult to discuss proper "spelling" when some words are spelled slightly differently in various parts of the world.

Which is correct: color or colour?
All depends on where a person is from.

[Jim Kelly]

It can be difficult to discuss proper "spelling" when some words are spelled slightly differently in various parts of the world.

Which is correct: color or colour?
All depends on where a person is from.

Yeah and I'm not going to be critical of that. Even though I love my good old Canadian spelling. The thing is to be consistent. Ideally, you have your own style guide. It doesn't have to be written down, but I try to be consistent with my mental style guide and use Canadian spelling.

Sometimes I feel like I need to use the American spelling, if that's what someone else is using. I used to write colorist when I was referring to the person that does colouring for comic books--because that's how it's credited in most comic books. But now I think colourist is just fine, because there are Canadian comics, too. I'm sure people can forgive me for that quirk in my spelling.

There are some other spellings that are simply correct and if we fail to use the right spelling, it can interfere with the sense of what we're writing. For example, it's is a contraction for it is (in Shakespeare's time, 'tis), while its is the possessive form of the pronoun it.

[Mormel]

Which is why it doesn't bother me.

The "_____ and I" thing feels like it's a more recent thing that is people trying to "correct" their grammar, but end up doing the opposite. Or at least it's recent enough that it hits my ear wrong.

There was a Dutch singer a couple years back, who wrote the lyric I don't want to think that it's too late/for you and I to make things right. This is wrong, of course, as when a personal pronoun follows a preposition (in this case 'for') it should take the object form 'me'. I've seen this more than once.

[Jim Kelly]

One thing that always annoys me is "begs the question" being used wrong. I guess you could argue that it's done so much and so often now that the wrong use has become the right use and I should just let it go. But it's like nails on a chalkboard for me.

And I think the people that use it wrongly are trying to elevate their language with some class, and that's why they slip it in, when they could just as easily use "raises the question."

Begging the question begs the same question to be asked over again, because someone hasn't actually answered the question. This could be used for politicians who will often simply restate what was already said before without actually answering the question asked of them. It's a certain kind of tautology, and so "begs the question" has been a good expression for rhetorical debates. But the expression now has lost that good purpose as so many want to use it to mean that one answer leads to another question.

If they really want to say this raises another question, then they could just say that--but they want to sound smart, so they use begs instead, as if they think that sounds so much better. And it just leaves me to think that they're not as smart as I had thought.

[Jim Kelly]

An article came up on my feed, saying "Lady Gaga stepped out without pants." This sounds a bit provocative, but I started to think how funny it would sound to anyone in the UK--since for them "pants" is underwear.

And some readers think it's hilarious, in old comics, when they said "boner"--meaning a boneheaded mistake, but meaning something else now. And then there's the name "Dick Grayson," which can't be taken seriously anymore.

[dancj]

Let's start with an easy word problem that I sometimes fall into and I see others wrestling with, as well. When to use "then" and when to use "than."

Does anyone really make this mistake? I'd always assume that it was just a typo rather than someone using the wrong word if I saw someone get that wrong.

[dancj]

Any time you're about to write or say "______ and I", drop the ______ in your head and use that word when you add the _____ in.

I feel like this is because they drill "_____ and I" into your head as a kid because we all say, "me and my dad went fishing". And people just put it in their brain in a file that says, "never 'and me', always 'and I'".

That drives me mad. It really grates every time someone says "and I" when it should be "and me".

[Jim Kelly]

Does anyone really make this mistake? I'd always assume that it was just a typo rather than someone using the wrong word if I saw someone get that wrong.

It's hard to know when someone is making a typo and when they really just don't know what they're doing. I make typos all the time and it's only when I go back and check that I see I've made a dumb mistake like putting then for than or their for they're--even though I know the difference. I put this down to my fingers having muscle memory and doing what comes naturally. For instance, when I type "write," it often ends up as "writer"--because my fingers are so used to typing "er."

I was trained to be a fast typist--I don't do two finger typing or thumbs and I use a proper qwerty keyboard most of the time--I imagine it's even worse for people using their phones. And predictive software will play havoc with your words.

I've also taught English and I know many people don't know the difference. And there have been times when I was stumped and I had to find resources to explain why these rules apply and you can't do it differently. Or some people will know how to say things the right way, but when they sit down to write, suddenly their language is all over the place--as if they don't know how to transfer their natural language from the spoken into the written.

And then there are some people who were raised thinking "you do you" and you shouldn't have to follow the rules. So if they want to use "your" for "you're" then they have every right to do that and anyone who says they shouldn't is evil. The problem with that way of thinking is there are many times when we don't know what the person is saying because it's so badly written.

[JackDaw]

That drives me mad. It really grates every time someone says "and I" when it should be "and me".

In the school I went to the phrase “me and my dad went fishing” would have been met with derision on 2 levels.

First it’s wrong grammatically (as Jim explained earlier...just check whether to use me or I by omitting “and my dad”, no one, except the Hulk says “Me went fishing”)

But what would have attracted a more savage correction would have been idea of putting yourself before the other person...so my teachers would order things thus:

1/ My father and I went fishing. This would be considered as completely correct, because grammar is correct and other person is put first

2/ My father and me went wishing. Grammatically wrong but teachers would think it showed awareness that other person is the more important

3/ I and my father went fishing...Grammatically correct but impolite

4/ Me and my father went fishing..double whammy wrong

Some of the teachers were quite ruthless on issues like this.

[dancj]

no one, except the Hulk says “Me went fishing”

I love how completely unrelated conversations on these boards always manage to come back to comics

[Jim Kelly]

Hey, I learned how to read from comics. I was getting X on my report card for reading (I can't believe they used to give X, how cruel) and after I got into comics I was getting A.