I never thought I would admit this, but I am a grammar snob. I am a stickler for good grammar, punctuation, and sentence structure. I use that revelation to preface my review of a book that I usually would never read cover-to-cover, but actually found quite enjoyable.
My boss gave me The Elements of Style as a birthday present, and I started to read it when I had some extra time at work. Yes, it is filled with rules on word usage and puctutation, but it does it in a way that flows nicely and is easy to read. Each page I found something I had been doing wrong for years or some way to improve my writing. It helped that the book was littered with interesting and often humorous paintings.
I am not sure whether I think that being a grammar snob is a good thing. I love being able to speak and write clearly, and I think that if we master language, our thoughts and ideas will be more easily expressed and understood. Alternatively, I feel like a harsh and unyielding disciplinarian, ready to strike any fingers that place a period outside quotation marks with a ruler. Your thoughts would be appreciated. Oh, and this post is probably ironically strewn with gramattical errors.
I used to be smart. At one time I even had a college education. I am pretty sure now that all of my brain cells are withering and wasting away. I will say, we had an grammer snob of an administrator that sent a proposal we gave him back. He wanted us to "fix" it and then he would look at it. He even had the kind heart to MARK the places he felt were wrong. The sad thing is, there was only one "REAL" error- the rest were stuff that I am not sure you could count as a rule. It is a proposal given to us by another territory manager, so I know that it wasn't even my lonely brain cell making it sound bad. We had 2 different font sizes on the prices (the prices in one font size, the package contents in another size) and that bothered him (ALTHOUGH we did it on PURPOSE). There were a couple of places where we had a - mark that he took offense to. AND (not grammatically correct, i know to start a sentence with AND) 2 places the margin was one _ space over. I have to say, as long as you don't become THAT bad, then you're okay by me! OH, and yes, we fixed it and sent it back (WITHOUT the mean note that i grammatically correctly wanted to include!).
ReplyDeleteAlso, while I was shopping at ShopKo the other night, I noticed the grammar error of the century and I wanted to call their main office. If I am correct, A LOT is spelled with a space in between, not alot (right?). They have a gift card that says Thanks Alot on the front in fancy writing. CRAZY! What are they teaching our kids????
ReplyDeleteThat man sounds awful. I am definitely not like that.
ReplyDeleteI never were any good on grammor; even worster on spelling. I am so glad I got speller checker
ReplyDeleteforgive me for not knowing people's online names, but who is Mr. English?
ReplyDeleteBrian, I don't know who the heck Mr. English is. Greg is the only one that I know who changes his "name" around (I just ain't smart enough). Any one want to fess up to Mr. English?
ReplyDeleteOf course, Mr. English is dad. Couldn't you picture that comment said in his hair lip voice? Anyway, I can't tell you how many memos I have handed to my boss only to realize later that I misspelled half a dozen words or put entire sentences out of context. Embarrassing.
ReplyDeleteMy boss should be an English teacher. I have to constantly write reports and he picks mine apart all of the time. I can go over it several times and he will always find something. It really is embarassing for an attorney when I correct them. You would be surprised how often that I find errors.
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