response 58 of 151:

Nov 19 04:56 UTC 2000

Does it work?

response 60 of 151:

Nov 20 16:01 UTC 2000

I agree with folks, but have difficulty really meeting minds with stuff.  I
need to work on my mediation some more.

response 62 of 151:

Nov 20 18:22 UTC 2000

re all the comments objecting to what I said in #42: 

Kids do not learn grammar from being told "don't say 'Me and Joe', say 
'Joe and I'."  They learn grammar from the people around them, beginning 
with their families in the early stages of their lives, and continuing 
with their friends and classmates in their elementary school years.  I 
expect they'll be perfectly comfortable with using formal speech in 
formal settings, but less 'correct' grammar in settings where other 
people use that kind of grammar.

I once heard my older boy, then about 7, say something along these 
lines:

"I think Christmas is fun, whups, I mean 'I'm *like* Christmas is fun". 

At home we would say "I think Christmas is fun."  However, at school, 
all of his friends would say say "I'm like" instead of "I think".  He 
"corrected" himself to sound like his friends.  He was practicing 
fitting in, and not concerned with correct formal grammar.  That's 
perfectly fine.  Also, it is beyond my control.  He *is* going to fit in 
with his friends.  I can battle about it forever, if I want to be 
fighting with him that long, but that's all I'm going to accomplish.  
He'll know what's correct in formal settings, just like I do.

response 64 of 151:

Nov 20 18:36 UTC 2000

If people jump off a bridge, it does NOT follow that YOU should jump off a
bridge.

Certain rules are EXPECTED; certain rules WORK - standalone or as
exceptions; and, the rest is horseshit. If you really feel you need to
generate a NEW RULE, then I am sure that yer peers ("yer") can manage
to keep you on ther "straight and narrow".

There are lots of "acceptable processes", but Eubonics and AOL-speak ain't
one of them.

response 66 of 151:

Nov 21 00:57 UTC 2000

(You know, I hate the whole "jump off a bridge" analogy.. of course I'm not
going to jump off a bridge just because someone else did.. that's fucking
dangerous!)

response 68 of 151:

Nov 21 01:24 UTC 2000

Actually, if enough people jumped before you, it wouldn't be such a 
bad fall.

response 70 of 151:

Nov 21 03:43 UTC 2000

<smirk>

response 72 of 151:

Nov 21 07:02 UTC 2000

Larry, just don't forget that prepositions are little words that *always*
go where the end of the sentence is at.

response 74 of 151:

Nov 21 17:01 UTC 2000

Re 71.  My eyes glaze over.  Direct object?  Indirect object?  I don't
have time for this stuff.  More than that, I resist it.  I don't want to
know.  There's no space in my head for it.

I have written a tremendous quantity of prose in my time.  Since I started
BBSing in 1983, I have probably written at least a few lines just about
every day.  I write it, I change it, I read it again, I revise it, I keep
working on it until it sounds good to me.  Grammar is never the problem: 
I'm striving for the right meaning, the right cadence, the right tone.  My
first draft is often angry and rude, and I revise it into a semblance of
calmness and civility.

I'm not normally called on to "defend" my choice of word order or syntax. 
I suppose I would make a poor English teacher, because I would have
trouble articulating why one sentence sounds good to me and another
doesn't.  I would also make a poor bricklayer, a poor surgeon, a poor
television newscaster.  Fortunately, I don't have to do any of those
things.

I have written for publication, and never once have I gotten into any
discussion with editors about direct objects or prepositions.

I think memorizing those rules and definitions may be helpful to some
people.  That's fine for them.  It doesn't work for me.

response 76 of 151:

Nov 21 22:23 UTC 2000

Yes...us English majors drool over things like "correctly modified nouns" and
"using well and good correctly", but you guys drool over things like RAM and
other stuff that makes my eyes glaze over.  ;-)  To each their own.  

I must state, however, that even though I don't know much about computers and
really don't need to know specifics about many parts of the computer world,
I still enjoy being told when I'm wrong and learning how to correct something
so that I don't look like an idiot.  It's part of a learning process.  I don't
go right out and tell people when they're a horrible speaker, and I'm not one
of those people who interrupt conversations to correct someone, but I really
really really REALLY detest things like, "Nobody cares if I talk like an idiot
or can't spell a word."  Why don't *you* care if you look bad?

(This is a general "you" and not directed at any one individual online or in
real life)

response 78 of 151:

Nov 21 22:31 UTC 2000

What?  It's a common expression.  =)

response 80 of 151:

Nov 22 02:24 UTC 2000

Actually, "language immersion" is how practically all of us learned
English.  This "formal school" idea is a fad of a mere few centuries in
length; before that, most people spent more time thinking about shit
than they did about their letters.  Shit was, after all, an everyday
product of farming and livestock, while letters were merely a curious
affectation of the priesthood.  Larry's response regarding grammar
sounds a lot lot like how many engineers responded to the idea of
science and mathematics in the 19th century.  I confess, though, I
wonder how he decides when to use a semicolon instead of a comma.