h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Well, greedy fadookie racks up another one!
What a cheapo!

The first of the last.

Pretty supid, huh?

I have just registered as a new researcher and, if this is the standard I can expect, then I will not be a researcher for long. What has happened to the beautiful English language? Have we lost the art of expressing ourselves in well constucted phrases? Please someone tell me that this message is not typical.

Dear Brummie,

Ah, I feel your pain. There is nothing so degrading to the human intelligence as poor grammar and/or vocabulary. Perhaps I sympathize because I am a writer; perhaps it's just because I've endured the low-life talk for too many years. In any case, I completely understand, and I stand here as a beacon of grammatical hope for you, researcher Brummie.

That aside, I think that it's important to note that most of the bad grammar on this site is in the forums, not the articles. So perhaps you should give the site a chance. Trust me, it grows on you.

Grammatically yours,
Josh, Mighty Keeper of Towels

Don't worry, there are plenty or grammatical pedants around. However, you do have to bear in mind that English is not everyone's native language.

¦M¦

This is not the right forum to criticise anyone's use of the English language.After all, the very conception of the process of corruption
is captured for posteriority on BBC television. Remember Kenneth Tynan?

This is not the right forum to criticise anyone's use of the English language.After all, the very conception of the process of corruption
is captured for posterity on BBC television. Remember Kenneth Tynan?

an american writer, to judge from the spelling.

Oops, I seem to have started a bit of discontentment around here.
Honestly, no offense was meant. I believe I posted this comment on my first day here at h2g2, and as a general rule newbies tend to act stupid.

Please don't pre-judge me, though. I generally am "qwite goode atte spillin'" when I'm not typing at midnight (like I am now), and certainly don't leave this wonderful place because of my early folly.

Oh yes , lago, I _am_ an american, but I'm not very proud of it (considering our current president and his "policies")

Hope this clears everything up (even if it about half a year late... )

I shouldn't worry about it Fadookie. As I pointed out last year, you could easily have been someone who does not speak English very well at all, and people should not hold this against you.

¦M¦

Well, Fadookie, we all have our crosses to bear! Rather funny you should think I was referring to you as an American I was really talking to Josh because of his use of -ize endings. But then he's probably using microsoft usa spellcheck anyway so one can't really tell. I apologise for that. Being a newbie too on my first outing, I goofed. Got to be more careful which button I press. TTFN.

Dear Iago,

I am an American, but I don't use spell check. I am my own spell check, as I have placed in multiple spelling bees in my life, and because as a writer, it's part of what I do. Sorry if my American spelling doesn't make sense.



Josh, MKOT

Ooh, never use a software spellchecker... always ask a real person...

¦M¦

hmm, a spelling bee came by me the other day in the garden.

reeling off "Polygonatum biflorum" and giving no pause at "Sanguinaria canadensis" it was checked, for a moment, by "Stylophorum diphyllum".

even so, i was impressed.

Hi, anon
You mean a gardner came by you on a spelling bee, I think. Nice one.
Iago

Sorry, Josh, if I pressed wrong button. I don't care one way or the other but you must accept that there is a difference (not necessarily better or worse) between USA english and English english, partly characterised by the use of -ize istead of -ise.
Regards,
Iago

Dear Iago,

Oh, absolutely. I hold no grudge; and what you say is very true. And there are far more differences that just the -ize's. Our dialects differ from English dialects in some very incredible ways. Anyway, it's a fascinating study which most people neglect. The sad thing is, most of the time people are so incredibly ignorant, they can't tell the difference between the accent of an Australian and a New Zealander. A Scot and an Irishman. It's nuts, man, nuts!


Josh, MKOT

Perhaps the American and British corruptions of the English Language is not the worst thing to happen. It may very well be that, by what some (myself included) might call corrupting the language, we are simply allowing it to evolve as it has for the past thousands (millions?) of years. For instance many people do not know that distance equated by the furlong, cubit or rod, or the weight denoted by a stone. Just an idea, but maybe we should be encouraging corruption!?!
Corruptly Yours,
Detrax

You might want to pop over to <./>AskH2G2</.> to ask this, DetraxMarda.

¦M¦

Let us not forget that 'English' is already made up of the old Celtic, Saxon, Roman, Latin, Norman and Dane languages, plus others, before we even get our grubby little hands on it and make it different again.
Same with food, chicken and chips, a good example of 'English' food turns out to be a flightless foul intruduced by the Romans and a French way of cooking a South American root vegatable. Still, there's always brown sauce I suppose.
Surely we can expect these blends to increase, with the internet making global communities so easy to form, I feel it is inevitable.
Every day I feel a little less 'English', and a bit more, well, Earthling for want of a better phrase.
Sorry about my spelling, after all, it's global, not English.

Well, that's killed that conversation. My work here is done.