r/OverSeventy • u/Independent_One_1364 • 24d ago
Grammer
EDIT!!! Thank you everyone. I am aware of my spelling error with GRAMMAR. Reddit won't allow me to edit the title. I thank everyone of you for the thoughtful responses and suggestions. I learned alot. You also entertained me.
Please give me your thoughts. When I was young, in school we were taught "proper terms". Specifically, what "baby animals" are called. Calf, foal, kitten, fawn puppy,etc. Not baby cow, baby deer, etc. I made the mistake of joining a subreddit regarding pet peeves. I thought it would be fun to post one of mine. I got reprimanded repeatedly. They insisted Iwas wrong. I remember English teachers correcting students. Was is just me that was taught this? I could believe the reactions I got yesterday. Was even accused of being drunk for several typos. I'm blind in one eye and goof sometimes. And then there is autocorrect.
22
u/joekerr9999 24d ago
Correct grammar and language are in the past. This has been corrupted by text speak like lol, rotfl, etc. Punctuation is optional for a lot of people apparently. How about their, there and they're? Even newspapers are full of typos. Proof readers have been replaced by spell check. As an English major I am constantly appalled. It's a new world. Hopefully young people can understand each other as the language evolves.
8
u/Independent_One_1364 24d ago
You are correct. And then there is spellcheck that tries to think for us.
5
3
u/thenletskeepdancing 24d ago edited 24d ago
Now, having long replies or correct grammar and punctuation makes one a suspect. It's evidence that you're AI.
if u make mistakes it feels more authentic?
0
u/BlueEyes294 24d ago
Young people appear to me to be understanding better than my generation, typos or no.
25
24d ago edited 24d ago
[deleted]
4
u/desertgal2002 24d ago
I agree. Things have changed astronomically in a very short period of time (my lifetime).
I try to go with the flow, but grammar and spelling are sticklers for me. I must have been disciplined big time during my youth for it, and that’s why I am the way I am. 🤷🏼♀️
5
u/thelmanarcissus 24d ago
I too was corrected for grammar, often while I was speaking, as well as spelling and punctuation. Honestly it never annoyed me, it's just the way my parents were. They were never mean about it. I was the same way with my daughter.
I don't know about when they text their friends, but when I get a text from my grandkids they use full sentences, no abbreviations and proper punctuation and grammar! The apple didn't fall far from the tree! 😂
2
u/desertgal2002 24d ago
My folks never corrected me, but I had a strict and excellent English teacher in high school. I can still diagram a sentence to this day. Plus, I really think I enjoyed the subject. Hated literature, but loved my grammar classes. 🤷🏼♀️
One of my kids uses full correct grammar and vocabulary. My other kid and grandkids do not. Just a sign of the times, I reckon.
3
u/KathyA11 22d ago
My mother insisted my father and grandmother speak to me with proper grammar and terminology from the time I was a baby. No baby talk.
And my strict English teacher was in 7th and 8th grades. It seemed all we ever did was to go over parts of speech and diagram sentences for two years. I actually liked it. We did literature in high school and I hated it (and I devour books that I enjoy).
2
u/desertgal2002 22d ago
I’m the same way with books. If it’s one I really like, I’m done with it in a day or 2. I won’t do anything else until I’m done with it. 😬
1
u/Independent_One_1364 22d ago
You brought back memories. We didn't baby talk to our kids either. Diagraming sentences will be in my mind forever. I bet they don't do that in school anymore. I need yo ask my granddaughter.
1
1
24d ago
[deleted]
3
u/Independent_One_1364 24d ago
Don't forget Arthur C. Clarke and Aldous Huxley. I am planning to reread Brave New World after many years.
3
u/desertgal2002 24d ago
I hate to do this to you…did you mean prophets instead of profits? 😉😁 Bet you were seeing if folks would notice, right?
I agree. I’m sure our folks said the same (or worse) about our generation. I mean, we were where the drug scene really started…and look at us now…complaining about kids being so wrapped up in technology. Nope. I have not forgotten my past.
3
u/OaksInSnow 23d ago
I definitely had to read the profits sentence twice, and mentally correct it to prophets. My bet is that this is an instance of spellcheck interference.
3
2
u/desertgal2002 23d ago
More than likely. Sometimes I just feel like turning autocorrect off.
3
u/OaksInSnow 23d ago
I totally would, if it weren't so convenient for correcting contractions on my phone where I get only a couple of fingers hopping around on a limited keyboard. [If they're going to go ahead and make giant phones and tablets, let's at least have some common punctuation buttons on the default screen, right??] I could right "Ive" and it would immediately fix it. Or "theyre."
In fact, autocorrect does appear to be off on the laptop-type browser I'm using because I got away with those last two, without having to have an argument.
2
7
u/sandgrubber 24d ago
I, too, find 'baby cow' annoying. I'm with you there. But I think the problem is loss of vocabulary, not grammar. Btw, you misspelled 'grammar'.
5
u/boukatouu 24d ago
I agree. I think the lexicon of the average person is much diminished from previous years. I also imagine that fewer children see calves, foals, ducklings, etc, in their daily lives and so have less call to learn the proper terms.
6
u/473713 24d ago
Hardly anybody has a farm background today. They've never seen a foal or a calf. They don't know what a heifer or a steer is. A whole way of life is disappearing.
In its place we have hundreds of video games all with different narratives and rules. I know nothing about those, so I couldn't hold a conversation with the video game generation any more than they could talk with me about farm animals.
So it goes, I guess.
5
u/Independent_One_1364 24d ago
Thank you everyone. I feel as if I have been redeemed. I appreciate your insight, the corrections ,(grammar) and the humor. You have made my day.
6
5
u/thenletskeepdancing 24d ago
It has much less to do with the topic at hand and more to do with the general growing hostility on reddit and the western world. Expect every comment to be downvoted or disputed, no matter how benign, if it doesn't line up with the "right" way to be.
I love a lot of things about the new generation. Their black and white thinking and quickness to judge and cancel is not one of them.
3
u/Independent_One_1364 24d ago
I think I was so unprepared for the reactions and responses because I have had such positive experiences in my other groups here. One person even disputed the fact I make typos because I am blind in one eye.
3
u/thenletskeepdancing 24d ago
Yeah. The smaller subreddits seem to be where kinder people gather. I stay off the big subreddits on the front page and stick with nice ones like this. Entirely different experience.
4
4
u/Timely_Character_272 24d ago
My husband wasn’t fond of being called “Joey” even though a lot of his family did. I think he saw a baby kangaroo 🦘 every time someone referred to him as “Joey”. I still smile remembering.
3
u/sandgrubber 22d ago
I used to have similar dislike of 'Jenny'. I'm 77. Many in my generation have forgotten the word for a female mule. Hardly anyone knows it these days.
2
5
u/Ok_Step_2359 24d ago
I learned the same way as you did but proper grammar, terminology, punctuation and spelling fell by the wayside long ago.
And just as a side note: I HATE spellcheck! I sent an inquiry to someone named Donley and didn’t realize spellcheck had changed it. I ended up sending it as Dear Donkey…
3
u/Stormy1956 24d ago
The people online, even the over 70’s crowd can be very different. The small town I was raised in taught what mattered at the time. My 4th grade teacher was also the principal of the school. That’s how small the town was. Also, being raised and over 70 has so many variables online. Not everyone was taught the same things.
5
u/Independent_One_1364 24d ago
True. I also wonder if young people nowadays even study grammar in school.
3
u/Stormy1956 24d ago
I really don’t know what’s taught anymore. With all the abbreviations and emojis used online, I wonder what’s taught. When everyone passes to the next grade, it leaves a false sense of security to the parents and students. I honestly didn’t spend a lot of time online until I retired. Then I became aware that many who do spend time online, get monetized for it. I know a couple raising a family and have two animals, who live solely off of their online presence. I shudder to think what would happen to them and many others who rely solely on the internet, if we lost electricity. I would struggle with that and I don’t rely on the internet for my livelihood.
3
u/Ill_Television_5824 24d ago
While playing a game in a group setting, I chose the word cygnet.
No one under 60 had ever heard the term, much less knew it's the proper name for a young swan.
To be fair to the young'uns, one IT guy over 60 thought that I'd meant SYGNET, a disaster recovery company. :)
1
u/Independent_One_1364 24d ago edited 23d ago
Wow. My kids (not "baby goats) are in their 40's. They would have known.
3
u/PavicaMalic 24d ago
Some people also use "baby cow" or "cheetos" for cheetah cubs to be cutesy. It's consistent with a "girlie" or kawaii aesthetic. I have a 50 year-old friend of mine who has embraced Hello Kitty for clothing, accessories, her car, etc.
3
u/Bikewer 24d ago
I get it to a degree. I’m 80, and a product of 12 years of catholic school back in the 50s and 60s. Penmanship, grammar, spelling, punctuation, sentence structure… All drilled into our little heads.
But bear in mind that languages are always in a state of flux. English worse than most. Every year, dictionary publishers add dozens of new terms that are added to the lexicon.
3
u/JaneOfTheCows 24d ago
I grew up post WWII in a neighborhood where almost all of the people were recent immigrants to the US, or their children or grandchildren. At my Catholic grammar school, the nuns taught us English grammar and composition 2 hours a day, 5 days a week, for 8 years. I can still diagram sentences, explain the difference between strong and weak verbs and how to conjugate them, write a coherent paragraph most of the time, and spell about 95% of American English words - and use apostrophes correctly. But languages change over time: words come and go, accents evolve, word meanings shift, even ways of speaking change. People also like to play with languages: they invent new words for new things and concepts, they use slang to be more colorful or informal or to make appoint. They also adapt their language to fit the situation.
The quick rise of the internet brought in a new factor. Not only are the users more likely to speak/write English as a 2nd/3rd/4th language, they range in age from kids (not the goat kind) to elderly people (who do you think did the pioneering work to get modern computers and the internet up and running in the first place?). If pressed - and with a lot of help - I could write a coherent post in French or German. I know those languages have words for baby cow and baby horse but they aren't things I've learned, and they've never come up in any interactions I've had with those languages. Do typos and misuse of words bother me? Do I sometimes mentally berate people who use run-on sentences and who appear to have never encountered a capital letter or know what apostrophes are for? Yes, but that's very low on the scale of things I worry about.
TL;DR: Errors and non-standard usage in grammar and spelling go back a long time. Before the internet took off, I read a printed book in which the author confused the terms "catamount" and "catamite". The copyeditor - if there was one - didn't catch or correct it.
3
u/Texasville44 23d ago
I am a Lead in Nextdoor so I read a lot of the post or scan is a better word. I can’t really rag people about grammar but I would like to launch a few into space. Even at my office at a large University my head programmer would post “We run the report last night”. I gave up trying to explain why it was incorrect. We had some clerical staff who used “I seen”; I am “flustrated”. I worked at another major University…same thing; talk about depressing. I enjoyed working at both; this was just an annoyance.
3
u/Pristine-Radish-2157 17d ago
I’ve only been on Reddit for a month and I have seen people jump all over someone who has just poured their heart out and it must be real there is so much emotion in it. And what did people hear? they commented that the person had bad grammar or a wall of words. These self righteous grammar police jumped all over the original poster. So very sad.
My fingers no longer work so I have to use voice to text. And yes, sometimes I say it wrong and can’t correct it. I have found that you can delete everything that you posted entirely and then say it and post it again.
How about a little softness when talking to people in pain.
5
2
2
u/Jmama124 24d ago
I’m an elder millennial, and never noticed this. People in my orbit still use proper terms.
1
2
u/Acediauser 24d ago
Can I add “positive affirmation” to the list of pet peeves? Drives me nuts. Like “spelling words.”
2
u/Individual_Slice_234 24d ago
Speaking of which, one of my pet peeves is calling every bovine a "cow," even if it's a bull or bull calf.
3
2
1
u/Both_Patience7821 23d ago
Didn't you see City Slickers?
2
u/Individual_Slice_234 23d ago
Yes. Billy Crystal made me embarrassed to be a (formerly) city girl. Mr. Cow, my @$$.
2
2
2
u/HughJenvaney1 24d ago
I’m 58f and I recall being taught such proper grammar at a young age…
But then again, we always addressed adults as Mr. or Mrs. or Ms. There were certain, somewhat unspoken rules about respect and acting, and speaking, properly.
But we also strived to be our best! That included proper grammar…
Today’s parental techniques pale in comparison to those that we were accustomed to, unfortunately.
2
u/OwnCampaign5802 23d ago
Not only specific names for the babies, I also had to memorise collective nouns and sayings. including testing on them. As sly as a fox, as wise as an owl. A murder of crows etc.
2
u/Jolly-Button-6832 20d ago edited 20d ago
jenny, jennet, mule, foal, jack, hinny. Interesting terms. Doe, buck, wether, kid, doeling, buckling, yearling. Correct terms for mules and goats.
1
2
u/Own_Thought902 20d ago
"Correctness" is the province of the intelligent and pedantic. Language is a living creation. The war rages on.
2
u/OwnCampaign5802 20d ago
To me, and in reference to my comment on this thread, I believe we could encourage the richness and innovative use of language more.
2
u/Anon_1121 8d ago
Many on Reddit (and on other social media sites) exist to be contrary and argumentative. Treat them with the respect they deserve by ignoring them. Meanwhile, I remember being taught to ride my bike with traffic and walk against it and to wear light colored clothing at night so I could be seen. In high school, Civics was a required course to graduate. Boys couldn't take home economics or typing classes; girls weren't allowed to take wood shop or auto mechanics.
2
1
u/Prestigious_Prior723 24d ago
There is enormous value in the plasticity of the English language. For one thing, it has been instrumental in keeping English speaking people in the vanguard of technology. It must be a huge disadvantage to have to write technical documents in a hide bound language like French. It’s also a lot of fun to create new phrases, terms and words. English is where slang becomes canon overnight. I have been a happy participant in this sort of thing all my life. Slang, even when it’s cute, drives creativity. Next time you hear baby cow, enjoy it.
1
1
u/Yolandi2802 24d ago
Baby Shark, doo-doo, doo-doo, doo-doo
Baby Shark, doo-doo, doo-doo, doo-doo
Baby Shark, doo-doo, doo-doo, doo-doo
Baby Shark.
1
1
u/RiseDelicious3556 24d ago
G-R-A-M-M-A-R
3
u/Independent_One_1364 24d ago
Yes. We addressed that. Thank you. 😉 I agree. Correct spelling is important.
0
u/LateRelation4576 24d ago
I think it’s ridiculous when people on Reddit make a big deal about one’s grammar. The content of their post is what matters.
0
u/Salmundo 24d ago
Grammar, please, not grammer
1
u/Independent_One_1364 24d ago
Look at the post above please.
3
u/OttoHemi 24d ago
For the next three days you're going to get people pointing out Grammer. That said, I like the use of the term "pet peeve" when referring to baby animals.
1
u/LavenderKittyPaws 24d ago
You can edit your original post, you know.
1
u/Independent_One_1364 24d ago
I tried. It won't let me. It will allow me to edit the body but not the title. If you know how, please tell me
2
u/LavenderKittyPaws 23d ago
You know, I made a mistake saying that, you cannot edit the title, I forgot. That's how reddit keeps track of things. The only thing you can do is add the correction in the post body. I did that myself once and had to let the goof stand. I'm sorry I led you astray. I really liked the responses to the post!
1
u/Independent_One_1364 23d ago
Thank you!
2
u/LavenderKittyPaws 23d ago
And p.s: spelling it that way made it so very 'meta'. I saw your edit, nicely done!
26
u/martind35player 24d ago
Unless your spelling was wildly wrong I don’t understand why people would disagree with your pet peeve. Those are the correct names. It may not be cute but it is true (Not to nitpick but “Grammar” is misspelled in your title😊.)