Comments on: Debunking Grammar Myths

By: batnastard

batnastard — Thu, 07 Jan 2010 11:24:50 +0000

Someone should tell the APA — I believe the “rule” about conjunctions is in their 6th edition publication manual. Prepositions and others might be too.

I think the unreal conditional in English, e.g. “If I were you” instead of “If I was you” is a contrivance derived from Latin as well.

By: V

Thu, 07 Jan 2010 02:01:29 +0000

“Sarah took John and I to the store”
I hear sentences like this all the time. I’m teaching English in Japan and my students have learned English grammar in their schools for years. But memorizing all these rules results in weird sentences like the above, or things like “I like to play yoga”.
The other big problem is when they directly translate using Japanese grammar– “kaimono ni ikimasu” becomes “I go to shopping”. Very intriguing.

By: Lou

Lou — Wed, 06 Jan 2010 21:54:46 +0000

@Brea: in chili.

By: Timothy

Timothy — Wed, 06 Jan 2010 21:21:16 +0000

Some of these “rules” are like some of the previous posters have said – appropriate in certain circumstances. But the “rule” was taught without a proper explanation of why it’s wrong in that circumstance.

Another example is people are corrected if they say “John and me went to the store” but not told why “John and I” is the correct use in this particular case, merely told it should be “John and I” not “John and me”. This then results in travesties like “Sarah took John and I to the store”

By: greenstrawberries

greenstrawberries — Thu, 15 May 2008 08:56:56 +0000

The whole reason that teachers tell students not to start sentences with conjunctions (because, and, etc.) is because they do it incorrectly. I tell my students (1st grade) that fact. They will eventually be able to use those words at the beginning of a sentence, but it’s hard to do, so we just tell them not to at first.
When I was in high school, we were not allowed to use “be verbs” in papers. (am, is, are, were, be, being, have, had) The theory was that it forced you to write using active verbs. The problem was that you wound up with really long convoluted sentences, and sometimes, you need to use a “be verb!”

By: Brea

Brea — Tue, 06 May 2008 13:53:48 +0000

When is it ok or better to use a dash?

By: Jen

Jen — Tue, 06 May 2008 13:28:07 +0000

If I may add another caveat to the use of semicolons, in addition to the excellent explanations that have gone before, it would be that the two independent clauses need to be fairly short. Otherwise, you are better off creating two sentences. Semicolons are best used when you have two short, closely related complete statements that you want to express in one sentence.

By: Josly

Josly — Tue, 06 May 2008 06:12:04 +0000

Great article. I’ve always felt bad because I’m of the generation that was never taught grammar, and thus, have a horrid inferiority complex about it. Sometimes, just “feeling” it doesn’t work.

By: Anna

Anna — Tue, 06 May 2008 05:50:52 +0000

I have a question to ask: How is the word “namely” used?

For instance, would this sentence be correct? –> There are two types of people, namely happy and sad.

Or does it work like “includes”, where the examples cited must be less than the number that exist?

By: PartiallyDeflected

PartiallyDeflected — Tue, 06 May 2008 03:55:01 +0000

My favorite sentence ending with multiple prepositions is when a parent brought the wrong book upstairs to read to his son and the little boy asked, “What did you bring the book I didn’t want you to read out of up for?”