It's / Its

[SeaJayPea]

May I, dare I, presume to correct some of my fellow contributors? I was brought up at a time when bad spelling or misuse of words brought about a sharp rap on the knuckles. This one was my primary school teacher's particular bete noire.

It's with an apostrophe means 'IT IS'. It does not indicate a possessive. It's the one exception (see what I did there?).

Its without the apostrophe does indicate the possessive 'the car finished up on its roof' is right.

Probably shouldn't identify worst offenders, so I won't. You know who you are....

Just sayin'

[FrogNog]

I get cross when people say less instead of fewer, but I'm far from perfect myself and put commas, everywhere.

[rccatnap]

Well SeaJayPea, see what you've started. I received a bit of a bashing a few weeks ago when I lamented the pronunciation of the country Colombia as Columbia many times on BBC broadcasts, though they were by no means the only culprits. It's amazing (and saddening) how many of the contributors on AB take the lazy view that using the language correctly is not that important. It's getting the correct sense across and meaning to the readers that's more essential. Why the heck can't we encourage both?
There is a difference between innocence and ignorance, especially when the latter is culpable. I can feel the literary knives being sharpened already. lol.

[sunny-dave]

What sort of word is 'lol' ?

I expect better than dratted yooftextbolloxspeak from the Grammar Police ...

[gness]

rccatnap....it's not that it isn't important. Language is very important to me and many others on here...

What is not acceptable is being unkind to other members by pointing our their mistakes....or lack of a good education through no fault of their own.

To do so in such a gloating way is just wrong.

I was taught that one should always put a full stop after...etc. I wouldn't be rude enough to point out to SeaJayPea that he doesn't.

[Cloverjo]

Misplaced apostrophes jump out to me, and I can't stand to see them on signs. E.g. Outside a shop near me is a sign saying "Ladie's clothes" and I'm tempted to wipe it off every time I walk past.
I've inadvertently posted "it's" instead of "its" because of predictive text and I press the submit button before I've checked it.

[jno]

What sort of word is 'lol' ?

I think it's called an acronym.

[gness]

Exactly, Clover....I will change an apostrophe if I can...took me ages to change them in all the toilets at Leicester Hospital....but that was on an official printed notice.

Typing on here we can make errors....I have our instead or out in my last post....or we just don't know....and it's not the place of another member to point out our failings in the way it's been done here.

Unless you're making a point of course......☺

[jim360]

I wouldn't say it's so much that the inaccuracies don't matter. It's just that a good number of the inaccuracies are closer to people having two different, clashing conventions about how to use the language. In a lot of cases both conventions are equally acceptable and so those who might say "you can't say x, it's y" might actually turn out to be wrong. Often there is a choice. Sometimes it's even wrong to "correct" certain mistakes that were actually just made-up rules that have no origin beyond some poncy 19th-century grammarian thinking that English should be rigid. At other times it might be the convention now to say one thing rather than the other, but say 50 years ago it worked a different way and in another 50 years' time it will work in a different way again.

The result is that while I'd encourage accurate language I'd also suggest that people show more flexibility about what this actually means. The primary criterion for good English is that the listener and/ or reader should understand what's being said. The rest is rather up to the speaker; and, whilst I do still cringe whenever I read "it's hat", or "outside of the room", or "ten items or less", or some such, it's still better to overlook it in favour of not getting distracted by minutiae, especially when in each of these cases I think it's both clear what's meant and the "correct" forms in at least two of these cases are actually up for debate. The risk is something called "hypercorrection" which is often what's going on when many people try to "correct" grammatical errors. In fact "ten items or less" is the correct version! Who knew?

I'd therefore stray away from identifying "offenders" on multiple grounds. It's not only potentially obnoxious and can backfire, but also often the offence turns out to be anything but. One of the reasons English is such an utterly fantastic language is its relative lack of rules, and what rules there have been often get thrown away anyway. Trying to keep hold of these rules might have the opposite effect to that intended by destroying the very thing that made the language so special.

There is a good weekly column by Oliver Kamm in the Saturday edition of the Times that's well worth a look for all aspiring grammar sticklers. You'd be amazed at how often the stickler's "rule" is not just "more like a guideline" but even on occasion utter rubbish.

[gness]

And I grew up never daring to start a sentence with..and..or...but....

But sometimes it adds to a story....x

[Cloverjo]

Jim360, reading your post, I was thinking you might like the Oliver Kamm column, then you mention it at the end. He calls himself The Pedant but is really an anti-pedant. Good column. I always enjoy it.

[jeffa]

The one that is becoming more and more common is to insert a space before a question mark or an exclamation mark, e.g.
http://www.theanswerbank.co.uk/News/Question1361944.html

Now, I'm SURE that Mikey was not taught to do this at school nor can he in all honesty believe it to be correct English, so where has this come from? I see it all the time...

[sunny-dave]

Jeffa - I think it's a reaction to the tightness of some proportional spacing fonts (including the one used on AB).

If you place the ? correctly against the last letter of the the sentence, it just looks too close and there is a temptation to slip a space in for clarity.

See what I mean?

See what I mean ?

[Cloverjo]

Jeffa, I would think that was a simple mistake by Mikey. I'm sure he wouldn't think that is correct. If you've seen it often on AB or other forums, I'd guess it's because people type quickly and don't check everything before they post.

[jeffa]

No, Dave, I don't see what you mean at all!

This looks correct, because it is!
This doesn't look correct, because it isn't !

[gness]

I would have thought that when Mikey was at school it was difficult to know if there was a space or not....my hand writing was quite spaced out....the girl next to me squashed hers up....

Don't fret too much, Jeffa.....x

[Old_Geezer]

Whilst whoever makes the rules agree with you, it is a b ridiculous ruling. If apostrophes are used to indicate possession then it makes no sense to introduce exceptions. Objects clearly can possess others. The door has a handle for example. It is a bad grammatical ruling.

[Obiter]

a) Primarily it distinguishes between the possessive and it is
b) Yours, his, ours and theirs do not have an apostrophe either.

[Old_Geezer]

Punctuation with acsenders do look wrong pushed up against the previous word. It isn't part of the word. Punctuation without acsenders can get away with it. Officially right or wrong I leave a space so it looks right and doesn't jar the eye. Trouble is that my mobile predictive text removes space it has just "seen" me deliberately and explicitly add, presumably because the designer/developer thinks it hilarious to annoy the user.

[Old_Geezer]

Yours his ours theirs, should have. More bad official decisions. (he's anyway)

[Old_Geezer]

Apologies, him's.