Eats, Shoots & Leaves: The Zero Tolerance Approach to Punctuation

Irritating Goffs in the English Language by JSB Morse

The lack of love for language.

Although language and grammar are not constant institutions as they change and morph to introduce new words and meanings, I am still perturbed by a number of egregious errors that most people make unwittingly. I am all for progress and if a certain section of the population wants to consciously change the language they speak to make it more efficient or beautiful, or any other reason, I support it. However, most people are inadvertently destroying the language they speak with grammatical errors which do not make it easier to listen to, or more efficient.

There are three things which catch my ire of late: 1) the use of ‘myself’ in place of ‘I’, 2) ending sentences with prepositions, and the most disturbing and pervasive trend 3) the over-apostroph-ization of just about everything.

I’m not a grammar teacher, nor am I an English major, or very proficient writer, for that matter, but I attempt to speak and write properly. Since I’ve made a conscious effort to better my speech, the flaws that I have made in the past, and which others make now, are so blatant to me that they’ve become annoying. It is important to note that the main reason people are making these obnoxious mistakes is not a simple a simple mistake or because they’re lazy; rather, it is because they are trying to sound more intelligent or more understanding to their listener or reader. It is perfectly rational to introduce new words which have new meanings or use slang to get your point across more efficiently, but the three grammatical mistakes listed above do not do this.

The first irritating mistake is the misuse of ‘myself.’ This word, like himself, herself, and themselves should only be used to refer back to a subject and never as the subject. In referring to the subject, the words could be used as a modifier as in, “I myself will go tonight,” or, they could be used as a direct object as in, “He hurt himself.”
The actual emotions and convoluted thoughts behind the following sentence are not quite known: “Janey and myself have been there.” It is entirely possible that speaker wants to be efficient in his sentence, but what can be more efficient than the proper way to say that, “Janey and I have been there.”

It is more likely that the speaker wants to sound smart. People usually use unnecessarily large or extra words to sound more intelligent than they are. In addition, they could be trying to sound less egotistical, however, most people would say that ‘myself’ stresses that part of the sentence more than ‘I’ would.

Another way people try to sound more intelligent than they are, and immediately fall on their face, is the use of prepositions at the end of a sentence. The best speakers and writers are the most efficient, and although that means using large words when they fit precisely where they’re used, it also means cutting out extraneous words and placing the important words where they should be.
“Where were you at?” was used consistently on recent radio news broadcast and it almost made me cry. This journalist is speaking for a living and is butchering the English language. The proper sentence one would use to ask that question is simply, “Where were you?”
I can’t image that the journalist was adding the ‘at’ to stretch the segment’s length, for the news is usually concise. The only explanation is that she was trying to sound more intelligent than she is by filling in more space with her voice. I may be going out on a limb here, but I would have to conclude that she added that little word (multiple times), in order to appear superior in edification. Ironically, the use of the preposition made her look quite inferior.

Similar things happen when people stick the ubiquitous phrases, “if I may,” “as it were,” and, “sort of.” These short phrases are used so often it is hard to tell for what their true purpose is. Evidently, each has a legitimate place in language, but for someone to use one of them in every other sentence can get to be a little hard to take. It also displays a lack of creativity with language and some have said that the use of them show a dramatic insecurity with one’s writing, or speech.

The origins are more baffaling. For the life of me, I cannot understand from where ‘as it were’ came. I know what it implies, but it makes absolutely no sense. Is it short for something? If extended, would the user say something like this, “Your blankey, as if it were a word you used, is very nice?” Still, it is an odd way to express something.

The third, now omnipresent error in today’s society is the overuse--almost to a pathological extent-- of the apostrophe. I think it all started with the introduction of the LP and CD. It was then when people started using letters as a word. What were they to do when they had a couple of them? How were they to write that? Some thought ‘LPs’ looked weird, so they put an apostrophe between the ‘P’ and the ‘s.’ But if they were using the apostrophe to indicate that there was something missing between those letters, wouldn’t they have an apostrophe between the ‘L’ and the ‘P’ also?

Once there became a word ‘LP,’ the plural necessarily became ‘LPs.’ But people kept on displaying signs stating, “We have LP’s!” And to match the equal opportunity felt in other institutions in America, the apostrophe craze spread. Soon, the signs became, “We have CD’s, LP’s and Cassette’s!”

This may seem odd to many people, but if you look around, you will find plural words that have been made to look possessive. In the instance of the music store sign, what do those things actually own? Nothing, but it appears that those items own something.
It didn’t stop there, though. Oh, no! The apostrophe cult is very persuasive and has moved to all types of signs. Walking down the street, one can spy signs advertising, “…cappuccino’s…” “…watermelon’s…” and “…gas pump’s…”

Again, this does not save time or effort, in fact, the opposite is true. I contend that the funny people who put these signs up would rather look like they put some effort into it than being lazy, if they were going to look stupid anyway.

A similar irritating habit that people have been doing often recently is the quote, unquote process, which separates them from the words they are using. Apparently the hyper-quoters do not feel the label attached to something isn’t appropriate, so they put quotes around it announcing that they know it’s not appropriate. Yet, they still use the word. This is diabolical, as much as it is misused. If the word is not appropriate, than why use it at all? Is it because the listener would know what you’re talking about? Isn’t that the purpose? Quoting someone specifically is fine and appropriate, but when you use quotes to separate one of your own words, you have caught into the apostrophe disease.

I once took a politically correct anthropology class in college and almost wanted to crack up in the middle of an exam due to the apostrophe phenomenon. In an essay question, practically every other word had quotes around it implying that the question writer knew it was not a politically correct word, but wanted to use it because it was the most efficient way of expressing an idea.
Once again, this extraneous quoting of words is used to imply a greater intelligence than what is available. When someone puts quotes around one of their words they are giving the reader or listener a reason to think there is more information there. “Lesser people would use these words,” they would say, “but I know there is something wrong with this word, and when I put quotes around it, I’m acknowledging it.”

May I suggest to you, if you find yourself guilty of these no-nos (not no-no’s), please try to become aware of it, then change your habits. It may cause you to become irritated at other who make these mistakes, but it will ultimately make for a more beautiful, sincere language.