Attention, "alot" is not a word. (1 Viewer)

[John Thomas]

To quote a favorite song of mine, "We care alot".

It's a dirty job but someone's gotta do it.

 

[Andrew Pratt]

The one I hate the most is "seen it" instead of "saw it"...I hear it everyday from otherwise intelligent people. I find that poor grammar both when written or spoken significantly lowers my impression of that person and frankly it disturbs me how lax english is becoming these days:frowning:

 

[ChrisMatson]

-Run-on sentence
-Needs commas
-"english" should be capitalized
-Needs a period at the end of the sentence

Fun, isn't it?

 

[Francois Caron]

After school, life is an eternal linguistic exam. Here's what happens to people with mediocre and poor language skills, both spoken and written.

- Your job applications will be rejected before they're even fully read.
- You have no chance for advancement even if you already have a McJob.
- You're often misunderstood and ignored by others.
- You're never taken seriously.
- You may even lose a job because a client misunderstood what you were trying to say.
- The most promising mate you may ever find is one who belongs on the Jerry Springer show.
- You will live out your life in poverty.

In terms of forum postings, most of us aren't asking for perfection here. We all struggle with hard-to-spell words, proper use of hyphens and punctuation, and the occasional grammar "hiccup." A couple of errors in a post (especially a long one written at 3 AM) won't change people's perception of you in any way.

But when a post comes across as total gibberish and is riddled with every grammatical and spelling violation in the book, many of us ask ourselves if we can ever trust what that person may be trying to say not only in their current post, but in future posts as well.

Outside in the real world, it only gets worse.

 

[ChrisMatson]

Bill Gates dropped out of college. As was noted earlier, most grammar rules are (supposed to be) learned in elementary school.

We should not judge people based on their mastery of grammar, or pass judgment at all. As many have pointed out, there are different types of intelligence. Strong and effective communication, including proper grammar, is a great asset. It may even mask other areas of weakness. It may be possible, for example, to sound impressive even if you don't know what you are saying.

 

[David Williams]

I'm not a writer, or an english teacher and this is not speech writing 101, it's a message board.
There's no lack of respect for other members because you have a spelling error in a post.

There's a big difference between saying "He misspelled 'a lot' and used 'their' instead of 'there'. He's evil and must be ignored!" and "He wrote "IM SORY I CUD NOT TAEK IT ANY MORE!!!1!1! OMG I SE IT AVARYDAY AND IT IS DRIVNG ME MAD1!!!111! OMG WTF LOL TEH PROPER PHRAES IS A LOT!!!1!1 OMG AN EXMPLA IN A S3NT3NCE WUD B" (from Jason H's example). What is he smoking?"

Of course, everyone is going to overlook your average spelling and grammar mistake. That's a fact of life on a message board. I, myself, have only your average grasp of grammar. But when you are misspelling multiple words in poorly constructed sentences, people *will* think you are either a) a teenager or b) have the mentality of one. (No offense intended to teenage forum members who can spell and use proper grammar). This is the only point we, so-called 'Grammar Nazis', are trying to make.

 

[Reginald Trent]

I see this forum as a meeting place for people that share a common interest. However, we did not/have not shared the same school systems. Therefore, I believe the subject/reason for the forum should supercede expectations of error free post. Expectations to the contrary only insures disappointment.

 

[Andrew Pratt]

I find that poor grammar both when written and spoken significantly lowers my impression of that person and frankly it disturbs me how lax English is becoming these days

Having reread what I previously wrote it does seem rather harsh. For me the types of poor grammar and spelling that bug me are those that really blatant and it’s obvious the person isn't speaking the same language I am I've not seen any post in this thread that suggests anyone here is uneducated...quite the contrary actually. To that end though I'm likely the worst speller here so I tend to over look spelling mistakes. The other consideration we have to make on boards like this is that English isn't everyone's native language.

Regarding the subject of people judging other that speak poorly ask yourself if you would take a "valley" girl seriously no matter what her topic was if she continued to talk in "valleyspeak". How about the portrayal of southern US people being slow with they're drawl? It’s a fact we judge other people on our perceptions that include how well they communicate even though it’s unfair and frequently unjust.

 

[Paul_Sjordal]

Hey, I'll cut no end of slack for those for whom English is a second language. After all, they all speak English far better than I speak French, Swedish, etc. (which is to say not at all).

 

[Jeremiah]

Regarding the subject of people judging other that speak poorly ask yourself if you would take a "valley" girl seriously no matter what her topic was if she continued to talk in "valleyspeak".

There is 'valley-speak' and 'ghetto-talk' but that is far, far worse than bad spelling, poor puncuations, and double negatives.