Comments on: Tricky Linguistics, Indeed.

By: Jonathan

Jonathan — Thu, 29 Nov 2007 03:57:10 +0000

Hey, you wouldn't happen to know the name of the linguist that Steven and Hugh are lampooning in the video would you? A long time ago my mother bought this on tape and we thought it was really funny. Then later I saw the guy who they HAD to be makeing fun of in an educational video in high school. The guy talked exactly the way they portray him in the skit, they didn't exaggerate at all! I've been trying to find out who he is ever since.

To comment on your article though, I have always been bothered by two phrases that seemed to pop up around the mid-nineties: "My bad" instead of "my fault", and "same difference" instead of "same thing". I don't know how long those have been floating around but it seems like every one says them now. It drives me nuts. I agree about the "could care less" phrase as well, I shudder when I hear it.

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By: Yukiko

Yukiko — Tue, 20 Nov 2007 19:58:53 +0000

I appreciate you two's interesting comments, and more interesting examples from Wendy!

The 'I could care less' was mentioned in one of the talks at my department (on negation). The person who raised this, a professor from Australia who went to an English boarding school (hence speaks perfect British English) was 'shocked' to hear such examples.
It is really funny how negation drops like that…

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By: Wendy

Wendy — Fri, 16 Nov 2007 23:49:12 +0000

I loved the Monty Python-ish humor in this clip, Yukiko. Thanks for posting it.

It's interesting about the friend who started to say 'should have went' and then corrected himself. I think there are some mistakes (not that this is one) that educated people seem more likely to make than other people (due to hypercorrection), such as "between you and I." Ordinary speakers who always say you and me are never at risk of putting you and I after a preposition. Another smart person's mistake is pronouncing words like 'processes' with an emphatic 'eez' final syllable (via mistaken analogy with the plural formation of a small group of words like crisis/crises). Or using penultimate as if it meant tippy-top instead of next-to-last.

I am old enough to have witnessed a fair amount of change in the language just during my lifetime. For example, to me saying "I could care less" is just wrong — it's "I couldn't care less" (and parsing both out without the contraction reveals the sense behind it). But could care less was so frequently used that it's not really considered wrong anymore. Change happens fast enough to ultimately force you to choose between being a crotchety old buzzard mourning the usages of your youth or accepting change with grace.

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By: Suzanne

Suzanne — Tue, 13 Nov 2007 17:09:31 +0000

I just watched the Tricky Linguistics video and it was right on target! As a longtime instructor of public speaking, the entire theory behind when you repeat words and ideas to increase audience attention and understanding or to even increase your own dynamic as a speaker was turned right upside down by that video!
I do think the question of what you say and how you say it is the constant demand of our students when they work on oral communication. And it is a far more complex question to answer then we often take the time realize.

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