Pedantic Geeks - the campaign for real grammar ;)

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Originally Posted by elsiegee40

I know it's eduGod's thread, but...
http://www.edugeek.net/forums/genera...t-new-car.html

;) :D

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Well that just settles the argument then - I'm right, you're all wrong. If you don't believe me then I have God on my side :p

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Originally Posted by JoshJohnson

These very forums spell check your every post in US English, am I the only one who thinks that US English is just lazy English?! Sure, some of the spellings make more sense on the face of it, but grammatically they're breaking the rules! Color?! What the hell is color? Oh, you mean colour, well then why didn't you say so?! [/rant]

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US English is not lazy English, but simply another branch of the language which devloped along slightly different lines. There are words commonly used in the USA, such as "whinney", (our equivalent being "neigh") which were traced back to two small hamlets in Norfolk where they were in common use in the 1600s.

I believe the Founding Fathers (I'm sure Ring of Flame can correct me on this) also made a decision to rationalize the language by making changes to words which ended in "re", for example, such as theatre, which they changed to theater. A political statement of intent and a declaration of independence.

What annoyed me about seeing English (US) at the bottom of a Word document when I was a governor of a primary school was firstly how it hit the confidence of the pupils when they were spelling words correctly, only to be told they's made a mistake, and secondly, that whoever had installed the OS was too lazy to correct this for the British market.

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Originally Posted by beeswax

US English is not lazy English, but simply another branch of the language which devloped along slightly different lines. There are words commonly used in the USA, such as "whinney", (our equivalent being "neigh") which were traced back to two small hamlets in Norfolk where they were in common use in the 1600s.

I believe the Founding Fathers (I'm sure Ring of Flame can correct me on this) also made a decision to rationalize the language by making changes to words which ended in "re", for example, such as theatre, which they changed to theater. A political statement of intent and a declaration of independence.

What annoyed me about seeing English (US) at the bottom of a Word document when I was a governor of a primary school was firstly how it hit the confidence of the pupils when they were spelling words correctly, only to be told they's made a mistake, and secondly, that whoever had installed the OS was too lazy to correct this for the British market.

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On the subject of US V UK rationalise! ;)

I like this poem...

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Eye halve a spelling chequer
It came with my pea sea
It plainly marques four my revue
Miss steaks eye kin knot sea.

Eye strike a key and type a word
And weight four it two say
Weather eye am wrong oar write
It shows me strait a weigh.

As soon as a mist ache is maid
It nose bee fore two long
And eye can put the error rite
Its rare lea ever wrong.

Eye have run this poem threw it
I am shore your pleased two no
Its letter perfect awl the weigh
My chequer tolled me sew.

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Originally Posted by LeMarchand

Even correct use of capitals can transform a sentence. Imagine what people would think if this didn't have capitals:

I helped my Uncle Jack off a horse.

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I'm still laughing over this one!

@tcmd35.... I have a copy of this in the ICT Suite and our English Co-ordinator has one too. It's a source of much amusement! ;)

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Originally Posted by elsiegee40

On the subject of US V UK rationalise! ;)

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Rationalize is perfectly acceptable, being an older English version of rationalise.

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Originally Posted by beeswax

Rationalize is perfectly acceptable, being an older English version of rationalise.

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I stand corrected :)

In English, ~ise is the accepted spelling.

This is interesting on the subject:

AskOxford: Are spellings like 'privatize' and 'organize' Americanisms?

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The main advantage of the modern -ise habit? Lazy spellers do not have to remember that there are several important words which cannot properly be spelt with -ize. These include words which are not formed by the addition of the -ize prefix to a stem, but by some other root which happens to end in the same syllable, such as -vise (as in televise), -cise (as in incise), and -prise (as in comprise).

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Originally Posted by elsiegee40

I stand corrected :)

In English, it ~ise is the accepted spelling.

This is interesting on the subject:

AskOxford: Are spellings like 'privatize' and 'organize' Americanisms?

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I can't beleive that you checked up on me. ;) Thanks for the reference. It has made me think. I would spell organize with a z, but not privatise, similarly with analyse I couldn't bring myself to use the letter z in place of s, though I know not why. That's probably why I find myself reluctant to join the Pedantic Geeks, though my heart did rise when I noticed the group had been formed. It may be that I'm just a lazy git.

Hmm maybe I should start a "mi engrish s l33t" group :D
So I shouldnt be wasting my time looking for spell checking/grammar checking software for el'geek? I really have been looking for it too :)

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Originally Posted by beeswax

I can't beleive that you checked up on me. ;) Thanks for the reference. It has made me think. I would spell organize with a z, but not privatise, similarly with analyse I couldn't bring myself to use the letter z in place of s, though I know not why. That's probably why I find myself reluctant to join the Pedantic Geeks, though my heart did rise when I noticed the group had been formed. It may be that I'm just a lazy git.

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Not checking up on you... checking up on me... I wanted to find out why I was wrong, and I was! :o

Failed... and I founded the group! :p :getmecoat:

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Originally Posted by elsiegee40

Failed... and I founded the group! :p :getmecoat:

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Surely a pedant is someone who tries to be right. :takeyourcoatoff:

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Originally Posted by creese

Surely a pedant is someone who tries to be right. :takeyourcoatoff:

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:)

Like this...
"And exactly what is your definition of 'pedantic'?'" - Cartoonstock

I quite liked this one The Grammar Lesson

@elsiegee40
The problem is consistency. Depending on who you speak with at OED or OUP they will tell you -ize is correct for all examples but -ise can also be correct for greek derivations.
American and British English spelling differences - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia goes into this in some more detail, and I have emailed BBC news to see what they use.

Most of my school text books, or at least those which I can remember, used -ise but we did have one science reference book (from a Dutch publisher) which used -ize and it was pointed out to us, by our teachers, that this was incorrect.

Now, I will accept both, but I try to be consistent in using -ise ... and it is only when my spell-checker goes into overdrive it is missed.

It is also worth mentioning that the ubiquitous hyphen, used to concatenate many words, is now frequently removed. Within the National Curriculum this is deemed suitable for most examples, but you need to apply common sense. In other words, it needs to be readable, it needs to be able to be spoken clearly and it needs to be applied consistently.

We also need to remember that some of the differences in language between GB and US english (the correct term is 'British English', not 'UK English' ... if you see it down as "English (UK) it merely indicates you are UK based ... not a derivation of language) are down to the influence of France.