Language fails that make you angry

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In summary: Havelock Ellis) or the myriads who have died (Aldous Huxley). There is no reason to avoid [the noun]." (Merriam-Webster's Dictionary of English Usage, Merriam-Webster, 1994, ISBN 0-87779-132-5, page 657).In summary, "myriad" can be used as both a noun and an adjective to refer to a large, unspecified number of something. The use of "myriad" as a noun is not incorrect, despite recent criticism.
  • #106
Char. Limit said:
Hey, I do that! And so does everyone else here!

It actually annoys me when people say Q-pon. :)

A couple other ones that get me are when people say Bagel with a short 'a' and katchup instead of ketchup.
 
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  • #107
I have a cousin who actually pronounces it Cats-up. Why? Ketchup is pretty much the standard pronunciation (at least around here).

Every Christmas season, I have to bite my tongue when Pollack's jewelry commercials come on the air. The owner pronounces it "joolery" and he insists on making his own commercials.
 
  • #108
dacruick said:
It actually annoys me when people say Q-pon. :)
Same here. I say "Koo-pon", as do all normal people.
 
  • #109
I remember getting into a heated debate (and this will only make sense to those of you who are afflicted with ear hair) with someone on a BBS about pronunciation of the word "sysop". They absolutely insisted that it is pronounced "sis-op" and could not be pronounced "sigh-sop". Their rationale was that the term sysop comes from "system operator", and therefore the only correct pronunciation was "sis-op".

I asked him what that box plugged into the back of his computer was called - a "mod-eem"?

He conceded.
 
  • #110
http://www.okcupid.com/tests/the-commonly-confused-words-test

Here's a test of your ability to speak english good.
 
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  • #111
Looks like I need to brush up on the basics. :frown:

ScreenShot2011-12-08at61300PM.png
 
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  • #112
That was a very tough test!

mkkozn.jpg
 
  • #113
http://www.okcupid.com/quizzy/results?quizzyid=14457200288064322170&userid=11243491523438383239

Huh? How is this possible? English isn't even my native language? :confused: And I scored English Genius?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cWihNBmupdI

I would like to ask everybody here that if they ever see me making an English mistake, then tell me.
 
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  • #114
micromass said:
http://www.okcupid.com/quizzy/results?quizzyid=14457200288064322170&userid=11243491523438383239


Huh? How is this possible? English isn't even my native language? :confused: And I scored English Genius?

I would like to ask everybody here that if they ever see me making an English mistake, then tell me.

I'm often impressed by the language skills of non-native speakers on this forum.

You could easily pass as a native speaker, micro :approve:.
 
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  • #115
Wait, English isn't Micro's first language!? I always thought he just had, like, a Ph.D. in English or something.
 
  • #116
lisab said:
You could easily pass as a native speaker, micro :approve:.

You obviously did not hear me speak yet... :-p:biggrin:
 
  • #117
We have to consider that some non-US members have some pretty impressive language skills. I had mentioned to Borek that he and Marzena ought to come here for a visit sometime, and he said that if he did, we'd have to "talk" via paper and pencil because he couldn't speak English. I remember thinking what?!

When he was masquerading as StinkyElf recently in chat, it took me quite a few posts before I knew who he was, and that was only because of minor non-standard usage in verb tenses. Very subtle. I wish I had such skills in a foreign language.
 
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  • #118
This stupid test is a lie. I scored at genius level, but
a] it took me 10 minutes of trying to @#$!*!&#$ sign up to get my results, and then
b] I'm too dumb to link to the results like everyone else did.

Anyway, 93, 100, 100, 80.

I blew the Naomi and I one in beginners and I blew the further/farther and awhile/a while ones in expert.
 
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  • #119
English Genius

You scored 100% Beginner, 100% Intermediate, 100% Advanced, and 80% Expert!

You did so extremely well, even I can't find a word to describe your excellence! You have the uncommon intelligence necessary to understand things that most people don't. You have an extensive vocabulary, and you're not afraid to use it properly! Way to go!

You scored 100% on Beginner, higher than 59% of your peers.
You scored 100% on Intermediate, higher than 41% of your peers.
You scored 100% on Advanced, higher than 71% of your peers.
You scored 80% on Expert, higher than 47% of your peers.

http://www.okcupid.com/quizzy/results?quizzyid=14457200288064322170&userid=12756341031452352785

Apparently, English Genius doesn't describe my excellence. My wife thinks I'm uncommon too, but she calls it abnormal. I can't offer medical advice to anyone whose afraid of using they're extensive vocabulary properly, but I do recommend getting professional help. There saying I only did better then 59%? I think its subsequently of I got the age, gender, and sexual orientation questions wrong.
 
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  • #120
How exactly does scoring 100% on Intermediate still place you under HALF OF YOUR PEERS?
 
  • #121
I scored English Genius, 100%, 100%, 100%, and 93%. That means I got one question wrong, have to go find out what it was...

Edit: Hmm...the one I got wrong was a simple affect vs. effect thing...I must not have been paying attention.
 
  • #122
English Genius, but with one mistake in each section. 93%, 93%, 93%, 87%. (The one I missed in the final section apparently counts as two). To be honest, I would have expected to do better. :frown:

DaveC426913 said:
a] it took me 10 minutes of trying to @#$!*!&#$ sign up to get my results,
You're only asked to sign up if you have answered some of the personal questions. If you just click the show results button without answering any of them, you're taken directly to the results page.
 
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  • #123
Galteeth said:
http://www.okcupid.com/tests/the-commonly-confused-words-test

Here's a test of your ability to speak english good.

Exactly what I complained of above, they told me I was awesome! I wish.
 
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  • #124
lisab said:
I'm often impressed by the language skills of non-native speakers on this forum.

You could easily pass as a native speaker, micro :approve:.

I think educated foreigners will often perform better; especially if the language is learned more intellectually than naturally. We're guided more by social acceptance and exposure in our natural languages. But I am only a monolinguist, so my reasoning is inferior:

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/10/091029151807.htm
 
  • #125
Pythagorean said:
I think educated foreigners will often perform better; especially if the language is learned more intellectually than naturally.
I think there's some truth to this. There are some mistakes that us "foreigners" will never make, such as write "should of" instead of "should have" or "should've".
 
  • #126
Fredrik said:
DaveC426913 said:
it took me 10 minutes of trying to @#$!*!&#$ sign up to get my results

You're only asked to sign up if you have answered some of the personal questions. If you just click the show results button without answering any of them, you're taken directly to the results page.

228428783_066e28c3ae.jpg
 
  • #127
Char. Limit said:
How exactly does scoring 100% on Intermediate still place you under HALF OF YOUR PEERS?

I wondered the same thing.
 
  • #128
You scored 100% on Intermediate, higher than 41% of your peers.
Char. Limit said:
How exactly does scoring 100% on Intermediate still place you under HALF OF YOUR PEERS?
I guess 59% scored 100% too.
 
  • #129
All of our children are above average...
 
  • #130
It's exactly what Jimmy said. Most people score 100% on the Intermediate section, meaning that the score of 100% is only 47th percentile.

It means that the questions in that section are easy.
 
  • #131
Pythagorean said:
I think educated foreigners will often perform better; especially if the language is learned more intellectually than naturally. We're guided more by social acceptance and exposure in our natural languages. But I am only a monolinguist, so my reasoning is inferior:

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/10/091029151807.htm

Fredrik said:
I think there's some truth to this. There are some mistakes that us "foreigners" will never make, such as write "should of" instead of "should have" or "should've".

I'm inclined to agree.

I also don't know how differently English is taught but here, up until year 9 (out of our 13 years of pre-uni education, excluding pre-primary school), we were assigned a lot of grammar exercises and if we had a particularly tolerant teacher, quite a few (short) essays. In general, essays were not given too often and if students failed to do them, teachers would cut them some slack as classes are usually of 40 students and quite a few (of the teachers I've had over the years) seemed quite pleased to receive less scripts to mark.

Anyway, grinding through exercises in that "Essential English Usage & Grammar" by J.B Alter was quite painful. Curiously, it was also internet forums which made me work on my English a lot, albeit on a subconscious level. I got flamed a few times because of mistakes I made and stupid things I said (I was ~13-15 then) and I ended up proof reading everything I wrote a few times before hitting the "Submit Reply" button! :smile:

---

As long as I get a sense of what a person is trying to put across, I don't really mind. I do get annoyed by "text speak" and by people who use too many symbols for no good reason in their posts. On this forum I was on, there was a guy who would always use "~" and "!1!" and "&(%#" in every other post. Especially "~". I never understood why. :p
 
  • #132
Loooong post...

epenguin said:
"koo-pon" must be right! It comes from 'couper', to cut, pronounced 'koopay'.
Char. Limit said:
Hey, I do that! And so does everyone else here!
dacruick said:
It actually annoys me when people say Q-pon. :)
zoobyshoe said:
Same here. I say "Koo-pon", as do all normal people.
Nooooooooo! :cry::cry::cry:
This is war! :-p


Actually, if I remember correctly, as a kid I thought it was actually written something like "Qpon". Then I find out its written "Coupon" and think Neat!
Then I hear someone pronounce it koopon. :eek:
turbo said:
I have a cousin who actually pronounces it Cats-up. Why? Ketchup is pretty much the standard pronunciation (at least around here).
I always thought the alternate prononciation was written differently, as "Catsup"; a sort of slangy term.
turbo said:
Every Christmas season, I have to bite my tongue when Pollack's jewelry commercials come on the air. The owner pronounces it "joolery" and he insists on making his own commercials.
"Jewerly" is one of those words I don't know how to pronounce. Are you supposed to drop the W or not? :confused:
I have a suspicion that nobody knows how to actually pronounce that word.
DaveC426913 said:
I remember getting into a heated debate (and this will only make sense to those of you who are afflicted with ear hair) with someone on a BBS about pronunciation of the word "sysop". They absolutely insisted that it is pronounced "sis-op" and could not be pronounced "sigh-sop". Their rationale was that the term sysop comes from "system operator", and therefore the only correct pronunciation was "sis-op".

I asked him what that box plugged into the back of his computer was called - a "mod-eem"?

He conceded.
So... "sysop" isn't short for system operator... then what does it really mean?
Galteeth said:
http://www.okcupid.com/tests/the-commonly-confused-words-test

Here's a test of your ability to speak english good.
the-commonly-confused-words-test:
English Genius
FtlIsAwesome scored 100% Beginner, 100% Intermediate, 93% Advanced, and 87% Expert!
micromass said:
http://www.okcupid.com/quizzy/results?quizzyid=14457200288064322170&userid=11243491523438383239

Huh? How is this possible? English isn't even my native language? :confused: And I scored English Genius?

...

I would like to ask everybody here that if they ever see me making an English mistake, then tell me.
Go Micro! You inspire me! :biggrin:

Do I get GOOFB card each time I correct your English?
lisab said:
I'm often impressed by the language skills of non-native speakers on this forum.

You could easily pass as a native speaker, micro :approve:.
Char. Limit said:
Wait, English isn't Micro's first language!? I always thought he just had, like, a Ph.D. in English or something.
I only figured that he wasn't a native English-"typer" :-p when looking back at his old posts, then looking at his location listed on his profile.
micromass said:
You obviously did not hear me speak yet... :-p:biggrin:
Now I want to know what you sound like. Maybe trying singing Never Gonna Give You Up.




English speakers will mispronounce foreign names, sometimes because its difficult to pronounce, other times because of the ambiguities of English letters. For example Tokyo is To-kyo, not To-ki-yo, but the written form can't tell you that. (Well, it can, but you have to know how to read romanized Japanese first)

English speakers pronouncing tsunami is one the lame ones. They almost always drop the T, even though the T clearly appears in the written form, and its not all that difficult to pronounce. Once someone "corrected" me with sunami when I had said tsunami! :smile:
 
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  • #133
FtlIsAwesome said:
English speakers will mispronounce foreign names, sometimes because its difficult to pronounce, other times because of the ambiguities of English letters. For example Tokyo is To-kyo, not To-ki-yo, but the written form can't tell you that. (Well, it can, but you have to know how to read romanized Japanese first)
I don't think this is so much about misreading romanized Japanese. I've found non-Japanese-speaking Americans have trouble pronouncing kyo as one syllable.

English speakers pronouncing tsunami is one the lame ones. They almost always drop the T, even though the T clearly appears in the written form, and its not all that difficult to pronounce. Once someone "corrected" me with sunami when I had said tsunami! :smile:
This one bugs me too. Langauge Log had blog entries about this:

http://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=3025
http://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=3027
 
  • #136
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  • #137
FtlIsAwesome said:
English speakers pronouncing tsunami is one the lame ones. They almost always drop the T, even though the T clearly appears in the written form, and its not all that difficult to pronounce. Once someone "corrected" me with sunami when I had said tsunami! :smile:

This isn't specific to English speakers at all. It is called consonant weakening and is a natural part of language change. Basically, we naturally use the laziest pronunciation we can get away with.

These things used to bother me a lot until I listened to an audio book by John McWhorter about language change. I now realize that even the pronunciations we see as "correct" are mashed-up, butchered versions of other words.

All of our words are wrong, some are just wronger.
 
  • #138
Evo said:
But the primary is here.http://www.merriam-webster.com/cgi-bin/audio.pl?coupon01.wav=coupon

I realize they may be listed in a certain order, but does MW say if the order is meaningful?
 
  • #139
KingNothing said:
All of our words are wrong, some are just wronger.

If you're a writer, wronger isn't righter than anything else on this thread.
 
  • #140
KingNothing said:
I realize they may be listed in a certain order, but does MW say if the order is meaningful?
See up, koo pon is from the French, kew pon is the American version.
 

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