to hate people correcting my grammar/accent?

[vrocket]

I'm really not a member of the grammar police in forums and everyday speech.
I do think there is a time and a place for correct grammar, ie. official emails, letters and the like.
But I find it blood boiling when people correct me when I'm having a general conversation!
People correct my pronunciation (I'm from east london, so have a typical cockney accent).
So I'll sat wa-er for water etc. And the amount of times people have said 'Don't you mean waTer' scoff scoff.
I mean, you understood me didn't you? GRRRR.
And correct my grammar. I'll say something like 'x drove me and y to the supermarket' and some cocky bastard will pipe up with "Don't you mean x drove y and I to the supermarket'.
I loved that one, it meant I got to say to said cocky bastard 'no I actually should have said x drove y and ME, so not only are you patronising, you're thick as shit'.
I'm sure you have gathered by now there is indeed a particular cocky bastard that I'm referring to.
So AIBU to think that if you can understand me during a colloquial conversation, it doesn't matter if my grammar isn't perfect, and that my accent is FINE!!
(rant over)

I get people remarking condescendingly/jokingly on my 'brogue' (I'm Irish) and asking whether my son (born and growing up in England with Irish parents) will have an accent 'as thick as yours'. Now I'm a university lecturer with two Oxford degrees, so hardly meet most definitions of 'uneducated', but that's beside the point, obviously. I've had remarks on how 'pronounced' my accent is, given how long I've lived here - the assumption is that I would much rather have whatever the local accent is, but haven't managed it.

The irony is that on more occasions than I can count, those remarking have been people with very strong regional accents of their own they are clearly entirely unaware of.

In your situation, OP, I would draw your colleague aside and say 'Look, X, people are starting to notice how obsessed and self-conscious about accent and grammar you are, especially when you hyper-correct. [big sincere look] You don't have to be ashamed of your background, you know?'

Thanks for all your input guys!
Louise, that's BRILLIANT, I will definitely give that one a go, if only for my own amusement

I've got a London accent, which my colleagues tease me about, even though we're in London. They're teasing. I laugh it off.

'x drove me and y to the supermarket' and some cocky bastard will pipe up with "Don't you mean x drove y and I to the supermark

But what you said is correct. Isn't it?? Apart from " x drove y and me to the supermarket " would sound better. "X drove y and I" is plain wrong.

I would bet my last pound he's a sexist and this is his way of asserting his manly superiority.

I would fix him with a hard stare and then continue with what I was saying, glottal stops and all. Prick.

Is 'Do piss off' totally off the cards?

Rude git.

I mix up my consonants all the time (Instead of hot water it would be wot hotter), or sometimes just mispronounce words in general. I know how they're suppose to sound, they just come out funky because I think faster than I can talk.

Depending on my mood or who's correcting me, I just say my typical party line of "If you keep correcting me, we could be here all night".

How about: "let's make a pact - you stop correcting my speech and grammar, and I'll stop thinking you're a condescending obnoxious prat" said with a big smile.

YANBU.

I find people who want to appear "posher" use the example you gave.

Just makes them appear knobbers.

I love accents, and dialects. I always think it's fascinating when children have a completely different accent to their parents.

You could apply Muphry's Law, though that's far easier in print. I've lost count of how many smug MNers hee-haw about other people's SPaG while their own self-congratulatory posts are full of mistakes.

It's my life's work to point those out, but I'd never do it to normal, nice people.

haha yes me too Sangria.

Or
"Please stop incorrecting me, or I will have to send the grammar police round"

Fwiw, the "I" used incorrectly in place of "me" gives me the rage. You hear it a lot in people who think they are grammar pedants. No you're not!!! You're just plain wrong! Very wrong!!!

Very poor grammar does rub me up the wrong way I'll admit, but I hate it when it's used on MN as a stick to beat someone with, in a bid to 'win the thread' when it's got sod all to do with spelling and grammar in the first place.

It seems to happen a lot on here, the thread gets all heated about BFing v. FFing, or Tory v. Labour or whatever, and some twat pipes up 'and why should I respect the argument of someone who can't even use apostrophes properly? You are clearly stupid.'

It's ridiculous.

I get corrected by the locals for my generic, southern-ish accent. The locals are so local that 5 miles down the road, it's a different blend of local. No wonder I haven't picked it up in the last decade!

There's been some great comebacks suggested.

I can't believe how rude people can be. I am from the London area and live in Yorkshire. I used to do telesales and talked to customers from all around the north of England and Scotland. I love different accents and dialects. Although, it has to be said there are some I am not so keen on.

I admit that I am not keen on cockney accents, but I would never pull someone up on the way they speak. The only exception would be if they told me they were going for a job interview and wanted my advice.

I originally had a South London accent and when I went to secondary school it slid into cockney just because I wanted to fit in. When I was 16 a boyfriend told me that I would never get a job if I spoke like that so I made a concerted effort to improve the way I spoke. These days I think people are more accepting of different accents, but back then I think if I hadn't made an effort it would have been more difficult for me to get a job.

I don't correct my child's grammar when reading or talking- I model the correct way to speak instead. Correcting them is a sure fire way to dent their confidence.

The only time I correct it is when they're clearly doing it to wind me up eg asking for wa-er with a cheeky glint in their eye. On the whole my DCs speak pretty well.

How rude!! I can't deny that I have corrected others English, in my head, but it's alway written English (I receive a lot of correspondance in work). One of the reasons I keep my mouth shut is that I'm not an expert in grammar, the other, and main reason is I'm not rude.

My sister in law seemed to think correcting my accent was hilarious, I'm English living in Ireland, and also my children's accent too (they reflect mine in many ways, this is slowly disappearing as they get older). One day I snapped and asked her why the hell she found a child's pronunciation so hilarious, their mother was English so it should be hard to grasp they would also speak like me, and that I might find her mocking amusement if her own speech was perfect, which I'm sure she must realise, wasn't. She, naturally, got all offended and huffy, but hasn't said anything since.

I suspect though that this would be less effective with you in law, I would imagine LonnyVonny is correct and he's sexist and is using it to raise himself above you (in his own silly mind). Woo hoo to you on picking him uo on his 'y and I' correction, the plonker.

Oh I get this too - I got pulled the other day as I said I'm looking forward to dinner (meaning what you eat at midday!!!) typical Northern expression and got told, "you will have a long wait then as dinner is in the evening and tea is something you drink" Ha!

It's depressing that someone said they wouldn't offer a job to someone who doesn't pronounce their t clearly.

I find it very difficult to pronounce t, particularly in the middle of a word, not because I'm thick or uneducated or too lazy to do it, but because that is my regional accent and it's how I have always spoken (not Cockney though). It's a sound I am unfamiliar with making because I've never had to because it's not part of the common dialect here. Thinking I'm thick or unsuitable for a job because of it is like thinking a Germany person is thick for mispronouncing a W sound, or a French person is thick for struggling with a th sound.

A Germany person

Bloody autocorrect.

I'd tell him that you're proud of your cockney accent (as you should be) and tell him to keep his negative, ignorant comments to himself.

Correcting people's grammar is just plain rude.

What a knob!

It's always rude to correct the way someone says something, unless they ask for your advice or their job depends on saying it correctly and you are their boss.

My husband was staying in a nice, but not particularly posh private hospital and I was reading him the menu while he was still groggy from a general anaesthetic. The snooty nurse corrected me and laughed when I pronounce penne pasta as "pen" instead of "pen-ne". She didn't do it in a nice way either. Honestly who cares enough or is rude enough to do that?

Still seething about that one.