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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

AIBU to ask if the English are judgemental against people speaking improper English?

232 replies

ConfusedWife1234 · 15/04/2018 21:01

Hey,
I am not a native speaker and I always wondered how English people think about people who make grammatical or other errors when speaking/writing their language. So far most did not say a thing but what are they thinking?

OP posts:
SenecaFalls · 16/04/2018 00:00

The rule is that you should place the other persons name before your own.

That's a convention of English, not a rule.

It is grammatically correct to say "My mother is coming with me and my husband." Sometimes it's even appropriate to do this for emphasis. What is not standard is to say "My mother is coming with my husband and I" or "My mother is coming with I and my husband."

It's the case agreement that is important, not whether I or me comes first.

sockunicorn · 16/04/2018 00:02

I don't find it annoying when a non-native speaker makes mistakes. I actually find it quite endearing.

However when its a native speaker making errors out of laziness I find it quite annoying Blush. I wouldnt say anything but it does annoy me.

hmmwhatatodo · 16/04/2018 00:02

I tend to notice that when those with English as as additional language speak, we just take it as it is, regardless of how fluent or not the person may be. However, when English people speak in someone else’s language it often seems to be highly amusing to them ‘oh my god, an English person trying to speak (Arabic for example), wow, you sound so funny! Come and listen everyone!’ Obviously not always but I have seen it happen.

MrsTerryPratchett · 16/04/2018 00:15

There are a fair number of British people who can't understand each other. I worked in a call centre in London and whenever anyone from Northern Ireland, parts of Scotland or Liverpool called, they would direct them to me as none of the other people could understand a word. TBF I had parents with accents. And they were better with Caribbean/African accents so we muddled through.

But if British people vary so much, how the hell can we judge ESL types?

ThanksForAllTheFish · 16/04/2018 00:25

SenecaFalls, I was taught that personal pronouns always come last when more than one pronoun is used in a sentence. My English teachers would mark a sentence as incorrect if I had written it ‘me and my husband’ rather than ‘my husband and me’
I have a very vivid memories of being taught about personal pronouns in primary school. Personal pronouns and the lesson on onomatopoeias are two of my strongest memories from primary school.

I do think that in less formal situations and general everyday speech it is not as commonly used. I would never dream of correcting anyone who said ‘me and my husband’ but my brain does pick up on it.

Another one is the way people use the word ignorant when they actually should say rude. Some one cutting in front of you in a queue is rude, not ignorant. To use the word ignorant in place of rude is in itself ignorant and as much as that annoys me I do love the irony.

PinkbicyclesinBerlin · 16/04/2018 00:47

If everyone in my town or region or country says something a particular way and we all understand it then that is correct. It is not a sign of ignorance or stupidity just because it is not said in the same way as another subset of people would say it.

That is not what Four said though. She said if a native speaker said it then it is the correct usuage of English. There is of course regional dialects of English but for example if you consider ‘I done it’, there is no region where that is the norm, people say it where I am from but others in the same region say it as it should be ‘I did it’. Or the lack of the th in Ireland. Definitely mispronounced, not dialect whereas in Ireland we definitely say haitch as a given, that is dialect.

CompletelyExhausted · 16/04/2018 00:53

I couldn't care less if my international friends, or other people I meet who speak English as a second language, make errors in their speech! I'm always just so impressed they speak as well as they do! (I know gcse french from 20 yrs ago and that's the limit of my language ability!!)

However - I am not very patient with my degree level international students when they write essays. I do think if you r studying to degree level in UK, your written English should be up to the standard of degree-level. It is v v difficult to read essays when the writing makes no sense whatsoever and you have to spend ages figuring out what is actually meant in each paragraph Smile

CompletelyExhausted · 16/04/2018 00:55

Ps. Same applies to my native English speaking students (many of whom submit essays which are completely unreadable, and where the grammar is far far worse than the international students)

PinkbicyclesinBerlin · 16/04/2018 00:58

It is v v difficult to read essays when the writing makes no sense whatsoever and you have to spend ages figuring out what is actually meant in each paragraph

Yes it is utterly frustrating. In my experience standards of written English have dropped significantly at 3rd level.

wendiwoowho · 16/04/2018 01:41

I don't even notice tbh. It only really stands out when someone pronounces a word differently than the norm, I don't judge them for it though. I guess there is loads of words pronounced differently.

Plus, I say jamp instead of jumped all the time, most people here do even though it not even a word.

Pimpernell182 · 16/04/2018 02:00

I'm only on page 3 so apologies if this has been said.

fourfried the reason few posters are accepting your argument is you're mostly not talking to other language teachers. Whilst I completely agree that you're right, (having also studied language teaching and linguistics at a fairly high academic level and taught for 10+ years) with every respect you're not explaining it well!

Here's my attempt. Grammar can be prescriptive (tells you how to speak) descriptive (describes how people speak) or pedagogic (simplified for teaching purposes). Four fried is talking about descriptive grammar, which in academic / professional circles is the only kind people are interested in. Most of the rest of you are talking about prescriptive grammar which is beloved by pedants and derided by most people who've really thought about it.

If you are a prescriptive grammarian that means you think there are some things that are correct and others that are not. Or in other words there are rules of a language. It follows that we can ask who makes these rules? Unlike (e.g.) Italy, we have no academy of language whose job it is to decide what is English and what is not. So it must be the speakers of English then. So who are they? Well, they are many people. And they all speak pretty differently. And in this day and age none of us like to think ourselves arrogant enough to believe that our way is THE way. There are many ways. If a community of people speak a certain way, then that phrasing is correct in that community. No one community is regarded in the linguistic world as taking precedence over the others. It just doesn't stack up.

As one pp said, languages are alive, they grow and change. You don't have to go back very far to see evidence of that. If you want to see how things have changed almost beyond recognition you only need to look to Shakespeare or the King James Bible, both of which were instrumental texts in the standardisation of written English. These two books were essentially the gold standard of the language in their day. Read them now. Borderline unrecognisable as modern day English. Well no one has approved those changes. They've just happened, and will continue to. This is why people who've studied language are not much interested in descriptive grammar. It tells us nothing really.

A few further points!

I mentioned also pedagogic grammar. How can you teach something that's never right or wrong? It's very difficult to do obviously. So much in the same way as other disciplines (e.g. Physics) are simplified for teaching purposes, the same thing happens with English. We (as language teachers for speakers of other languages) teach a version of the English we speak, simplified for the level of the learner.

Usually (not always) this is based on what we might call 'standard' English, or in my case 'standard British English'. The difference between standard and correct is important though. Standard describes the variety of the language I speak. Something can be correct or incorrect within that. Someone who speaks a different variety (e.g standard American English, Scottish English) is not incorrect for speaking that way.

Does that mean speakers of non-standard varieties, or low-status varieties don't get judged by speakers of prestige-varieties? Of course it does not, but that is because people in general have no idea about all this stuff.

One final thing then I promise I'm done. Someone asked if speaking and writing are the same. The short answer is no. Writing 'they're' when you mean 'their' is not correct in any variety. Or perhaps more accurately, the above applied for the most part to spoken language. The written language is for obvious reasons much more standardised. People can and do choose to write in a variety closer to their own speech for expressive / literary / political reasons but for the most part in writing we use and are expected to use something approximating the standard variety of the country were in.

Op don't ever feel judged for your English. It's an amazing thing to have two functional languages in your brain and sadly most British people will never understand that.

shouldprobablysaynothing · 16/04/2018 02:43

fourfried

You actually teach people English? 😂

Glad it's not me on the receiving end of your "grammar" lessons.

SenecaFalls · 16/04/2018 03:15

Excellent post, Pimpernell.

Glad it's not me on the receiving end of your "grammar" lessons.

So who taught you to say "it's not me" instead of the excruciatingly correct "it's not I"? Wink

Mayagoldchoc · 16/04/2018 08:31

Language evolves, but if you're going to post something on mumsnet maybe wait for the Times to update their style guide! (Or a new version of the collins english grammar guide!)

ConfusedWife1234 · 16/04/2018 09:05

What is haitch by the way?

OP posts:
PinkbicyclesinBerlin · 16/04/2018 09:10

Come to Ireland Confused and we will let you into the secret.

wakemeupbefore · 16/04/2018 09:42

No.1 language in the world. Hmm

ThanksForAllTheFish · 16/04/2018 09:42

ConfusedWife1234

What is haitch by the way?

The letter H.

Some people pronounce is as haitch but the correct pronounciation is aitch.

Most words using the letter H would have the soft h sound (as in house or horse) but if you are pronouncing it on its own (as in saying “ Mr H Jones” or reading out the alphabet) then the haitch/aitch issue arises.

I’m in Scotland and haitch is used quite a lot where I live.

VexahliaDeRolo · 16/04/2018 09:53

The same would apply in your example. So would you say: "me went to see the rugby game" or: "I went to see the rugby game"?

I remember my Grandad teaching me this when I was at school, it's a very useful way to remember it. He was always particular about grammar.

I can't get annoyed about different accents, dialects, orders of words. As long as I understand what they're saying then fine.

My husband is picking up our local dialect, it's hilarious, he's got a Dutch accent saying local words. I love it!

Hillarious · 16/04/2018 10:02

I encounter a lot of non-native speakers of English at work. I'm not judgemental at all with spoken English - it's usually obvious that they're non-native and your aim in any conversation is to ensure you understand their message correctly. However, written English is quite different and any mistakes clearly stand out. If what they are writing is important, it should be easy enough for them to have someone check over their work.

As more people learn English a different, more "simple" version of the language is evolving. Non-native speakers will not necessarily understand the nuances of the English spoken by a native speaker and this can lead to confusion. A prime example of this was with a Chinese PhD student, writing in English (and her English is excellent), who was told by her supervisor that she "might want to change" one part of her thesis. The Chinese student's reaction to this was, well I might want to change it, but I might not, so she didn't. She hadn't realised that the supervisor was telling her to make the change. Certainly non-native speakers would rarely come out with a sentence along the lines of "I wonder if you might possibly be able to . . ." A lot of e-mails I get from non-native speakers can, on initial reading, seem abrupt and demanding - the English is quite correct, but the phrasing could be changed.

And yes, of course, English is changing and evolving all the time. We're now able to blissfully split infinitives with impunity!

FourFriedChickensDryWhiteToast · 16/04/2018 10:03

" with every respect you're not explaining it well! "

fair enough, I did have v cold hands and not in the best of moods...:):) you have explained it so much better, thank you Pimpernell

Abra1de · 16/04/2018 10:04

Look at the grammar and spelling in a significant number of posts by ‘natives’ on MN and you’ll be reassured! 😃

FourFriedChickensDryWhiteToast · 16/04/2018 10:04

" Glad it's not me on the receiving end of your "grammar" lessons."

well, should i can certainly see you are in need...:):)

Slievenamon · 16/04/2018 10:05

Yes i have been teaching as a second language for years, yes i have a degree in it, and yes i have teaching certificates. What i am telling you is standard lesson one in applied linguistics

If you believe that you believe anything! If even half of that were true you wouldn't be claiming that anything an English person says is correct English purely because they are saying it.

FourFriedChickensDryWhiteToast · 16/04/2018 10:08

are you calling me a liar now ? if i were to fabricate my qualifications, trust me i would make something else up, something that would mean i didn't have to justify my qualifications to random strangers on the internet, wouldn't I?

Thanks for telling me I don't have a degree or teaching qualifications, good Lord, if only I had known, it would have saved me such a headache.

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