‘When we was...’ and other grammar faux pas that grind your gears

[26mcjrfm]

Exactly this - does anyone else have any other grammar errors that they see regularly that make their teeth itch?

I am, by a far stretch, an English language enthusiast, but seeing ‘we was’ in a sentence makes me squirm!

We've literally just had a massive thread about this.

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/3723995-just-seen-my-first-spag-bowl-on-fb-i-feel-like-i-belong-here-now

It's still pretty fresh.

misuse of the apostrophe

Oh waow, how did I miss this!

Thanks, I’ll be here all night

I have always wondered whether people who speak in local dialect, where the grammar is incorrect, write the same way as they speak.

For example one of the copywriters at work always says "you was", but she has an English literature degree.

My favourite piece of gratuitous apostrophe abuse:

OP should of read the other thread.

Thas dialect tho...innit

"we was" is a perfectly grammatical dialectic variation - see this www.bl.uk/british-accents-and-dialects/articles/grammatical-variation-across-the-uk

Problem is most people stop learning grammar too early and get stuck with a set of rules they think are unbreakable and absolute. Further linguistic study will tell you that languages are constantly changing and in flux - that's what's so great about them.

Who cares, people speak differently, therefore they type differently. Pedants has it's own section.

MrsFrisbyMouse - thanks for that interesting link.

TAAToyT

I have always wondered whether people who speak in local dialect, where the grammar is incorrect, write the same way as they speak.

I'm from the SE, but have moved around a bit including London. My grammar and use of language has changed and I have this subconscious (annoying?) habit of mirroring or picking up on how others speak. So I'll quite regularly say ain't or we was or some other 'lazy' grammar, but I never ever write it. It was drilled into my teacher's pet self too much

@Sparklfairy I do that too! When I moved to my current home I encountered some vocabulary and grammar that I had never heard anywhere before and some of the grammatical "errors" used to really grate. But I soon realised that nobody here saw them as wrong and I started to see it as a regional variation, just like the local accent. 20 years later I find myself using the same phrases and grammar myself as they now sound normal to me. I have a public facing job so I suppose it is only natural that when you are talking to large numbers of people on a daily basis and they all use a particular form of speech that you will adopt it too. I don't write that way though - I still stick to the grammar rules that Iearned as a child, some of which I am sure are just as "wrong" as they will relate to the area I grew up in.

There's a few localisms like "we was" and misleading words like "pennies" meaning money/ coins, not low value coins that drive me round the bend. I accept most of the local vocabulary quite happily and have adopted a fair bit. (It can be hard work having lived most of my life outside the area of my accent though )

I'd be pissed off if you told me to "bring some pennies" and I did as you asked and found that I couldn't use my bloody "pennies" because they were too low in value because you'd used an inaccuate word, when what I needed was some coins. Most vending machines won't take pennies, and they don't add up to useful spending money.

If you told me I was "nesh", that's fine, I either know what you mean or don't know and will ask. Additional vocabulary is fine unlike inaccurate vocabulary.

"We was" is bad grammar and feeds too much into poor handwriting and language learning.

Elbowedout glad it's not just me! I cringe when I think back to my early 20s and my friends all talked 'rudeboi' it was like a foreign language - 'we gon link at ma yard innit' (translation: we shall meet at my abode old bean)

When I'm on the phone to clients and in person I become much more 'posh', not OTT but if I meet friends after a work meeting I go from 'lovely to meet you' to 'youalriiiiiggghhht mate?!'

According to linguistic scholars there is no such thing as a grammar 'error'. There are variations of language of which Standard English (used for written language) is one.
However 'what I done was' (exH used this all the time) drives me nuts. Also 'we was just leaving' - in fact any variation that's not SE I find annoying.

What's with this ' I got off of the....'
Hear it a lot now. Off of.

Constantly hear 'I'm sat' instead of 'I'm sitting'' and similar. Grrrr!

"I should have went . . ."

No. It's "I should have gone . . ."

Phrases like "grind my gears" and "make my teeth itch" are pretty annoying.

Shear GOD YES! One of the worst has to be "Give your head a wobble"

What does that even mean? It sounds so stupid.

And..."tear you a new one"

That's just disgusting.

Found a new one from a rape apologist cunto on Facebook this evening.

"Who made YOU the Judge and Judy?!"

** It's actually awesome and I'm going to start using it myself

Aaaaand I didn't RTFT, it's about grammar. Sorry. It's a class phrase though.

Those conversations where people are always turning round to say things.

"So I turned round and said....and he turned round to me and he said .....so then I turned round to him and I said....etc etc."

Something being described as "not that big of a deal". It's not that big a deal, but it bugs me .