Category Archives: Language
Which word could you do without?
Get off (of) your grammar soapbox!
Do you have a pet peeve? You know a particular phrase or misuse of language that makes your blood boil? I have. Lazy and quite often totally inaccurate phrases like “24/7″ mildly annoy me, but they don’t rile me. For that you’ll have to try much harder. Like the example below.
Happy Birthday to the humble Text Message
“Happy b’day 2 u. Happy b’day 2 u. Happy b’day dr txt msg. Happy b’day 2 u.”
20 years ago ago the first ever text message was sent by a Vodafone employee to a Senior Executive attending a Christmas party. It just said “Merry Christmas” but little did they know then how the technology would be used in years to come. Last year nearly 40 billion text messages were sent in the UK alone.
Is this guy a grammar pedant?
What a momentous week this has been. Barack Obama was reelected as US President, the Church of England has a new Archbishop of Canterbury and China is currently meeting to elect their new Premier who will see them through the next 10 years. Whoever ends up in the top job of any elected (or unelected) body, I hope they use their responsibility in a more proactive way than Lord Gilbert in the UK’s House of Lords.
The language of politicians or common people?
In the UK News a lot of coverage has been given in recent days to alleged abusive comments made by a senior member of our elected Government to a Policeman guarding Downing Street. In particular the noun “pleb”, coming from the latin “plebeian” meaning a common citizen.
