MY pet peeves

[Kaonohi]

Many people still use two spaces at the end of a sentence. In fact, my work place style guide calls for it. I’m against it, but I’m outnumbered. It’s one of my pet peeves.

The rule is a single space at the end of a sentence (see Chicago Manual of Style). In fact, for online text, html does not support two spaces, or three spaces, or any number of extra spaces, unless you use trickery. (Greg, I notice you used html tricks to insert those extra spaces.)

Oh, Chicago is full of mobsters who don't get 'compensated' for blank space.

From my English/Writing classes in the 1970/80's, I learned two spaces was the rule, and I'm too old to change.[space][space]

Live with it.

[Leo Lakio]

Do you count an error for putting just one space after a period, like this?:
something I am working on. I've gotten much better

rather than two, like this:
something I am working on. nI've gotten much better

Interesting. I am generally in the habit of using two, but I've been using one with more frequency in the past couple of years. I blame Twitter. Or the gentle sloppiness that comes with aging.

I oftentimes hear people in Hawaii saying "much" when they actually should be saying "many" in a sentence. That always drives me up the wall.

Eh, how much cans of soda should we bring to da party?

I suppose pidgin would be the source for many/much of these sorts of linguistic adjustments, eh?

Actually, Leo, I didn't look up your posts. Since you and I are in-real-life friends now, you fall into another category for my English teacher behavior.

That's vaguely frightening ... but just vaguely. The Alpha Female's father was a high-school English teacher his entire career, so she was raised with a strong sense of accurate usage, and has assisted me in a number of ways.

[Sharilyn]

"Oh my God." That phrase is so overused. I admit, I say it on occasion, as well as "OMG" while typing... but I've been hearing it so often that it's become annoying.

I don't mind when tourists mispronounce Hawaiian words. After all, it's a foreign language to them. At least they try. I know I mangle names and words when I visit places. I think it's funny, tho, when residents tell me they live on... "You know, that 'H' street in Lahaina"... meaning, Honoapiilani. Wow, they're so lazy, they don't bother to learn the name of the street they live on.

[memorylane]

Is it ru-inned or rune-d for ruined?

WTH is up with aks for ask only seemingly done by black people (no racism intended)?

And in all technicality, it should be rest-ah-u-rant instead of rester-rawnt.

[GregLee]

Is it ru-inned or rune-d for ruined?

WTH is up with aks for ask only seemingly done by black people (no racism intended)?

And in all technicality, it should be rest-ah-u-rant instead of rester-rawnt.

You hear both the two- and one-syllable pronunciations of "ruin".

If you google on "aks ask", you'll find that both pronunciations have existed since Old English, and it's possible that "acsian" is the earlier form. As a conjecture about why "aks" might have shifted to "ask", a theory about the most natural form of a syllable is that aperture in the mouth increases up to the vowel of the syllable, then it decreases more and more, up to the end. Then, since "s" has more aperture than "k", it is more natural for a syllable to end with "sk", with decreasing aperture, than it is to end with "ks", with increasing aperture.

I don't know how the "aks" variant came to be associated with Black English. There is some discussion here, http://linguistlist.org/issues/7/7-1048.html, but no one seems to know.

The "au" of "restaurant" is a French spelling, which would be pronounces "o" in French, and presumably in English when the word was borrowed. Apparently, there is an etymological connection with "restore". I don't see any reason it would be pronounced as a diphthong "a" plus "u".

[DaleP]

More and more, people are using "amount" when they should be using "number." This past weekend, I heard a sports announcer say, "The amount of people in attendance at today's game was...."

And don't get me started on how literally everyone overuses (and misuses) the word "literally."

[scrivener]

I think the better explanation for rest-er-rant is the schwaing of the unstressed syllable, no?

[GregLee]

I think the better explanation for rest-er-rant is the schwaing of the unstressed syllable, no?

Vowel reduction to schwa explains why the second syllable has schwa rather than "o" (or some other simple vowel), but it doesn't explain why it's not "a" plus "u" -- diphthongs do not reduce to schwa. Compare the basic "o" in the second syllable of "photo" ("o", lengthens at end of word), "photography" (short "o" shifts to "a" under stress), "photograph" (short "o" reduces to schwa).

memorylane thought it should be pronounced "ah-u" because of its spelling, and I'm saying that this is wrong. The "au" is a Frenchified spelling, and it does not reflect an English pronunciation as a diphthong.

This is an instance of my own pet peeve, which I gave earlier in this thread, of jumping to the conclusion that the pronunciation must be wrong when it doesn't seem to correspond to the spelling.

[memorylane]

Not too long after posting mine (thanks for the very interesting reply on it BTW),
I was watching an earlier 2000's show called Boston Public and one of the adult characters said something or other and ended with "wouldn't you of?" I was like HOLD THE PHONE!! Wouldn't you of? Surely it should be be wouldn't you have?
I virtual online school my son and it is stunning how much I didn't retain and how the stuff he is being taught is barely and rarely used correctly these days.
I'm told I must be some kind of dumb hick idiot and that people cannot understand what I am saying through my posts so I suppose I don't use the 8 proper pieces of sentencing or the correct punctuation as well but mine isn't near as bad as most I see so I guess I will survive.

[GregLee]

Wouldn't you of? Surely it should be be wouldn't you have?

It is, essentially. That is, "have" goes through perfectly ordinary pronunciation changes which give it the same pronunciation as "of" would have in this position. So "of" is a reasonable way of spelling the reduced form of "have". Specifically, the changes are: (1) loss of stress in grammatical or function words like auxiliary verbs, (2) loss of "h" in unstressed syllables, (3) reduction of unstressed vowels to schwa. The spelling "'ve" for the conventional contracted form of "have" doesn't work quite as well as "of", in this case, because "'ve" implies that there is no vowel left at all (while actually there is still a schwa in the pronunciation).

But "of" has not yet been conventionalized here, so in written English it would count as a dialectal substandard form.

[scrivener]

I'm willing to bet the way it was written in the script is "Wouldn't you have?" But as Greg suggests, it gets contracted and/or schwad (I didn't see the episode, so I can't say). Were you to write it out, it would look awful: "Wouldn't you've?" but that's pretty much what we're dealing with. This doesn't erase your peevishness, but maybe it at least allows you to cut the actor, character, or writer some slack?

By the way: if you were reading HT and you saw this:

Surely it should be be wouldn't you have?

would it raise your ire as much as "wouldn't you of?" Just asking!

[Leo Lakio]

By the way: if you were reading HT and you saw this:

Surely it should be be wouldn't you have?

would it raise your ire as much as "wouldn't you of?" Just asking!

Ask Mr. King or Ms. Winans.

[memorylane]

Even tho it was the end of her sentence?
It just seemed so "off" especially being the show about school and teaching.

[Walkoff Balk]

"Oh my God." That phrase is so overused. I admit, I say it on occasion, as well as "OMG" while typing... but I've been hearing it so often that it's become annoying.

O my gawd! (with a New Yawk accent)

[GregLee]

Specifically, the changes are: (1) loss of stress in grammatical or function words like auxiliary verbs, (2) loss of "h" in unstressed syllables, (3) reduction of unstressed vowels to schwa.

I've just figured out how to use phonetic notation on the computer I'm using now:

Changes to "have": hǽv (1) hæv (2) æv (3) əv
Changes to "of": ʌ́v (1) ʌv (3) əv

So, this shows how it happens that "have" and "of" can be pronounced the same way.

(There's a phonetic "keyboard" at IPA chart.)

[Frankie's Market]

I oftentimes hear people in Hawaii saying "much" when they actually should be saying "many" in a sentence. That always drives me up the wall.

Eh, how much cans of soda should we bring to da party?

I suppose pidgin would be the source for many/much of these sorts of linguistic adjustments, eh?

Perhaps. But I've also heard that mistake being committed by college graduates who think they are speaking proper English when they say things like, "How much doughnuts should we buy from the bakery?" I've encountered people who never realized that "much" shouldn't be used whenever referring to things that can be counted.

I don't mind when tourists mispronounce Hawaiian words. After all, it's a foreign language to them. At least they try.

That leads to another pet peeve of mine: Locals "teaching" tourists about Hawaiian words, but getting it wrong. How many times have I heard UH fans at a volleyball match telling visitors that the team is named the "Rainbow Wahines." Folks, it's Rainbow Wahine. No "s" at the end.

[scrivener]

Folks, it's Rainbow Wahine. No "s" at the end.

Okay. Now we're entering the realm of one of my pet peeves. You are correct: the official name of the team is Rainbow Wahine. But to refer to them as the Wahines, while incorrect, is not wrong. I know that plural S does not exist in Hawaiian, but when we're speaking about that team, we're speaking in ENGLISH. Why do we go so far out of our way sometimes to avoid using words such as LEIS, LANAIS, and WAHINES when we don't bother to use the corresponding pluralizing articles (such as NA)? If you want to stick to standard Hawaiian vocabulary even while you're speaking in English, I guess that's your call, but I don't think you should get ruffled if people SPEAKING ENGLISH stick to standards of the English language.

I'm Japanese and speak the Japanese language just a bit. I have no problem with words like KIMONOS or TOYOTAS, and do you know why? Because when we use those words in our own language, we're not speaking Japanese. We're using borrowed words from the Japanese language while speaking English.

I wrote an article about this very topic (about this very volleyball team) about four years ago here, if anyone cares to see the rest of my thinking on the topic.

[Frankie's Market]

Okay. Now we're entering the realm of one of my pet peeves. You are correct: the official name of the team is Rainbow Wahine. But to refer to them as the Wahines, while incorrect, is not wrong. I know that plural S does not exist in Hawaiian, but when we're speaking about that team, we're speaking in ENGLISH. Why do we go so far out of our way sometimes to avoid using words such as LEIS, LANAIS, and WAHINES when we don't bother to use the corresponding pluralizing articles (such as NA)? If you want to stick to standard Hawaiian vocabulary even while you're speaking in English, I guess that's your call, but I don't think you should get ruffled if people SPEAKING ENGLISH stick to standards of the English language.

I'm Japanese and speak the Japanese language just a bit. I have no problem with words like KIMONOS or TOYOTAS, and do you know why? Because when we use those words in our own language, we're not speaking Japanese. We're using borrowed words from the Japanese language while speaking English.

I wrote an article about this very topic (about this very volleyball team) about four years ago here, if anyone cares to see the rest of my thinking on the topic.

Well, that's quite a mouthful of an explanation in order to justify referring to members of the team as "Rainbow Wahines." Problem is, those unsuspecting visitors at Stan Sheriff Center probably won't get the full dissertation on the topic when they casually ask a UH fan about the team's nickname.

I'm one of those people who really do want to get school/team nicknames right, if only so I have a better understanding of the institution and to broaden my cultural horizons. I didn't mind it years ago when someone corrected me about referring to members of the Stanford football team as being the "Cardinals." Officially, the school's nickname is Cardinal. (No "s" at the end.) But if no one had bothered to speak up, then I wonder how much longer I would have gone on my merry way, thinking that the school's teams were named after the bird rather than the color.

[Frankie's Market]

I'm Japanese and speak the Japanese language just a bit. I have no problem with words like KIMONOS or TOYOTAS, and do you know why? Because when we use those words in our own language, we're not speaking Japanese. We're using borrowed words from the Japanese language while speaking English.

So you wouldn't correct a student if he/she talked about feasting on SUSHIS at a Japanese buffet? What about someone saying they exchanged 100 dollars for 8000 YENS at the bank?

[Leo Lakio]

A variation on the current discussion between Scrivener & Frankie's Market involves the musical instrument long associated with Hawai`i --- I get into lengthy conversations with folks here on the CONUS regarding the correct pronunciation and spelling of said instrument (as well as the plural issue).

`ukulele
ukulele
ukelele

oo-koo-leh-leh
you-kuh-lay-lee

When writing it, my preference is to go with the first on the list, including the `okina. However, in correspondence regarding a local organization of players (of which I am the v.p.) - Seattle Ukulele Players Association - I drop the `okina; partly because (a) that is the more common spelling in non-Hawaiian usage, and (b) since `okina is a letter in the Hawaiian alphabet, our acronym would not be "SUPA" but rather "S`PA." (Yes, I am being slightly facetious with that second reason.)

The third spelling is simply inaccurate, yet common enough to generate 15,500,000 entries on a Google search (versus 38,200,000 of "ukulele"). Google at least tries to steer users to the corrected version first.

As for the two pronunciations, while the first is accurate, the second is commonly accepted - and even scans better in the lyric of a song like "Ukulele Lady." I don't generally tell people that they are "wrong" to pronounce it that way, just as I don't correct most folks who say karaoke as "care-ree-oh-kee" rather than "kah-rah-oh-kay." I simply use my own preferred (and to me, more accurate) pronunciation in conversation - if asked about it (which I often am), I will elaborate, and in some cases, the other party will choose to make an effort to change their own pronunciation, if they see me as providing a more authoritative version (yes, it sometimes happens).

[GregLee]

`ukulele
ukulele
ukelele

oo-koo-leh-leh
you-kuh-lay-lee

...
The third spelling is simply inaccurate, ...

Inaccurate to what? The third spelling more accurately represents the second of the two pronunciations you give, which has a reduced vowel in the second syllable "kuh". So far as I know, unless it's pronounced "you"/"yuh", an unstressed vowel spelled "u" in English can't be reduced to "uh". That is, English speakers would expect a spelling "ukulele" to be pronounced "you-kyuh-lay-lee", according to ordinary spelling conventions, like such words as "accurate", "annual".

[Leo Lakio]

Inaccurate to what? The third spelling more accurately represents the second of the two pronunciations you give...

So accuracy of spelling is dependent upon pronunciation?

[GregLee]

So accuracy of spelling is dependent upon pronunciation?

I didn't know what you meant, so that's why I asked you "Inaccuracy to what?" Comparing to another recently discussed word, if by accuracy you meant "like the spelling in the original language", then "restaurant" would be more accurate than "restorant", because the word is spelled with "au" in French.

At any rate, I think it is clear why so many people spell it "ukelele".

[Leo Lakio]

At any rate, I think it is clear why so many people spell it "ukelele".

Oh, yes, that's true. Misspelling words based on pronunciation is common.

[Walkoff Balk]

The automatic call backs after you left a voice message and hanged up. It's not the person screening calls and calling back. So, I just the let phone ring.