Let's resurrect diagramming

I realize I'm old--and old school--but if new pedagogy is what spawns "professional writers" like those who created, proofed, and/or edited this lead, it's time to rethink the way we (don't) teach English now. Seriously, folks:

What is the subject of this sentence? TRIP.
What is the linking verb? MAY BE. (NOT is just an adverb.)
What is the complement? SOMETHING WORTH MONEY, SOMETHING WORTH TIME, SOMETHING TO PARTICIPATE IN.

Huh?

Never mind the preposition ending the sentence; the author is apparently now talking about the MEETING, which is just the object of her earlier prepositional phrase, not the subject of the sentence. Yikes! Back in my day, newspaper reporters lowered their writing to an eighth grade level so typical readers could understand the story. Now, it seems, we need for them to raise their writing to an eight grade level ... for the very same reason!

With acceptance of "they," "them," "their," and "theirs" as generic singular pronouns, emphasis on creativity over convention in academic writing, and tolerance of grammar anarchy in general, teachers and professors are cheating their charges. Students need, employers tell us time and again, "excellent communication skills," but they graduate unable to write (or speak) coherently. In the real world, workers don't get paychecks just because they meet a page count and complete the prescribed number of drafts on time. We need to wean students away from their preschool T-ball "everybody plays, everybody wins, everybody gets a trophy" mindset. There is a right and wrong way to do everything.

Perhaps it's time to reinstitute the archaic practice of memorizing parts of speech, or even diagramming sentences. If the reporter above had ever learned to map her own thoughts, we wouldn't need GPS assistance to wade through her story!

The day the language died

Yesterday (March 14) was Twitter’s fifth birthday. They published several statistics, including these:

·         3 years, 2 months and 1 day. The time it took from the first Tweet to the billionth Tweet.

·         1 week. The time it now takes for users to send a billion Tweets.

·         50 million. The average number of Tweets people sent per day, one year ago.

·         140 million. The average number of Tweets people sent per day, in the last month.

·         177 million. Tweets sent on March 11, 2011.

What didn’t find its way into Twitter’s statistics was the number of Tweets that contained misspellings, grammar errors and bastardized abbreviations for words that aren’t that long in the first place.

Before you get “all up in my grill,” rest assured I know that Tweets are currently limited to 140 characters each and that without some abbreviations, one would not be able to stuff all one wishes into one’s Tweet. (I also know that many Tweets, if not most, are a bunch of drivel that doesn’t merit Tweeting in the first place, but that’s a whole ‘nother discussion … as is Tweeting/texting to someone who’s sitting at the other end of the sofa.) What irritates me is that poor language skills are not only prevalent on Twitter and in text messages, they’re leaking into real-world conversation. Just last week I was standing in line at a checkout counter and heard somebody behind me talking on her cell phone. I suppose I must give her credit for not texting or Tweeting her chatter, but she definitely loses credit for actually verbalizing the abbreviations “BFF,” “OMG” and “TTYL.”

My goodness, have we gotten that lazy? I can only conclude that we have. You might argue that “BFF” and “TTYL” are quicker to say than their full versions, but what about “OMG”? Can you seriously argue that “OMG” is quicker to say than “Oh my gawd”? They’re the same number of syllables! Fine, type the short version. But don’t SPEAK it.

I hate to think how many grammar-school kids are going to grow up confused about the spelling of words such as “please,” “thanks” and “welcome,” just to name a few. It’s bad enough that those words seem to be disappearing from our spoken language. Most kids, when they use those words at all, spell them “pls” or “plz”, “tx” or “ty”, and “wc.” I’d like to think it’s just because they’re trying to keep their Tweets and texts short and fast, but I suspect it’s more laziness than anything else. Otherwise, why not just call the person? If you can’t call someone because of where you are or what you’re doing, you probably shouldn’t be Tweeting or texting, either. And if that person isn’t someplace where he or she can answer the phone, he or she probably shouldn’t be answering your Tweet or text, either. (The etiquette of Tweeting/texting is also a whole ‘nother discussion, as well.)

And complete, grammatically correct sentences in a Tweet/text? Forget about it. I received a text a week or so ago that read “Where you at?” It was a wrong number, but that’s beside the point: Why not “Where are you?” One more character and correct sentence structure would result in dismemberment or a horrifying death? In this case, I suspect poor spoken English has resulted in a poor text message instead of the other way around, but the end result is the same. I suppose I should be happy it didn’t read “Were U @?”.

Our words, our conversations, our social interaction – they’re all becoming abbreviated. More and more, it seems the only things that are truly connected are our electronic devices.

And that’s FU.

Today's blog is brought to you by PhantomScribe's friend and fellow former military public affairs instructor, Roni. (You may recognize her as a regular and like-minded responder here.) Roni is retired and living in central Illinois, where the coyotes howl at passing trains and the buffalo gnats rule the spring skies. She collects vorpal swords and keeps cats, mome raths, borogoves and slithy toves as pets. Roni enjoys snipe hunting and cornstalk topiary. Her sarcasm is legendary and her purse light, and she longs for the day when stupidity will no longer be the basic building block of the universe. Roni has been encouraged recently by other friends and family members to start blogging, so she is guest-ghost-writing this column as a litmus test. PLEASE BE NICE TO HER!

Shame on us!

I've been using a spreadsheet to keep track of which classmates I owe a visit and/or comment on these weblogs ... and I've discovered that some of us are terrible slackers! I personally haven't blogged (here) since Week 6, but I had 13 posts banked (Mike S. has me beat with 15 posts; A.J. is right behind us with 11), and I have responded to 12 of yours (behind Lane with 15 and Vickie with 13).

Fewer than half of us (Lucas, Vickie, Mary, A.J., Mike S., Jeff, Lane and I) have hit the midterm postings requirement, and only four of us (Vickie, Mary, Lane and I) have hit the responses goal. One of us has blogged only once, and two others have responded to no peer posts. C'mon, people! This is 10% of our grade and the semester is half over! Get caught up! I love you!