When did "I seen" become acceptable?!?!? VENT!!!!

[Eeyores Butterfly]

Warsh appears to be an Eastern thing. My father sort of grew up in the DC area, at least, that's the place that he called home the most (military family) and he says it. I picked it up from him. I don't say it anymore, but when I was younger I used to.

Many of these little mispronunciations or mistypings can easily be chalked up to somebody whose speaking and reading vocabulary are not at the same level. It seems that most people are more advanced in one area. I know for myself, I was reading well ahead of peers. I saw a lot of words in print before I ever heard them spoken and have ended up with some rather interesting pronunciations. The one that I had issues with for a long time was "hearth". I was absolutely convinced that it was "earth" with an h at the beginning, not "heart" with an h at the end. I still think "herth" sounds prettier. I can see the same thing being said for people who use phrases in their writing like "mute point." Their speaking vocabularies are probably more advanced than their written vocabulary.

 

[DarthKTrava]

I am stickler for grammer, and I am not shy about correcting people. My kids call me the "Grammer Police". Some of the things that bother me:

"I seen it." No, you SAW it.

"John and me are going to the movies". No. I always tell them to separate it in their heads and make two sentences. John is going to the movies. OK. Me is going to the movies. No, not so much.

"I don't want none." (or any other double negative) NO. If you don't want none, then you must want some, right? This works really well at dinner. Me: spooning up broccoli. Child: I don't want none. Me: puts broccoil on plate. Child: But I said I don't want none!! Me: I know, that's why I gave it to you. Now you don't have none, you have some.

"She brang me some." NO!! My standard response to this (so much so that my children now say it automatically without me even opening my mouth) is "Brang is not a word, it is the noise a cymbal makes when you hit it."

"He axed me to do it." UGH - makes shivers run down my spine. He did not AXE you, axe murdering is illegal.

I think a lot of bad grammer is just ingrained. My DH was brought up in a very uneducated home. He was always spoken to in this way, so that is how he learned to speak. After 16 years with me, I have him mostly retrained. The kids pick it up from their grandparents and from school. I nip it in the bud.

Perhaps the spelling police should be called?

 

[DarthKTrava]

When I was laid off of work and drawing unemployment I had to press 1 for English.

Which you have to since the only other option is 2 for Spanish. If you speak another language, you're just out of luck!

And I don't like ebonics either. Either speak English or get it yourself! If I don't comprehend you, you're likely to not get what you were wanting in the first place....

 

[RunningGirl]

same time that "i go" became the new "i said"

drives me mental too.

Some teens seem to think that "like" and "said" are synonymous. That drives me crazy.

 

[S. C.]

Which you have to since the only other option is 2 for Spanish. If you speak another language, you're just out of luck!

And I don't like ebonics either. Either speak English or get it yourself! If I don't comprehend you, you're likely to not get what you were wanting in the first place....

I feel I should not have to press 1 for English in the USA. Give them the option to press 1 for Spanish etc.

 

[Sorsha]

Perhaps the spelling police should be called?

GrammAr police outrank spelling police.

 

[Cindyluwho]

GrammAr police outrank spelling police.

Yes, but if we had the GramMA police, perhaps we could stop women over 50 from wearing mini skirts

 

[surfergirl602]

My kids picked up "I done" or "she done" etc from school and it drives me crazy!

Mom, look at what Julia done?

I done it while I was sleeping.

ACK!

 

[surfergirl602]

FTR, you are not allowed to "axe" me. You can ASK me, but you can not AXE me.

YES!! This one drives me insane!! And when people say a sing grrr...
it's a singer, or I am singing, not sing ginng.

I know it doesn't have to do with grammar, but there was a guy in the commissary whose shorts were literally down to his knees, his boxers were hanging out, and his shirt didn't cover his butt!! My kids commented on how his pants fell down, and I shouted out in an exasperated voice, "Oh, for God's sake, pull your pants up! I am sure that no one in this commissary want to look at your a$$! I sure don't, and I don't want my kids looking at it! Grow up and get some manners when you're in public!" Crazy for me, I know, but I'm just so fed up with the disrespect! The soldiers and those with kids agreed with me, and he pulled them up, but they were so big that he had to hold them up. he couldn't even walk straight with how low they were. he waddled, like a duck.

 

[FireDancer]

Just as an FYI: Firefox has a built in spell checker which is handy for posting in online forums. It is available for Windows, OS X, and Linux which should cover just about everyone here.

It is by far the most secure browser, especially with the addition of the NoScript plug in and 3rd party cookies turned off.

Ok, back to the vocabulary rant:

Ebonics, unlike French, Germany, Italian, Spanish, etc is not a language. It is an improper user of the English language, much like Cockney English is for our friends over the pond (Norf London anyone?). I can't say I am all that perturbed about multilingual societies. I do think anyone moving here should learn our language enough to get by just as I would learn Italian if I moved to Italy or French if I moved to France. Pressing 1 for English doesn't bother me as much as having to speak Spanish to get a job in certain parts of the country.

 

[Sorsha]

Yes, but if we had the GramMA police, perhaps we could stop women over 50 from wearing mini skirts

Good plan!

 

[My2Cinderellas]

I can't stand it anymore!!

When did it become acceptable to type or say the words "I seen"?!?!?!

"I seen this at Disney....."

"I seen this on tv...."

"I seen..."

I makes me so mad I want to just grab that person and shake...beat...throttle....ARRRRGGGGHHHHHHH!!!!!

It is not "I seen...".

It is "I saw..."!!!

Okay, vent over!

I see you've had a chat with my FIL. But you forgot the other half of the sentence.... it goes like this:

When WE WAS in Florida, WE SEEN this neat whatever.

 

[DarthKTrava]

GrammAr police outrank spelling police.

For those instances where it's not so severe as to call out the grammar police.... when there's only spelling errors... (not including what could be construed as "typos").

 

[MariDisney]

For those instances where it's not so severe as to call out the grammar police.... when there's only spelling errors... (not including what could be construed as "typos").

When there ARE only spelling errors.

 

[DarthKTrava]

When there ARE only spelling errors.

True.

And don't use the grammar checker in Word. Sometimes the sentence it spits out makes less sense than the sentence you wrote to start with.

 

[tinkermom23]

I can take a few typo's but can someone explain the word "prolly" to me instead of probably?

OK... this is a biggie... it makes me cringe!
My teenage nieces use it in conversation too. As if it's a real word.

DH uses double negatives with the kids all the time. Dives me nuts, I just mumble under my breath and sometimes correct him later. The problem is that he uses them when he's scolding the kids or is upset about something.

"You aint doing nuthin' tell you clean that room of yours!" I try not to laugh but I usually end up leaving the room.

I have lived in MN all my life and never knew that you shouldn't end a sentence with "with" until my friend from TX told me. I had graduated college and still said "You wanna come with?" I know it's wrong but I catch myself saying it all the time.

While I'm on a roll... another peeve..... when people post a message without using any capital letters, puncuation, or paragraphs, and lots of acronyms. It makes it very hard to read.

 

[ols386]

"I seen" drives me nuts too. Along with "axe" (ask).

Don't the schools teach grammar and spelling anymore? Or if they do, then some of the kids aren't paying attention.

This may not seem like a big deal to some, but when you have a job interview, especially for a job where you will be interacting with people in the business world, I can guarantee a potential employer will notice these things. It would be sad if that were the reason someone didn't get that great job they wanted because of sloppy language.

 

[Kurby]

Ill admit that I don't always use capitals but here's my excuse lol. Must days I'm on the road and using my blackberry and while it will put in capital letters when I use the . It doesn't know the difference between ill and I'll and funding it is a pain.

When using my lap top or desk too its just lazyness. I am capital perfect with work and typing to my aunts and uncles but when I get here I get lazy. And that's just how a lot of people get.

 

[ols386]

Ill admit that I don't always use capitals but here's my excuse lol. Must days I'm on the road and using my blackberry and while it will put in capital letters when I use the . It doesn't know the difference between ill and I'll and funding it is a pain.

When using my lap top or desk too its just lazyness. I am capital perfect with work and typing to my aunts and uncles but when I get here I get lazy. And that's just how a lot of people get.

That's true. On here, I think it isn't such a big deal, but I don't like to hear "I seen" or "axe", when someone is speaking. Because when you get used to talking like that, it becomes second nature to use those incorrect words, and then when you're in a situation where it DOES matter, a person might forget to speak using the correct English words.

 

[Eeyores Butterfly]

I'm sorry, but when I'm on a bulletin board I am a stickler for things like capitalization and punctuation. I can handle a short post with no capitals, but if it's more than a few sentences I skip it. Same thing with people who refuse to use proper punctuation. Ellipses indicate a thought that has trailed off and you read it differently than you would a period. There are people (not just on this board) who use ellipses between every sentence and I just cannot read those posts. The same thing with posts where either every other sentence is it's own paragraph or the post is one huge paragraph.

Those things make the post too hard to read and I will normally skip them.