It all started with a picture of my lamb pies. I’d spent the morning baking with the children and was feeling very proud of my culinary achievements. If you had seen some of my previous cooking efforts you’d understand why. Perhaps I was overly excited when I decided to share my lamb pies with the world on Facebook, but I was very, VERY proud of my pies.
Complimentary comments drifted in, a few people “liked” my pies, a few comments like “yummy” and “delicious” popped up, my Aunt Jacqui was even kind enough to ask for the recipe. I was glowing in both the heat of my baking trays and my Facebook adulation.
Then it happened.
A friend, a sweet, doe eyed Scottish mother of adult children, wrote what I imagine she thought was a passing comment. I can’t tell you exactly what the comment was, as it’s been deleted (by her), but it was something like “are there no ends to your talents”. I giggled, I considered my future career move in to the world of nuvo cuisine. I was obviously going to be more Nigella than Martha (sexier and less jail time). Another comment arrived in my inbox, it was from another friend, who had never met the person he was about to correct, he said “*is* there no end”. That was it, nothing else, that was his comment. Ahem, he didn’t even mention my pies?
Within moments, another comment popped up from my publicly humiliated friend “oops, sorry “ she said, she acknowledged her hideous grammatical wrong doings over the highly debatable pies and then disappeared. I imagine she promptly went and put her dunce cap on and sat in the corner.
I was dumbfounded, but also incredibly curious. Are there grammatical expectations on social media? Did Mark Zuckerberg and his team post a grammatical guideline for Facebook? Maybe I didn’t receive the memo? I thought about Twitter, hundreds of mini status updates being squeezed in to 140 characters, how were they going to break the news to Kanye “Imma let you finish” West and his 2 million followers?
As an expat, I wonder if there’s a hint of elitism with our grammatical expectations. I have many friends who have learnt English as a second language and continually feel the need to apologize for their faux pas. After an almost comical year of disastrous French lessons, I would hate to attempt a grammatically correct sentence, especially when used for grammatical public consumption. Inshallah, one day I may be able to string three Arabic words together.
What about if you’re dyslexic? Are you excused for getting your mords wixed up?
I’m not sure about you, but I’m not sitting around considering the words of Shakespeare while I text and tweet? It’s more likely I’m either at swimming training with one eye on a child, cooking dinner, in between meetings or negotiating bath time. After seven failed attempts at bed time this evening, the second little traveler arrived at the end of my bed to discuss if we could change hot lunch day, “get in to bed…..and have you let your sister cut your hair again?” I screamed. Yes, I’m a terrible mother.
It appears we’re all not perfect, but my pies is.
So, what do you think? Are Facebook and Twitter friendly, casual conversations, designed for all walks of life? Is there ever an excuse for bad grammar?
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Oh dear. As I said yesterday, I don’t believe it is ever OK to unnecessarily correct someone else’s grammar. Unless they’ve carved themselves a crown of gold that says ‘Grammar King’ and are going about breathing flames of riteousness on to everyone else.
Having said that, my standards are ridiculously high and yes, I often fail them myself. I don’t necessarily correct people but if I see something that is obviously wrong I find it physically jarring and rather uncomortable. But that’s just me and my own quirks.
The one time I got in an argument about it (on Twitter, no less) was when someone tried to correct my use of the word ‘alliteration’. Not grammar, I know, but close enough. Her correction was wrong and I let my wrath unfold upon the poor thing.
I was having a bad day. That’s an excuse right?
Now I sound like a nut.
Wasn’t he just having a bit of a laugh? I often laugh at what a typo does to a sentence or comment and especially at myself!
I believe the proper etiquette for grammar corrections in social media realm is to just mutter to yourself under your breath about how the world in general and the education system in particular is going to hell.
And then carry on with yoour life.
Hi Carol, he’s a lovely lovely guy and also highly intelligent. Ten minutes before correcting my friend he had posted on his status update “This year I’m going to be more pedantic about spelling and grammar. Feel free to reciprocate”
I guess what he meant was “this year I’m going to be more pedantic about YOUR spelling and grammar”.
Like I said, he is a really lovely guy, I’m not having a dig at him, just wondering how others feel about it.
I think if you’re a professional writer there are expectations of your work but if you’re on social networking sites you should be made to feel comfortable.
We haven’t all had the same opportunities in regards to education, nor do we all care as much about where the apostrophe goes, but we all have something valid to say.
Kx
Ok, so my brothers were educated in the 60’s & 70’s at Sydney Grammar, their English & Grammar is perfection, plus our mother is English & she wouldn’t have it any other way. They grew up to be a rocket scientist & surgeon, typical of their school. My sister started school in 1977 & missed out on grammar, i started in 1980 & was taught grammar in a formulated fashion, perfect as i’m a maths type person. We both went to a fancy private school too but my sister never recovered from her grammar mis-education. Me, success.
All that said, i often delete comments & retype them to not cause a spelling or grammar faux pas or any commentry on my comment!! I think bog posts should be well written, but comments, man, half the time the cursor can’t keep up & words jumble & skip letters, it’s hardly an attempt to get a degree!!
Bless your sweet Scottish commenter, love Posie
Oh, but don’t get me started on they’re, there & their, or your, you’re, when they are wrong i can’t forgive!! Also disorganised, it’s not UNorganised, that has been hammered home. Love Posie
Wow those pies look great! If your friend had just posted that comment about being pedantic about spelling and grammar perhaps he assumed eveyone had seen that and the correction was meant in jest.
And I’m with KJ on how to handle it in social media.
I have, on more than one occassion, been referred to as a “grammar nazi.” A misplaced comma, dangling participle or incorrect use of a pronoun can literally make me crazy. But I’m 100% with KJ on this. In the world of social media, mutter quietly and move on. Most of the time.
I think it’s rude to correct other people’s grammar unless they’ve specifically asked you to (and even then, it needs to be done tactfully). Having said that, Posie, I stared at your comment about “bog posts” for about 10 seconds before I realised you meant “blog posts”. Or did you mean “bog posts”? Sorry!
I would never, ever correct anyone’s grammar, unless they are one of my bestest best friends, in which case I will correct their grammar quite gleefully, and – even better – if they misuse a word I will dance a little happy dance of delight and sing a song about how silly they are.
But that’s just the kind of friend I am.
When someone corrects my typos or grammar online it makes me think less of them. My initial reaction is “You’re not my Mum!!!”
If anything, I think social media almost requires abbreviations and grammatical slurrings. I am one of those annoying people who write text messages in full. It takes forever, and it makes me not want to communicate via text because it’s too much work. My point is that our language is evolving with this technology. The world moves too fast for grammar.
Thems pies is good, BTW. LOL.
The pies look lovely.
As for grammar, I try to ensure mine is up to scratch but glaze over typos and errors in others. I’ll notice, but do nothing about it.
However, if a blog post is full of grammar that makes me screech and bad spelling, I probably won’t come back. Too nerve-racking.
I think your Scottish friend is technically correct with her grammar. If she had said “are there no end” then yes it is incorrect. Her only error was to pluralise the “end” to “ends” when it is more commonplace for it to be singular…At least she made the verb agree with the subject, which is in my book very correct grammar. xx
Oops. I take that back. I didn’t read the full sentence. xx
Definately don’t agree with correcting someones grammar publicly – it’s like having something in your hair or clothes that needs to be straightened or removed – you want to be told discreetly and in a way that doesn’t draw attention to it. The pies look delicious!
Nice pies!
I think it’s unforgivable to pull someone up on grammar, spelling etc on a format that doesn’t allow you to amend what you’ve just written ie twitter, facebook and blog commenting systems.
Good lord, I make so many typos I’d never write anything if some smart-arse kept highlighting them. Also these things are written at speed and are just random thoughts and replies, small instances in time, not a sat down and thought out reply where the writer has had time to formulate their reply and ensure all grammar is perfect and spellings correct.
PS I wonder how many errors I will spot in this once I’ve posted it.
Grammar is regional. One of the things about blogging and Facebook is that it is international. I love the way people from the UK and Australia speak English, but it isn’t English the way I speak it. So what! And, how about those typos? I have a helluva time proofreading my own stuff, so even after I reread it there may still be errors. So what! And, I am dyslexic, so it takes me awhile to sort it all out anyway. I was once suspended from high school for asking a substitute teacher in English, “don’t you think you should know something about the subject before trying to teach it?” That, however, was because her misuse was dramatic and inexcusable. Usually, I just cringe at newscasters, songwriters and such. On social networks, I think most anything should be allowed as long as the content is able to be understood.
Oh, and the lamb pies look lovely, though they are not common fare in the US (or at least my part of it) and I’m not much for eating lamb myself.
I don’t think that grammar should be corrected on a *social networking* site – it’s meant to be fun ferchrissakes, not school!
I don’t care how people spell or how many participles they dangle. I’m happy that we’re all communicating. Just for perspective: I hate typos. I have all but given up on newspapers because the grammar and spelling errors leap off the page and assault my eyes. Social media is different somehow. It’s for connecting and enjoying people.
First and foremost, I’ve been enjoying your blog! (And the pies looked lovely.)
Commenting on someone else’s grammar, spelling, vocabulary, sentence structure, etc. on social media? Absolutely not. For someone you don’t even know? Even worse.
Doing so reflects far more poorly on the corrector than on the recipient. The likelihood that your Scottish friend will want to comment again? Sadly, I doubt it, what with worrying about grammar snobs.
(And the pies truly did look lovely.)
Popping over from Naturally Carol.
I try to use correct spellings but alas have been failing at teaching my computer to ‘learn’ to spell colour, neighbour etc. correctly.
I don’t like reading a message full of shortcuts-I have a Facebook friend that does and it is so hard to read, sometimes I just give up, I just can’t translate her ‘status’.
As for correcting, only if the ‘oops’ makes it funny and can be done in a lighthearted way.
Typo incident: I worked in our city’s public library system and we had date due slips that had messages on them. One month’s worth had been circulated for a couple of weeks before someone noticed that the blerb had a beautiful typo. It was talking about some lady making a donation to the *pubic* library. We just about wet ourselves over that.
The pies look quite yummy!
I’m a professional writer/author/journo/editor. But on FB, twitter etc, I’m not. I write/comment the way I think and just as I may say something incorrectly while chatting informally, I often make mistakes which I don’t bother to correct. Because I’m on time off and with friends/loved ones. And I don’t think they expect me to be perfect. I think it’s really mean to correct someone this way.
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