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In the English language, there are grammatical constructions that many native speakers use unquestioningly yet certain writers call incorrect. Differences of usage or opinion may stem from differences between formal and informal speech and other matters of register, differences among dialects (whether regional, class-based, generational, or other), difference between the social norms of spoken ...
An opinion piece excerpted from his book Between You and I: A Little Book of Bad English. Grammar Puss Archived 2014-04-30 at the Wayback Machine, by Steven Pinker (1994). Argues against prescriptive rules. A revised draft of this article became the chapter "The Language Mavens" in The Language Instinct
This list comprises widespread modern beliefs about English language usage that are documented by a reliable source to be misconceptions. With no authoritative language academy, guidance on English language usage can come from many sources. This can create problems, as described by Reginald Close:
Image credits: imll99 Clearly, the people featured on this list didn’t do a great job of correcting others. But is there a polite and respectful way to do so?
Judgmental language – using insulting or pejorative language in an argument. Pooh-pooh – stating that an opponent's argument is unworthy of consideration. [84] Style over substance – embellishing an argument with compelling language, exploiting a bias towards the esthetic qualities of an argument, e.g. the rhyme-as-reason effect [85]
A aggravate – Some have argued that this word should not be used in the sense of "to annoy" or "to oppress", but only to mean "to make worse". According to AHDI, the use of "aggravate" as "annoy" occurs in English as far back as the 17th century. In Latin, from which the word was borrowed, both meanings were used. Sixty-eight percent of AHD4's usage panel approves of its use in "It's the ...
Federal Reserve Governor Christopher Waller, whose views are often a bellwether for U.S. monetary policy, said on Monday that with inflation still forecast to fall to 2% he is inclined "at present ...
In linguistics (particularly sub-fields like applied linguistics and pragmatics), a hedge is a word or phrase used in a sentence to express ambiguity, probability, caution, or indecisiveness about the remainder of the sentence, rather than full accuracy, certainty, confidence, or decisiveness. [1]