It's not the way I write normally, and I'm all for taking on constructive criticism, I'm just pointing out that while it may not be a preferable way to use the comma, it was effectual and certainly not 'wrong'.
I know what I'm talking about here, writer or not because if you write about grammar being 'wrong' in an exam, you lose marks. The term 'wrong' or 'incorrect' no longer carry any weight in linguistic studies. Let me see if I can dig up something from one of my old AS text books. E: Right: :
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Perhaps, I'm not trying to be scrupulous. Moreover you're ignoring the topic at hand now, no doubt because I've backed up my argument with a sufficient amount of evidence.
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Unless you were writing discourse in which the person was thinking before they spoke:
John's eyes shifted to the left and he pondered for a moment, "Harry was a, joint account manager." It's not wrong, it's non-standard. |
That's what I used to tell my maths teacher!
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The thing with maths is there's generally a right or wrong answer. English is more namby-pamby and down to personal interpretation.
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That's observant of you, but you've conveniently left out:
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Eh, obviously you're not going to learn anything new today. You could do English pupils everywhere a huge favour though, go to the various examination boards such as OCR, Edexcel and AQA, and yell at them red faced that they're wrong to detract marks from exam papers that declare they've found grammar mistakes rather than instances of non-standardisation. I think there's an entire generation here that will find themselves at an enormous detriment if you don't do something.
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I know what you're getting at, but if you take that theory to certain extremes, it's going to be incomprehensible, and if it's incomprehensible, it's wrong, because then why did you set out to write it in the first place? |
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On the other hand, have you considered that perhaps “non-standard” is in fact synonymous with “wrong and stupid”? Because the phrase reminds me of the popular phrase among bad artists – “it’s my style!” |
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http://owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/resource/607/02/ In fact, your usage of it is so wrong that there are no examples of it being either right, or wrong anywhere on the internet. It's so far from what's considered acceptable that no one seemed to have realized that anyone would have been stupid enough to use it that way. |
Rather than being unnecessarily truculent, I might point out that this is the way I've been taught, this is what has been drilled into my head since I was 15, as far as I'm concerned it's this way or not at all. I'm being deathly serious here, if you have a problem with anything I've said, take it up with the examination boards that teach this. I'm done.
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Let's be clear. No one taught you to use a comma like that. Anyone who did should be stripped of their license to teach. |
No, I mean, they taught us about non-standardisation, and that there isn't a 'wrong' way to use a comma. I still stand by the principal that you can put a comma anywhere in a sentence and I can justify it. There's no point in being any more forward about it because you're not going to believe me unless I physically send Stephen Fry to your door to explain it to you in person.
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Here’s the simple version: as OANST’s links show, commas are used to break up sentences into chunks – clauses, list items, etc. When writing dialogue, you can also make an argument that commas could be inserted to emulate the way a person’s speech flows (e.g. “well doc, I was, eh, y’know, diggin’ a hole”). That is the justification for your writing of “I simply pointed out that you, are not.” The mistake being made here is that it isn’t dialogue. It’s a forum post, it reads as written text. Your use of the comma breaks the sentence. If it was spoken aloud, the emphasis would be made by stressing the word “you”, as in “I simply pointed out that you are not!”; it would not be made by just adding a pause. And since you declined to add emphasis to your text and instead inserted a comma, it reads as an awkward pause in a single clause. Thank, you and goodnight. |
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Let's just agree to disagree, we're all right. There really are no winners, let's all take up the Olympic spirit. Bahahah. All right, I'll admit that your argumentation here proves I didn't use the comma adequately, Hell I never denied I didn't use it well, or I don't think I did, but nevertheless it's not 'wrong', which is the only point I've been trying to make. |
It is wrong. It’s wrong because you haven’t used it in the right context, as my previous post explains.
In the right context, a comma could probably be inserted somewhere abnormal (like speech). The problem is that setting up that context is difficult to pull off without it reading awkwardly – and if it reads awkwardly, that makes it wrong. This is the point. |
We should all just agree to adopt the stance on grammar accept before the Baroque/Renaissance eras, i.e. there wasn't one. Some texts had no grammar at all. Wouldn't that just be so much easier to read?
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I reckon we should all write like Dr Seuss.
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I reckon that this is going to be split off into it's own thread even though the conversation is effectively over. Which is what always happens.
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More than a page full of arguments that stemmed from a fucking comma. I'm literally in awe. I used to enjoy looking at people's faces in this thread.
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jesus wept post some fucking mugs
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Now let's all talk about the fact that Scrabtrapman used the word 'truculent' and no-one called him out on it. |
I thought someone might eventually. To which I had a reply already prepared. The need never arose however. Much to my upset.
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