I make plenty of errors in grammar. Most of them are in punctuation, because I would rather a sentence be read the way it sounds in my head, as opposed to the correct way. Also, I mess up usage of which and that all the damn time. So being imperfect, and truly, not much of a grammar snob, I know I’m not sitting in a pretty place to judge. But there is one grammar error that is so (perhaps irrationally) irritating; it does nasty things to my temper.
Mostly because it’s so simple. (See? Look at that sentence fragment! Guilty!)
People tend to think, probably because of being repeatedly corrected as children, that when it comes to using I or me, I is the more proper – the grammatically correct choice. This is so very, very wrong. And it makes me nuts to see it in writing – especially when done by bright, educated folk.
Let’s get this straight right now. I is a subject; me is… well, everything else – like objects of prepositions, indirect objects, whatever. If you’re not the doer in the sentence, you’re the receiver. And that makes you a me. I shall demonstrate.
Example 1: Labeling a picture
So, you have a nice shot of you and Pickles. And you’re gonna upload it to Flickr. How do you label it? Pickles and I? Or is it, Pickles and Me? Pickles and I is only correct if you and pickles are doing something in the photo. Like waterskiing. Pickles and I are waterskiing. But if it’s just a nice shot of you and your poorly named friend/pet, it’s Pickles and Me. There is an implied, This is a picture of… that makes both you and Pickles objects. Not subjects.
Example 2: Receiving a gift
Dad gave Shelly and I a pony for Christmas. No, he really didn’t. Dad gave Shelly and me a pony for Christmas. Think of it in terms of “we” and “us” if you must. If you can substitute “us” for the names in the predicate, then you should be using, me. Because Daddy didn’t give we a pony. He gave it to us. Or, as suggested by grammar cops Sarah and Biscuit, simply omit the other person from the sentence and see how that strikes ya. By the way, the same goes for the usage of “he” vs “him” and so on and so forth.
Oh my god. Okay, I’m stopping now. My blood pressure is up and I’m sure you’re all ready to kick me in the face.
That’s awesome.
I’m a spelling snob.
I’m totally with you. That is SUCH a pet peeve of mine. It’s even worse when you have people making the error in spoken conversation! OOoohh, it’s sooo hard to hold my tongue!
Here’s the one that makes em cringe:
“These ones” or “Those ones”
Example:
Sally: “Suzy, which jeans did you end up buying at that fantastic sale?”
Suzy: “Oh, I bought these ones.”
Throw up in my mouth.. everytime.
I guess that bothers me too but their, there and they’re irk me so much more! I do correct when I see mistakes with the usage of those, can’t help myself.
I completely understand.
And, I agree totally.
(…currently on a kick of beginning sentences with conjunctions,….)
Oh, I totally agree and understand. I have a hard time with well and good. I can barely restrain myself from reflexively correcting people, even inappropriate people such as strangers or, once to my deep chagrin, my boyfriend’s mother. I simply refuse to believe she was doing good right then. She was just sitting there drinking a cosmo, not helping a damn person! Definitely doing well, not good.
I totally feel you on this one. My mother always says, “He don’t.” As in, “He don’t like beans.” Drives me crazy. I asked her if she would say, “He do,” and she looked at me like I was crazy. As if there’s a difference. Humph.
I also loathe the use of “your” in place of “you’re”.
I’m so glad I have friends here who understand my pain. Thanks Fish for being the beacon lol.
“Your” and “You’re” being misused. ARGHH! Enough to make my blood boil.
(sentences fragments must not bother me though)
HURRAH FOR GRAMMARIANS! Admittedly, you aren’t as dictatorial about it as I am, but THANK YOU for caring. I am a card-carrying member of SPOGG (www.spogg.org) and a very big Lynn Truss fan (author of “Eats, Shoots, and Leaves” which, incidentally — due to the restrictions of this medium — I can neither italicize or underline, as is actually correct, and so will have to resort to quotations). May I post a link to this entry on my own blog?
OMG Jen. The “she do”, “he don’t” are like fingernails on chalkboards. The ever-popular “Where you at?!”……
OR “I be/been” instead of “I have been” OR “shoulda” instead of “should have” OR “Where you went?” AARGRGRGHHHHHH!
Whew.
AAAAAAAhahahaaaa! There’s an ad for vaginal infections in your sidebar!
My personal grammar pet peeve is when people mix up your and you’re.
Past participle, people! “We should have WENT there.” “I have ATE already.” AGGGGH….”gone” and “eaten.” Drives me frickin’ batty.
I agree entirely. Being a writer *and* Virgo-rising, I’m compelled to. It’s only right.
However…
How do you bridge the transition from ‘accepted’ English to ‘urban American idiom’, where words such as ‘axe’ -’He put up his hand to axe a question.’- are concerned?
Oh, my; can open, worms all over…
P.S. As we’re naming favourite pet peeves, here’s mine: there’s no such word as ‘alright’. Or ‘alot’. Oh…but then we’re getting into the ‘common usage becoming acceptable form’ discussion. Sorry…
Please also inform the innernets that the past tense of “lead,” as in a horse to water, is “led”, not “lead” just pronounced with a short e. “Lead” pronounced with a short e is a METAL. Thanksyou.
Oh, and even newscasters are saying “There’s” instead of “There are” when the thing they’re talking about is plural. These people are killing me!
To my knowledge, and that of MSWord, “alright” is actually a word, where as a lot requires a space. Just sayin’.
Whoops, misplaced comma up there, outside those quotation marks. Sorry, innernets.
Oh here’s a worm for you:
SINCE WHEN IS “SNUCK” A WORD. WTF! There are many anchors that have the audacity to keep a straight face and say that word on television!
Oh oh oh and another worm:
“What had happen was…”
“I was like…”
aaarrarrararararraraaaaagagggghhhhhhh!
Okay, Joy, that’s five. I think you’re cut off.
Sorry Fish. My A.D.D is running rampant today.
I’ve been studying all day for the GMAT, and just when I think I get a break from the grammar part….Thanks a lot! =)
i cheated my way through the grammar and punctuation sections in school. i do not know how to diagram a sentence. i do not know what a any of these words mean (subject,noun, verb, pronoun, predicate, adverb, adjective, etc). i am an intelligent person, i just never caught on. instead of gettting A’s on my papers in school, I would get B’s or C’s because of my grammar and punctuation. help me!
You are the Grammar queen, young and sweet, only seventeen (or so)
Grammar queen, feel the beat from the tambourine
You can spell, you can conujgate, having the time of your life
See that girl, watch that scene, diggin the grammar queen
I love you for this. Poor grammar is a big pet peeve of mine. could list here all of the things that people do that bother me, but I wont. Yes, I know it pales in comparison to drugs and crime. But it hurts me to see such deterioration in grammar and spelling in our culture. Lately I’ve been acutely aware of the way I communicate with others, both in the way I speak and write. The more concise we speak, the less chance of something being misunderstood, or misconstrued.
Steps off of SoapBox.
It irks me too, although I am often a culprit, especially if it is in my email.
I get irked with there, their and they’re or your, you’re.
As for me or I, I don’t tend to be the culprit there. As I follow the, omit the other from the sentence. If it can stand alone as I, then that is the correct word to use. If not, then it should be me.
But again, those in glass houses… and just my opinion from ‘the pot’.
did someone already say “to” “two” and “too?” wow, can’t stand that.
and im pretty picky about spelling two. (just kidding!)
Thank you for pointing this out. Everytime I see someone write “Jane and I” on Flickr I cringe and drives me bat**** insane. Not to mention that it probably makes the baby Jesus cry.
Again, I thank you.
Ooh ooh! My very least favorite grammar worm of all time – the dreaded double negative.
Ex. “She couldn’t help but to laugh at his joke.”
Gaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhh
Fun topic, Fish! I’m sure you didn’t intend for us all to jump in with our own pet peeves, though.
Oh, the floodgates are open…
The most annoying grammatical error, in my opinion, is the rampant overuse of the apostrophe.
Shoe’s for sale
Another pet peeve, ‘supposively’ and ‘supposibly’. The word is SUPPOSEDLY.
I am not perfect either, but some things should be learned by 2nd grade!
I inheritted the me vs. I thing from my mother. My personal favourite is fewer vs. less.
However, having gone through school in French immersion, I have no formal English grammar education, so I can’t really talk, since I don’t even know what a predicate is. Thanks for explaining so well, Fish. I tend to subscribe to the “omit the other person” theory.
Of course, I am also guilty of sentence fragments.
I can still hear my mother saying, “You don’t end a sentance with a preposition.” It furiates me when i hear someone say, “Where ya at?”
it’s like nails on a chalkboard
I think we should speak consisely, not consise…
Another non word I can’t stand is “irregardless.” My younger sister says this all of the time. It drives me crazy. As a former English major (switched to Communications), I loathe poor grammar.
Joy: I share your distaste for “what had happened was.” What is that?
Simple trick my mother taught me: “if you take the other person out of the sentence, would you say I or me? If you’d say ‘me,’ use ‘me.’”
Example: I went to the store. Jack and I went to the store.
Example: Are you inviting me? Are you inviting Jack and me?
Thank you so much-I was just about to look this up as I always make these mistakes! I never remember how to speak properly-I’m ashamed that English is my first language and I can’t figure it out!
I guess I’m suppose to list my pet peeves but I just can’t get use to the idea.
Can’t avoid adding my peeve to the discussion…. I hate “Drive safe!” For pity sake, you need to use an adverb.
I really, really hate that!
As for the sentence fragments, etc.: The way I learned was, you learn the rules so that you can break them with a purpose. A good writer can get away with that because it’s done for cadence and flow, not because you don’t know any better. You are a good writer, so it’s all good!
Okay, you totally should have been my English teacher in elementary school because I completely understood that!Now, if you ask me to do the ‘parts of a sentence’ diagram….i’m gonna slit my wrists….
I recently saw a t-shirt that said: Bad grammar makes me [sic]. heee heee!
In a world full of IM’s and Blogs with LOL and OMG it’s a wonder we can write properly at all! I have to admit that I would be lost without my spell check for back up.
I am so glad however that you brought this issue up because a friend and I had this discussion a few days ago. Her friend has pictures posted on her webpage and they had the little captions under them. They said Danny and I, my new dog Scout and I. I kept saying it was wrong but I was out numbered. Atleast now I have it in writing to back me up.
Wait, is “snuck” not a word? Don’t tell my boyfriend; I used it in Scrabble the other night…
Also, is “amendations” a word? My boss just asked me to put it in a document she edited, and I refused to do so. I don’t think it’s a word! (And neither does Merriam-Webster)
OMG. I thought I was the only one who gets irritated with I’s and Me’s. I was just talking to a friend about how I get irritated when people label pictures ‘my friend and I’. I know I don’t have the best grammar, but using I’s and me’s incorrectly just bugs the hell out of me. haha
I write for a newspaper for a living. I once wrote a wonderfully snarky (well, moderately snarky by my standards but amazingly snarky for something that my editors would actually agree to publish) article for the paper about how people are hunting down metaphor and killing it.
And the page designer inserted a howler of a grammatical error into the second paragraph.
It was a sign of my increasing maturity, and my skyrocketing medication levels, that I did not rip her head off and root around inside her thorax with a pica pole until I pulled out her heart.
U R such a dork….I luv U tho.
in 10th grade i moved back to new york from another country. i had never learned correct grammar, but english was my favorite subject in school. imagine my horror when i started failing english when i couldn’t pass a grammar test. my english teacher was NOT sympathetic, and tried to correct me using the very same terms i did not understand. she made me cry from frustration.
another english teacher was nice enough to save my failing behind and whip me into grammatical shape (in just 3 months). it turns out, a few years later she was tapped to write “grammar for dummies” – (it’s a perfect gift for your “you’re/your” stupid friends.)
now, incorrect grammar is the bane of my existance too, H. This is why i’m friends with YOU!
Yikes, you have a very uptight readership Ms. Fish!
Oh, I’m frantically scratching my brain to see if I’ve done that in my blog, and I am the guilty party that you are writing about!
My big peeve is ‘got’. “You have GOT to be kidding me!” ‘Got’ is not needed. You’ve got mail? You have mail… you have got mail is redundant.
(Anyway, I’m sure the grammar police can pick my response apart, however I have a boy who just did a big poop in his pants sitting on my lap, and I need to change him before it starts crawling up his back.)
I actually find your sentence fragments endearing, Fish! I’m a magazine columnist, but I copy your writing style on my blog (meaning, I write sentences the way they should sound, not the way that they should be gramatically written). I’m totally a disappointment to the profession
Not to be too picky, but with respect to “alright” versus “all right”, Merriam-Webster says:
“The one-word spelling ‘alright’ appeared some 75 years after all right itself had reappeared from a 400-year-long absence. Since the early 20th century some critics have insisted alright is wrong, but it has its defenders and its users. It is less frequent than all right but remains in common use especially in journalistic and business publications. It is quite common in fictional dialogue, and is used occasionally in other writing .”
Although MSWord has a default dictionary, it also adds words that the user accepts, so if it’s in MSWord, it’s probably because someone clicked “add to dictionary” instead of “change.”
When people add the word “bit” after “tad.”
That. THAT’S what drives me nuts. Oh and the whole Southern thing when people say “Well ya might could wanna do this or that.”
You either might, or you could. Using more words than necessary doesn’t make redneck advice sound any better.
Do or do not. There is no try
Oh yeah; the whole ‘bring’ vs ‘take’ thing. And how mystifying that most people aren’t even aware of a) the difference and b) when each should be used. (Raising the prickly issue of ‘regional appropriateness’)
Ah, smugness. What a great launching-pad for the weekend…
I don’t trust MSWord sometimes.
Seeing as I brought it up:
As far as I’m concerned…and I’m probably no more or no less fixated on grammar and word use then any of the other so obviously hyper-intelligent and erudite people who read this blog (or write it, Dear…)…there is but one use for ‘alright’ and that’s in the British greeting ‘Alright?’, which as long as I lived there, made me smile no end; it’s friendly, it’s inquisitive, it’s declarative…the perfect bookend to ‘Cheers!’ (Which does not do anything tripplingly off the tongue of any North American, no matter how hard they try, BTW)
As far as use ‘over here’, to me it’s plain sloppiness. I have no problem with unfettered growth of the English language, its all-inclusive nature is what makes it so robust. But change as a result of vibrancy is one thing. Change from sloppiness is another creature entirely. For shame.
(From Fish: Perhaps shame ought to be saved for those who use “then” when they mean “than”? Ease up, there.)
Anyone else out there mentally correcting the comments as they go? No? Just me?
Ah, well.
Being a Nazi of any kind–even a grammar Nazi–is a lonely business.
I can just kiss you for explaining it in a way I understand! I’m always leary about whether to use me or I and I usually figure out a way to avoid the situation entirely in fear of writing / saying I when it should be me. Me just sounds so wrong sometimes, even when it’s correct.
I will no longer use I when I should use ME!
I have never posted before, but now my entire office is in a debate. Where the crap is the double negative in
“She couldn’t help but to laugh at his joke.”?
HELP!
“WITH THAT BEING SAID”
ARRGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHh
The “but” in that sentence is the double negative.
She couldn’t help laugh at his joke. That says it all right there. The inclusion of “but” makes it wrong. Maybe that specific sentence makes it cloudy. Let’s do this:
She had but one task — to save the world from bad grammar.
She had not but one task — to save the world from bad grammar.
See the difference? But acts as “no more than” in this case. It applies to the first example, though it’s a little less obvious.
That was my guess. I have the WORST grammer/spelling in the world. By the way, I am a big fan and feel like I just had a run in with a celebrity, thanks fish!
OK – someone else might have mentioned this one but the mis-usage of between and among drives me bonkers. Between is comparing 2 things, among is comparing 3 more or. YOU CAN’T DECIDE BETWEEN 3 THINGS!!!
I’m just happy when the other person in my conversation knows enough English to understand what I am saying (and visa versa).
I’m LOVING this!
This is a Mid-western thing, which used to grate on my nerves when I lived there – “Want to come with?” And I’d sit and stare, waiting for the end of the sentence, and it never came. IT’S “WANT TO COME WITH MEEEE?!!!”
“Where are you at?”
That right there is why I can’t figure out how someone can be a $190K/year VP. And yet, she is.
I have to ask… how do you feel about Simplified Spelling?
This could open a whole new can of worms.
Great post! And great comments everyone. It’s nice to know that I’m not the only one out there that feels like throwing myself in front of a bus whenever someone speaks incorrectly.
this is by far my favorite post because it’s about my biggest grammar gripe.. i hate that in my experience, those who do this a lot are the ones who ARE grammar snobs. ok im about to have a heart attack just thikning about these people but i just needed to commend you on this fantastic entry!!
Oh dear.
Please, everyone, do not take Fish’s grammar as gospel. She is wrong.
It IS “Jenny and I”, not “Jenny and me”.
The use of “and me” is vulgar and has, unfortunately, crept into common usage. Don’t do it.
Pez.
e.: It’s emendations, though probably doesn’t matter at this point, ‘cos unless you’re Hawaii or Alaska or the South Pacific (which you may well be), the work day is done, and you and your boss have mended fences.
While I’m in agreement with 99% of the grammar/usage/spelling points in Fish’s post and the Fishfans’ comments, some comments seem to be attacking spoken, regional English variations (what used to be called dialect). Personally, I love hearing spoken English variations, including many of the usages herein. Yes, I know “herein” is a preposition, but it’s Friday night, and I’m feeling crazy.
I think all yall should distinguish between spoken and written English. Mode-switching is normal. After all, I love to speak Southern and Cajun when I’m drinking, but I’d never do it while writing.
Fragments, by the way, are a great example of having to know the rules before breaking them.
Now: MY PET PEEVE.
Idiots who confuse then and than. How does that even happen? And I see that particular one much more up north than down South. “I like him more then her.” Hell, it even sounds Southern. But I never saw it before moving up here.
And Fish, don’t worry over much about punctuation. Often, punctuation is more a matter of style than of hard and fast rules (compare AP Style’s treatment of the serial comma to, well, the way you were taught as a young chitlin)
Actually Pez. Fish is right. When labeling photos, you do say “Pickles and me,” not “Pickles and I.”
Look at http://chforum.mid.co.uk/dcboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=110&topic_id=33&mesg_id=33&page=
I’ve learned not to complain too loudly only because sometimes I’m the one in the wrong. For example, supposably IS a word, meaning “That can be supposed or conjectured.” I know this because it used to be one of my pet peeves! But one mistake that is indefensible is the misspelling of lose (antonym of win) as loose (antonym of tight). Stop it now internet!
Woo hoo! Loving this post and comments.
Another good tee-shirt (that hangs in my closet, and which I do actually wear from time to time): “Good grammar costs nothing!!”
No one has mentioned the misuse of “myself”? As in, “you’ll be meeting with our finance director and myself.” Blech. Maybe it’s just out here. I don’t know if it’s worse if they’re misusing “myself” or “I”…
But I have to go with the well/good switcheroo as my biggest peeve. In case anyone is keeping track of the biggest winners (losers?) of grammar peevedom.
Some of you who’ve posted might like a great NPR show called “A Way with Words” (http://www.kpbs.org/Radio/DynPage.php?id=12)Thirty minutes of grammar questions with hosts who just LOVE the English language.
I’ve learned to accept many things, grammar-wise, but it’s the apostrophe abuse that always gets me. it’s and its, you’re and your (your cool? what about my cool?), and banana’s for sale. Oh, and also quotation marks for emphasis, like signs that say we sell “fresh” meat.
Alas, it is a hard life as a grammar bitch.
I live in Pittsburgh, where, horribly, people often leave out the ‘to be’ of a sentence: “The car needs washed.” “She needs kicked in the face.”
So irritating.
ugh.
uptight, unrealistic, prescriptivist snots.
GET OVER IT.
Pez:
“The use of “and me” is vulgar and has, unfortunately, crept into common usage. Don’t do it.”
It is only “and I” when used as the subject. Otherwise, it IS wrong. Check your grammar book. I recommend “The Elements of Grammar” by Margaret Shertzer (see pages 14-17, which sets forth the correct use of pronouns).
I don’t think it matters one way or the other how you write in your own blog, its always entertaining (and enlightening!) anyway! I like that its not always perfect, it makes me feel better!
oh, thank you so much for this post. though it drives me crazy when i hear the me/i mixup, it is ten times worse when someone who DOES incorrectly use “i” totally ACTS like a huge grammar uppercrust snob thinking it’s correct, or they correct me for saying “me.”
gack.
Australians use of ‘yous’, if we are going to use a term meaning a collection of people – bloody hell just use ya’ll.
I’m with you 100% here. My other enormous frustration: misuse of the word “myself.” It should NOT be used as a subject (“Pickles and myself are going to the movies”) OR an object (“Dad gave baseball tickets to Pickles and myself”). It’s a pronoun that may be used reflexively as the object of a preposition (“I gave myself a pat on the back”) or as an intensive (“I, myself, will do the honors”). HUGE pet peeve. If you don’t know/remember how to use it properly, don’t even bother using it; it’s rarely necessary. Sometimes when people misuse “myself” or use “I” instead of “me,” I get extra annoyed because I think the person is trying to appear smart – but is really just ignoring correct usage of the language.
Jen, I just saw your comment where you mentioned the “myself” thing… other pet peeves: confusion of “less” vs. “fewer,” and the expression “even still…” Not sure if that last one is even actually grammatically incorrect – I just think it sounds awful. Please: “even so” or just a simple “still” can express your point just fine. Sorry, this got me going today… I’m a speech-language pathologist so I work with this stuff quite a bit
I am SO with you on this point!!! (and I use that little trick of taking out the other person in the equation to check myself more frequently that I care to admit)
Thank you for this! It’s so nice to be able to admit to frustration with incorrect, yet commonly-accepted grammar.
The apostrophe, the “myself” that seems to be everywhere these days; all so irritating.
I cannot buy a product if there is a grammatical error in its label or advertising. I just…can’t!
Could you please just go ahead and give the lesson on “that” and “which?” Thanks!
Like oh my GOd! you are SOOO right!
English is not even my first language, so please excuse me if I say something that’s totally wrong. The thing is, I actually agree with Pez about the “Jenny and I” structure when labelling photos. It’s all about whether you choose to believe that the implied sentence is “This is a photo of Jenny and me” or “These are Jenny and I”. Why should the first sentence be more appropriate? If you compare to other languages (German, for example) you’d find that they assume the second sentence to be the implied one and, therefore, they use the first person in its subject form.
However, I have noticed that spoken English seldom uses the subject form (I, he, she, we, they) when it stands after the verb “to be”. Instead, it is often said “It’s me” or “This is him”, which explains why using “Jenny and I” to label a picture may sound totally wrong. To a foreigner like me nothing “sounds” right or wrong… To me, all there is is the learnt grammar.
Does this make sense to anyone or am I just totally wrong?
There is an easier way to remember this. Use “and me” when you would say me if you were the only one in the sentence. “Dad bought Sarah and me.” “Dad bought pizza for me.” Use “and I” if you would use I. “Sarah and I went to the beach.” “I went to the beach.” (You wouldn’t say “Me went to the beach.”)
This posting was nominated by moi for the 100Bloggers Carnival in the best use of descriptive adjectives category. If this carnival had not appeared on your radar, you can check it out here:
http://100bloggers.com/2006/08/26/your-heat-of-summer-carnival-nominees-are/
and here (to also cast a vote)
http://www.larryhendrick.com/weblog/2006/08/26/heat-of-summer-blog-carnival-voting-begins/
Good luck!
My mother’s relatives say “you’s” and “them’s”, as in:
*So you’s are going out to dinner tonight?
*That sweater? Yeah, I think it’s them’s.
And I can’t forget “we’s” and “they’s”. Ugh! Makes me want to slap them!
Firstly: Spanish Girl, you are wrong. “These are Jenny and I” is not correct grammar. “These” is the subject of the sentence whereas “I” is the object. If you want to use “I” you would say “I am in this picture” or “Jenny and I are in this picture.”
Does that make sense?
I guess naming photos is tricky. I would assume that the labels respond to the question, “Who are the people in the picture?” The answer is: “It’s me and Jenny.”
What’s my grammar pet peeve?
“The reason why…”
You can’t say “reason why”! Just say “The reason is…”
Using “why” with the word “reason” is redundant.
I see masters students making this mistake! What is the world coming to?
I always use “me”, but forgot what I was taught as the correct usage when learning English. This is what I found (source below):
Usage note 2. A traditional rule governing the case of personal pronouns after forms of the verb to be is that the nominative or subjective form (I; she; he; we; they) must be chosen. Some 400 years ago, owing to the feeling that the postverb position in a sentence is object rather than subject territory, me and other objective pronouns (him; her; us; them) began to replace the subjective forms after be, so that It is I became It is me. Today such constructionsâIt’s me. That’s him. It must be them.âare almost universal in speech. In formal speech or edited writing, the subjective forms are used: It was I who first noticed the problem.
Dictionary.com Unabridged (v 1.0.1)
Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2006.
So the correct form for writing would be “I” actually, no matter how weird it sounds.
I cringe when people don’t use adverbs correctLY.
My wife hangs her prepositions. It’s annoying.
“Where are the potatos at?”
“Where are you going to?”
“Where should we have lunch at?”
In her defense though, she is Mexican American, and I seem to recollect that in Spainish, hanging a prep, is gramatically acceptable. I might be way off though.
As for me, I am the son of an English teacher and a hillybilly. So internal struggles abound.
Hen, thanks for explaining, I always appreciate a chance to learn. However, I’m not really sure you have convinced me just yet. Let me argue why.
“To be” is a linking (Copulative) Verb
A linking verb is a special class of intransitive verbs. It is a verb used to equate, identify, or join together one interchangeable substantive with another. It connects the subject of the sentence with a coordinating (or complementary) predicate. As with other intransitive verbs, there is no direct object since there is no action transferred.
As a consequence, you could never use an object in a copulative sentence.
Therefore “It is me” would be just wrong. That is, when strict grammar is applied. The way the people talk tends to change the language getting to the point where incorrect language becomes accepted by the academics. Maybe that’s where I’m wrong. Is this the case? Have the academics accepted “to be” as a transitive verb? (Note: “to be” is an instransitive verb in every language I know).
I share your hatred of the ME vs I misuse. How about bad grammar in music? As much as I love the Doors (and understand the need for rhyming in a song), I have always hated that verse in Touch Me that ends with “For you and I”. Or Paul McCartney’s Live and Let Die: “And in this everchanging world in which we live in”? Makes me crazy!
Would you consider the following a grammar or spelling mistake? A classmate of mine in a 300 level communications class submitted this:
It may be somewhere in the book, but I must of mist it.
MIST?? Are you crazy? I was so astounded when I read it I had to e-mail it to my grammar snob friend. Glad to see that we are not alone.
Alright Alright ALRIGHT!
I plead Guilty.
Bad grammar: Major turn off
My own grammar: unique.
Especially when I write verse.
It’s staccatto and it’s terrible terrible grammar.
But then it’s got it’s own rythm
It’s the way it sounds right in my head and NO that displaced comma will not be OKAY.
*sigh*
So I just carry on with my double standards.Call it my artistic licence.
Bah!
amen, sister!
Verbal Gaffes make me crazy.
It’s oriented, not orientated.
Jewelry, not jewlerey.
I be going (or I be doing anything else) is not acceptable.
Don’t aks me. Ask me. As in, “I need to aks you a question”.
“Went missing” What the heck does that mean??? It’s commonly accepted phraseology on the news casts. Makes me crazy.
I’m a nurse, not a grammar major, but these things make me crazy. I will admit to dropping and/or dangling participles. Also, simplified spelling will send me over the edge. Please don’t send me an email with UR in it. You are an adult. Spell correctly. (But then I don’t text message either, so I don’t appreciate the form) I am guilty of sentence fragments, but that’s from 35 years of writing sentence fragments in medical documentation.
Ok, I feel better.
Spanish Girl, you are right! It is an intransitive verb and so the correct form would be “It is I”. That is formal English and the informal has made the incorrect version come into regular usage. Thanks for the lesson!
What’s the deal with the recent incorrect use of the word AS?
“We can’t leave at four, as we will still be in the meeting.”
Shouldn’t it be SINCE or BECAUSE we will still be in a meeting?
I love Devo more than anything, but the lyrics to Whip It should be “Whip it well.”
(From This Fish: It is neither incorrect nor recent. From Dictionary.com, meaning #8: since; because: As you are leaving last, please turn out the lights.)
I know you were just kidding, Miss Fish, but this is pretty funny…I know someone who completely misuses the phrase “curiosity killed the cat”.
“Curiosity killed the cat, the kids want to go swimming.”
“Curiosity killed the cat, we went shopping over the weekend.”
It’s makes me laugh and want to tear my hair out, all at once!
Oh, this really gets to me — not so much a grammar gaffe, but a misused expression — “I could care less!!” No, it’s “I COULDN’T care less!” If you could care less, then you still care; if you couldn’t care less, then you can’t care any less than you do — i.e., you don’t care!!! I’ve seen this even in books and it drives me nuts!
I hate it when people confuse “you’re” and “your.”
Oh man! I just found your blog and love it! This drives me SO crazy, too!!! And you know what I hate even more than “I” vs. “Me”? When people use “myself” incorrectly. I am an editor, for pete’s sake, and even my bosses at my editorial job do it. Like, “If you have questions, please ask myself or Bob.” NO, nonononono! It’s “Please ask Bob or me.”
I know that it is wrong to say, “those ones or These ones” but why? It drives me crazy when people say this but I can’t explain to them why it is wrong.
ohh ohh I am late, but I hate it when someone says AM instead of I’m or I AM.
Ex. Am so in love with you boy.
How about: “please advice me” instead of ‘kindly advise’?
An easy way to remember it: take out the other person in the I/me debate. I went to the store so, Bob and I went to the store. This is a picture of me, so this is a picture of Bob and me. Linguistically, this kind of error can some times be associated with people trying to sound more proper and educated than they really are. People use words (like I) that they think make them sound more sophisticated, without actually understanding the rules.
When I was little, my dad used to make me say a sentence until I got it right.
Example: I would say “Me and Sherry are going to ride our bikes.” He would say “who”? Until I came up with Sherry and I are going to ride our bikes.
Now I cringe when I hear people say it incorrectly. I want to say “who”?
written today…
Ok, I love all of you! I’m an English prof who just ran across this site. We need more of you! lol
I, like, just can’t, like, thank you all, like enough! (bet you can’t, like, guess what my peeve, like, is?)
Is this just a “Michigan thing” or have others heard this: I seen it. Educated, successful people say it. If I ask someone if they have seen a particular movie…the answer is likely to be, “I seen it last weekend.” We also have our share of double negatives, me and I, bring and take, and other common errors…but the “I seen it” is heard every day.
Since the dreaded “alot” was discussed earlier, I would like to voice another pet peeve of mine… “anyways”. It’s surprising how often that little “s” is tacked onto “anyway”.
Anyways, just seen you’re blog and don’t want too miss a chance to says something that bugs me alot. But enough already.
Actually, “Fish,” with the photo naming, I don’t think whether you’re engaged in an action in the photo has anything to do with it.
When labeling a photo, you’re using “Pickles and me” as simply an abbreviated version of the sentence “This is a photo of Pickles and me,” right? You’d use the same construction about any photo of you and Pickles, regardless of whether or not you were engaged in an action.
Examples:
Scenario 1–You are doing nothing in the photo.
You’d say: “[This is a photo of] Pickles and me.”
Scenario 2–You are swimming in a pool in the photo.
You’d say: “[This is a picture of] Pickles and me [swimming in a pool].”
Take out the words in brackets in each case and you have just “Pickles and me” remaining. Add the words back and you have two grammatically correct sentences, and unlike in your example, they are consistent in their wording (both use”Pickles and me” as the object in the sentence).
What do you think? (I know I’m about a million years late in commenting on this post.
I have never heard the word “forte” pronounced correctly. When pronounced “for-tay” it means “loud”, when referring to something one does well, it is pronounced “fort”.
My other pet peeves are: less/fewer (almost always wrong), and “these ones” which really brings about the chalk-board reaction.