Welcome back to Grammar 101...
where I help the grammatically-challenged become proud Grammarians.
Or at least I try to! lol
None of us can claim to speak English perfectly. We all make mistakes sometimes and that's okay. However, sometimes we come across mistakes made by others that just make us cringe and want to smack them on the forehead.
Today, I decided to do a special
Grammar 101: Pet Peeves Edition whereby we talk about those grammar boo-boos that make us sad.
I'll start with a couple of mine...
1) "Mines"...yes, mines! Is this a Hispanic thing? I've heard or read this phrase "that's mines" far too many times and it begs the question, "how many of you are there?"
WHY this is wrong: Mine is a possessive term that we use when we want to claim something as ours. If you say that is mine's, then you're being redundant. If you say that is mines, they you are pluralizing yourself implying there there is more than one of you. Either is completely WRONG. So please, never, ever say that "something is mines".
2) "Should have went": I've said it before and I'll say it again. When I hear people say "I should have went", I die a little inside. This is just awful.
WHY this is wrong: To say "I should have" is to use the Present-Perfect Tense. This tense is used when combining the present tense with a past event that has present consequences. The present perfect is a compound sentence formed by the combination of a "helper" verb and an action verb. In the case of "I should have gone," have is your helper verb and gone is your action verb in past tense. In modern English, the use of the helper verb to have will always result in the present perfect which means you must use the appropriate 'version' of the action verb to accompany that tense. *phew*
3) "I want that so bad": Sadly, this is probably one of the most commonly used phrases these days. Why? Evidently, it's because people cannot tell the difference between an adjective and an adverb.
WHY this is wrong: Bad and badly do not mean the same thing. When you use the word "bad" you are using it as an adjective to describe a noun. Ex: "I smell bad" means that you stink! When you want to proclaim that you really want something then you would say, "I want to see that movie really badly." An adverb is a type of adjective that is primarily used to describe not a noun, but a verb. In the example above, I'm using the word "badly" as an adjective to describe the verb "to want". Got that?
Peeves submitted via Twitter...
4) people that" instead of "people who".
WHY this is wrong: Simple! People are always referred to as WHO. It is only objects that are referred to as THAT.
5) tweets: "Random Capitalization of Whatever Word the Author Thinks Is Important." Guys, don't do this!
WHY this is wrong: Remember, we ONLY capitalize the beginning of a new sentence or a proper noun. There is no need to go "shift key crazy" and capitalize every word in a sentence.
6) tweets: When people say "would of" instead of "would have".
Should HAVE, would HAVE, could HAVE!
WHY this is wrong: "Would of" is not correct in any way. The word "of" is a preposition and it's only used to indicate a relationship between two nouns in a sentence. Other prepositions are: on, with, to, in, for, and. Should, would, could are NOT nouns therefore you do not follow it with a preposition but with an auxiliary verb, specifically have.
7) tweets: People who write 'alot' instead of 'a lot'.
WHY this is wrong: This is wrong because it "a lot" is two separate words, not one. Think about it! By definition, what is a 'lot'? A 'lot' is a group or set of something. When you're saying "that is a lot", you're really saying "that is a large group of [something]". Makes sense, right?
8) tweets: "I seen it".
People really say this?
WHY this is wrong: The word 'seen' is the past participle of the word 'see'. (A participle is the form of a verb ending in -ed. A past participle is a participle with past, perfect, or passive meaning, such as seen.) In the case of the word 'see', to say it in simple past tense you would use the word "saw" as in "I saw that too." If you want to use the past participle version, you would need to use the helper verb "have" before it and say "I have seen it."
So tell me, what are YOUR grammar pet peeves?
Wishing you a better day than yesterday!
