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yrieithyddShould I be worried that an email to the English Faculty post-grads contains the sentence:
Shazia Mirza is one of Britains only female muslim Stand-up comedians.
I can see four or five* glaring errors in that! What is the world coming to if emails to English post-grads at the premier university in Britain can contain such atrocious English?
*Depending on one's views of feminine forms of jobs etc.
Shazia Mirza is one of Britains only female muslim Stand-up comedians.
I can see four or five* glaring errors in that! What is the world coming to if emails to English post-grads at the premier university in Britain can contain such atrocious English?
*Depending on one's views of feminine forms of jobs etc.
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no subject
Date: 2005-11-07 12:26 pm (UTC)Would you use comedien/commedienne? I can't work out if I do or not, it's never come up afaicremember.
no subject
Date: 2005-11-07 12:33 pm (UTC)What? See five errors?
Would you use comedien/commedienne? I can't work out if I do or not, it's never come up afaicremember.
That was the potential fifth error. I'm fairly sure comedienne is used of Jo Brand. I'm not sure what the general line is, but I'm tending to try and reclaim the feminine forms, for example using Portress for the female porters at college. Given people object to chairman, it seems strange to object to authoress.*
*The particularly interesting one I found was that in Aber the women's cricket team was unanimous in wanting to be called batsmen not batswomen. For me, this was because I felt batswoman implied we weren't equal with the men, which was my objection to the use of authoress for Joey in the Chalet School books as I grew up. Whereas, ISTM, that the objection to chairman etc is that it implies the position is only open to men. But, I'd sometimes put the difference down to the fact that in English the maleness of chairman is more obvious than that of author hence the difference, but batsman/batswoman belied that.
no subject
Date: 2005-11-07 01:31 pm (UTC)Yes. Though now I read it slowly, my brain went *clung* on the 'one of..only' thing. Um, ok. (1) "Britains" is barely a word, they may have meant the possessive (2) only should be few or specify a number (3) why is stand-up capitalized? (4) I'm ashamed to admit how long this one took me. Should it be 'islamic'? This always confuses me, because afaict 'muslim' would be a normal way of forming an adjective so I never misunderstand it.
And "female muslim stand-up comedians" does sounds clumsy somehow. And for that matter, how many comedians are there? About 1% should be islamic[1] women demographically.
I'm fairly sure comedienne is used of Jo Brand
But she would have to be different :) I use "aviatrix" in jest... And batswoman just sounds odd too.
I think its that 'chairman' sounds clearly 'man' (though in some case I think you just accept that), whereas with eg. comedian, it could function for both as is, and it would be nice to have some consistency either way on whether we have a female form, or use the same for everybody.
[1] This is when I realised.
no subject
Date: 2005-11-07 01:59 pm (UTC)*Now that's interesting, why do I not capitalise the adjective for christian, but do for Jewish and Muslim?
no subject
Date: 2005-11-07 02:22 pm (UTC)I think that sounds like what I was doing. They're both still referring to the religion, right (as opposed to, eg. one being cultural) but, hmm, maybe it's that "Islamic" has more connotation of the context being related to the religion, whereas 'Muslim' is ready made to mean "a person who happens to be Islammic".
*Now that's interesting, why do I not capitalise the adjective for christian, but do for Jewish and Muslim?
Hmmm. Googling suggests they should *all* be capitalized. I would have thought the adjectives would be ok without -- I've been on the web too long, or perhaps hanging about with scientist-adjectives :)
Maybe 'christian' has just been used for longer round here, so has acquired more meaning than "Being Christian" so takes the more generic form.
no subject
Date: 2005-11-07 02:34 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-11-07 01:08 pm (UTC)I, for one, am glad not to have had to learn three genders and a case system - though it does put me at a disadvantage when trying to learn German and Latin.
no subject
Date: 2005-11-07 01:56 pm (UTC)Descripitivist!
What a young language!
And no, actually, I think the `one of ... only' is just plain wrong because it doesn't mean anything. Is she the only one? or are there merely a small number?
I, for one, am glad not to have had to learn three genders and a case system
But they're fun! Though even in Old English, the declensions aren't that strong in that the various forms are not that different. Word order is still fairly important. And if you'd learnt them from youth, then it wouldn't be a problem!
no subject
Date: 2005-11-07 01:23 pm (UTC)1. Britains should have an apostrophe in and thus read: Britain's.
2. The word "muslim" should be capitalised to read "Muslim".
3. It seems odd to say "one" of "only". One might say "She is the only" or "She is one of a small number of...".
4. If one is going to say "one of Brtain's only etc." then I think I might put commas between female, Muslim and stand-up.
5. It is dubious to capitalise "Stand-up".
I think "comedians" is fine, but accept the variation.
no subject
Date: 2005-11-07 01:43 pm (UTC)Exactly.
2. The word "muslim" should be capitalised to read "Muslim".
Indeed.
3. It seems odd to say "one" of "only". One might say "She is the only" or "She is one of a small number of...".
Yep, this was the one that leapt out at me first. It was contradiction. Maybe they meant `one of only a few' but only implies one and being `one of one' is just odd!
4. If one is going to say "one of Brtain's only etc." then I think I might put commas between female, Muslim and stand-up.
Aah, I hadn't thought of that; commas in strings of adjectives is one for which I couldn't quote rules. Of course if one were to use comedienne, one could then dispense with female and I then the comma question would be resolved.
5. It is dubious to capitalise "Stand-up".
Especially if one does not capitalise Muslim!
Good to see you commenting. Ann and I had been wondering how you were. Indeed, when you were cited in one of
no subject
Date: 2005-11-07 01:34 pm (UTC)Anglicists have not been noted for precision in English grammar and usage for a long time. Too busy deconstructing, I suppose!
The best proof-readers I know tend to be classicists, theologians, engineers and the like - adherents of disciplines where some link between thought and expression is still useful.
Do we need feminine forms? A real can of worms looms here. A deaconess is not a female deacon. "Poetess" usually implies a second-rate poet. What about Webmistress? An email I got last week (not in French) referred to the "editrice" of a book.
no subject
Date: 2005-11-07 01:52 pm (UTC)It is an interesting one. I don't think I've ever got round to writing the post I meant on this, though the argument is summarised in my first response to
A deaconess is not a female deacon.
Unfortunately. That's the Church's fault for creating a role which was not just the female equivalent of Deacon.
"Poetess" usually implies a second-rate poet.
But should it? Yes, that was my objection as reading Chalet schoool books from the age of 7 or so. But does that show up our sexism?
What about Webmistress?
[grins] I like it!
An email I got last week (not in French) referred to the "editrice" of a book.
That's just odd. Surely in English it would be editress?
no subject
Date: 2005-11-07 03:02 pm (UTC)Yes, if it were necessary to edit the Chalet School canon, one would certainly send for an editress ;-)
no subject
Date: 2005-11-08 11:03 am (UTC)<a href="http://www.rockterrace.demon.co.uk/GGBP/>Girls Gone By Publishers</a> are doing this. <i>Chalet School in Exile</i> and <i>Highland Twins</i> both have all their chapters. I always felt there should have been more in <i>Exile</i> and there was (although less than I'd hoped for) and <i>Genius</i>/<i>Chalet School Fête</i> (IIRC) showed that some of the plot of <i>Highland Twins</i> had gone!
Pedantry
Date: 2005-11-07 01:36 pm (UTC)Another hyper-critical pedant.
Re: Pedantry
Date: 2005-11-07 02:02 pm (UTC)It did originally certainly. But that hyphen seems to have been part of the general loss of hyphens in English. Interestingly in Welsh I would definitely say e-bost! I'll also say that it definitely should not be e'mail whatever they may have put in the notices on the computers in the UL when they are telling you not to check it on the catalogue machines.
I believe it is so written in the RFCs which invent/define it.
RFCs?
Another hyper-critical pedant.
[grins] Who are you and how did find my LJ?
Re: Pedantry
Date: 2005-11-07 02:07 pm (UTC)http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Request_for_Comments
Internet standard thingies.
But I'd be inclined to use email if I want to, just because it's easier. Electronic mail is no longer the primary referent in people's minds imho.
Another hyper-critical pedant.
It did puzzle me someone felt the need to hide their pedantry.
Re: Pedantry
Date: 2005-11-07 03:54 pm (UTC)Re: Pedantry
Date: 2005-11-07 03:59 pm (UTC)OTOH, do we need to optimize our langauage for people who don't know what email is? :)
Re: Pedantry
Date: 2005-11-07 04:00 pm (UTC)Re: Pedantry
Date: 2005-11-08 11:03 am (UTC)Re: Pedantry
Date: 2005-11-08 11:03 am (UTC)I'll think about using e-mail.
Re: Pedantry
Date: 2005-11-07 07:06 pm (UTC)Me? www.picindex.info/author/
Pedant? Yes.
Frequent offender? That too!
J.
Re: Pedantry
Date: 2005-11-08 11:08 am (UTC)[grins] I remember a friend commenting on the error made by a education minister where she (I think) said:
This will result in less intelligent people going to university
when she meant fewer intelligent people. I like this example as I can use it to justify my pedantry on this point (and counter people who cite Alfred the Great!)
Re: Pedantry
Date: 2005-11-08 12:35 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-11-08 10:42 am (UTC)