yrieithydd

Aren't there *any* times you don't like it though? Have you never been absolutely exhausted and desperate to try to communicate something and still of the opinion that Self Improvement is a wonderful thing, but also of the opinion that something else is way more important just at that moment?

Lucky you, if you haven't! Please be sympathetic to those of us for whom that isn't the case.

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I can't think of such times, yes when I'm tired I'm likely to go `yeah whatever' and threaten to thwap the person, but I do not think I'd take offence.

Does it also make a difference about whether the offence has occurred in speech (where I'm unlikely to be pedantic when listening to someone who is stressed about stuff, unless I'm certain it would be taken as a lightening note) or in writing? If I've written something whilst stressed, upset etc and then it exists in a form which various people could read at later dates but which could be edited easily by me, I'd rather someone pointed out the error and I could change it because then my slip when exhausted won't still be around to haunt me.

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I struggle with this in a slightly different context. I spend a lot of my time talking to non-native speakers. It's a fine line between wanting to correct people's English (which by-and-large they would like me to do) to nitpicking, and often I just want to have a conversation with them rather than pull them up on their grammar. Which sometimes involves lots of handwavings and me inferring things from context. But then it's actually quite hard for non-native speakers to get grammar/pronunciation corrections because native speakers fill in the gaps subconsciously. So I feel I should do that, but I don't want to nitpick all the time.

For people I know well I sometimes take time out from the conversation to say "I've noticed you saying 'more easier' a lot: the correct is actually 'easier'". But I don't know what to do for casual conversations.

On the written pedantry point many years of Usenet posting have taught me not to make content-free posts - my post might have cost 'thousands of dollars' to propagate around the world: bandwidth is money, even more so in the old days. And I don't think pedantry is contentful unless it's to clarify something that might be ambiguous (your less/fewer students example would count if the context wasn't clear which was implied). So I pedant, but only when I have something else to say as well. Most of this is on Usenet which is uneditable so corrections aren't an option. If I were writing a thesis then I'd expect everyone to pedant as much as they were able because there are months of editing time. Pedanting my shopping list isn't terribly useful as I'll throw it away tomorrow. Other works probably fall somewhere in between as to the significance and longevity of the document.

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Pedanting your shopping list once in a while might have its uses, because there are context-specific learning outcomes, especially if there is a chance that someone else might need to complete the shopping.

I think I agree with you though, about context, and you've said what I tried to say further down the page with more clarity and intelligence...

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We cross-posted, but I think we're saying complementary things.

I don't take issue with ambiguous pedantry (the shopping list example) because that's where my assumptions don't match up with other people's. But if it's not really ambiguous then I think it's necessary to be much more careful. For example, in Workington there used to be a shop bearing the sign "Stationery Box: we wont be beaten" to which my reply was 'If you're wont to be beaten, I'm going somewhere else'. But at the end of the day the meaning is clear, through there being one much more probable interpretation.

The other thing is that pedantry can turn into linguistic snobbery. "I know the plural of 'forum' is 'fora' and I'll insist everyone else use it because I'm so clever" (I'm guilty of this, as well as most of the other examples). But other people may not have the same education as me, particularly if English isn't their first language, so I end up rubbing their noses in it. There's a fine line between instruction and putting other people down. Perhaps I do that unintentionally (I assume everyone is educated to the same standard as me) but it's still a put-down

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There's also the fact that some people are intelligent, but have communications issues, which mean that all they want is to be understood as best they can, but that the fine details are an irrelevance to an over-processed mind.

There's not much point in correcting someone if it's not going to help them or be taken on board.

And helping someone to learn Cambridge English isn't necessarily going to be helpful if they're going to spend most of their time on the streets of Liverpool or Birmingham.

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I struggle with this in a slightly different context. I spend a lot of my time talking to non-native speakers. It's a fine line between wanting to correct people's English (which by-and-large they would like me to do) to nitpicking, and often I just want to have a conversation with them rather than pull them up on their grammar. Which sometimes involves lots of handwavings and me inferring things from context. But then it's actually quite hard for non-native speakers to get grammar/pronunciation corrections because native speakers fill in the gaps subconsciously. So I feel I should do that, but I don't want to nitpick all the time.

That is a different context. I have noticed that when

curig and I are communicating in Welsh, I'm not pedantic because it would often get in the way of conversation. This is in itself a slightly different speaker, because he is nearer a native speaker than I am (being a young second language learner) but I'm the one who's had the grammatical education. Because we don't have the shared knowledge base in the same way that we do in English, it's not fun in the same way and would hinder communication. I do try and use correct forms back at him and he says he notices. I think that when learning a language exposure to the correct forms even if you're not explicitly being taught them can be effective. It's how young kids learn after all.

Feedback on persistent errors is helpful at times, but not to interrupt communication entirely.

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I (still) don't see your problem. You are desperate to communicate something. You attempt to communicate it by saying X. I fail to parse X as English and say, "Don't you mean X*?" where X* is the English sentence which strikes me as being closest to X. You say, "Yes", or repeat X*. It may well be, if you are trying to communicate a thought subtle and highly nuanced, that X* fails to make me understand what you are trying to say, so we have to carry on talking some more, and build up to Y and Z. In any case, my saying, "Don't you mean X*?" doesn't in any way prevent you from communicating your meaning. Probably you did mean X*, and perhaps most people would have taken that as read, but you just have to say, "Yes." If you didn't mean X*, then I am genuninely confused, so the problem, whatever it is, isn't pedantry.

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If you really don't know what I'm talking about, then of course you should ask - there's nothing to lose. If you're pretty sure you know but aren't definite, that's more difficult. If I'm struggling to piece together a difficult train of thought and you interrupt me then no, it isn't just a matter of saying "yes" - I will lose the train of thought altogether, which will make me sad and angry and mean you never get to find out what you wanted to know. Whereas if you wait for me to struggle through, your question will probably be answered in the natural course of things. There is, however, as you say, a small chance of you getting the wrong end of the stick. Does that make any more sense?

In any case, this was not a post about either of these things, it was a post about pedantry, hence the title and the tag.

yrieithydd wasn't writing about resolving the listener's confusion, she was talking about helping the speaker to use language better. Which is a good thing, but not in the kind of situation I'm talking about.

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Notwithstanding the etymology of the word, I don't think in ordinary English usage a linguistic quibble ceases to be pedantic if the quibbler's intention is other than to educate the original speaker.

I ask almost automatically, because if I stop to think about whether there is a real risk that I have misunderstood, then I have ceased listening to what you are saying, and then you definitely won't succeed in communicating your thought.

It would be fine if everything you said was written down, and then I could look at the end to see if it resolved the ambiguity of the beginning, but I can hardly be expected to hold a whole long speech in my head to compare the different parts of it. I have no real choice but to try to understand what you are saying as you say it. For a thought to pass from you to me, there must be a process: Catriona thoughts --> words --> Robert thoughts. It seems to me that you are expecting that process to be sequential, so that I wait for you to finish with the first arrow before I get to work on the second arrow, but that's not possible. Therefore, particularly if you're working through a long and confusing train of thought, it is not reasonable of you to expect to speak uninterupted. The fundamental problem is that things hard to communicate are hard to communicate, which means that the attempt frequently fails.

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I was going by the content of the entry as well as its labels. I think it was quite clear what kind of pedantry C was talking about from the justification she gave for it. That was certainly the only kind of pedantry I was talking about in my first comment.

I ask almost automatically, because if I stop to think about whether there is a real risk that I have misunderstood, then I have ceased listening to what you are saying, and then you definitely won't succeed in communicating your thought.

Not at all. Allowing me to continue will help me to get it straight in my own mind, and when I've done that I'll probably repeat it in a more concise form that will be easier to follow. If not, you can ask about it afterwards.

A more effective alternative would be asking you to go away while I work it out by myself, but that seems a bit eccentric even by my standards.

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Of course, it might be that most other people don't really attempt to follow trains of thought that are almost too complicated for them. They're either clever enough to navigate the intricacies without effort, or stupid enough not to try. Or just not so easily distracted by outside noise as I am.

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cartesiandaemon.livejournal.com

Oh yes, that resonates with me. I've observed a few special cases.

* I don't see suggesting a correction as a criticism as much as most people do (though I suppose it does feel a bit more like that directed at me). So, I say "interesting fact:" or "do you mean" and think it's helpful, whereas someone else will be pissed off.

* However, I'm often more sensitive to nuances of word choice. If someone says "But, blah, blah, blah" I think "They disagree with me" when "but" might just have meant "a minor refinement is" not, as it sounded like, "I refute you thus:"

* I enjoy talking about grammar and obscure facts, so what to two people like me is a fun diversion, to someone else might be a trip to hell.

* Sometimes I'm genuinely unaware of a common usage. I remember at school a friend asking if he could lend something and I wasn't *trying* to be an arsehole when I said "Uhhh.... what? Do you mean borrow?" I genuinely wasn't sure what he meant.

* Alchemist has a point. It is frustrating when you're trying to communicate something, and someone else seizes on irrelevent details. (*hugs* I can hear the frustration in the post.) But it's odd -- the people I am most mutually pedantic with, are also the people best at grasping what I mean to say, especially if I ask them to.

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* Sometimes I'm genuinely unaware of a common usage. I remember at school a friend asking if he could lend something and I wasn't *trying* to be an arsehole when I said "Uhhh.... what? Do you mean borrow?" I genuinely wasn't sure what he meant.

I remember an incident like that soon after we moved, so I was probably seven. One of my new* classmates asked `Can I lend your pencil?' and my response was `no, why do you want to lend my pencil to someone else?' It just did not make sense.

But it's odd -- the people I am most mutually pedantic with, are also the people best at grasping what I mean to say, especially if I ask them to.

Maybe because you're on similar wavelengths!
*I typed knew!

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beckyc.livejournal.com

One of my new* classmates asked `Can I lend your pencil?' and my response was `no, why do you want to lend my pencil to someone else?'

Oh, yes, I got confused at my primary school with *exactly* that example. It wasn't anywhere near the only one either - I was a middle class (ie considered "posh") child of two teachers going to a school where most of the children were living in the roughest council estate in the town.

The one I remember that the other children didn't understand was when we were playing and I was the shop keeper* and they were the customer, and they chose items and asked how much it was and I said "It's free", and they duly counted out "One, two, three" and gave it to me.

*Arguably, I had no concept of how to be a shop keeper nor of economics and from what I can tell was a five year old tree hugging anarchic hippy, but that's another matter entirely.

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beckyc.livejournal.com

It is frustrating when you're trying to communicate something, and someone else seizes on irrelevent details.

True, but sometimes it is funny, if you know that the other person has the same sort of sense of humour as you do.

(*Thinks* - of course, one probably shouldn't do that when one is chairing a debate, and gets asked rhetorical questions by the speaker, but it was too good an opportunity to miss ;-)

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cartesiandaemon.livejournal.com

*Thinks* - of course, one probably shouldn't do that when one is chairing a debate, and gets asked rhetorical questions by the speaker, but it was too good an opportunity to miss ;

Unless it's about evil slash.

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I often end up pedanting myself (by saying something and then almost straight-away correcting it). I can see where

the_alchemist is coming from though. If one is trying to have a serious discussion, or just get a simple point across and the other party is ignoring that and only being pedantic that can be very irritating. But* that's not something of which I'd consider your pedantry guilty.

*Given the OP, we seem to be happy with sentences beginning with "but".

And as you like pedantry and I didn't want to create a tangent elsewhere, this post gives me the perfect opportunity to pedant this malapropism...

Posted by

yrieithydd in another place:

Had the original thread move come after it had gone in that direction I'd agree that it was justified but it proceeded it.

"Preceded", I think. *grin*

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I often end up pedanting myself (by saying something and then almost straight-away correcting it).

I do that!

But* that's not something of which I'd consider your pedantry guilty.

Good! I do not intend to be obstructive with it!

"Preceded", I think. *grin*

You're right I did mean preceded. My brain half queried it but couldn't be bothered supplying the relevant definitions!

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curig is amused at the correction.

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As I said I don't want to `leave other people with the impression I'm someone who doesn't know the difference between' proceed and precede!

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Why does it matter?

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Why does anything matter?

There are all sorts of reasons why I care.*

For a start, basic honesty; I do actually know the difference so the other is a false impression.

Clarity; with that particular example, what I wrote does not actual make sense. Had I meant proceeded, it should have been `proceeded from it'. However, although there is obviously something wrong with the sentence, it is not clear whether I have omitted a word or used proceeded when I meant preceded. Given that the former would have the opposite meaning to the latter, correcting it is sensible. Admittedly this is not always the case.

Pride; Maybe not an edifying reason, but I do not want to be thought stupid. Maybe that also shows up my intellectual snobbery.

Covering my back; when one is perceived as a stuck-up know-it-all people are ready to jump on one's least mistake.

Being me; I am a pedant. I think correctness is important.

Why should someone else's `it doesn't matter?' be more important than my `it does matter?'. Yes, outward correctness is not the be-all and end-all** of life but that's not to say we cannot at least try!

*What is the difference between something mattering and us caring about something?

**How should that phrase be hyphenated? (Assuming one values hyphens!)

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**How should that phrase be hyphenated? (Assuming one values hyphens!)

The Concise OED has it as you've done it.

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I'm not sure. I know I use 'matter' and 'care' in different senses. I think I was using "matter" in the sense of "well, I know you're intelligent, and that you know more than me..."

Things matter because of who we are. I know I put huge emotional investments into things that objectively don't matter, because it avoids me admitting that which does matter, and therefore doesn't leave me so vulnerable. Decoy strategy, I suppose.

Pride - why would anyone think you stupid? you, of all people?

Covering your back - isn't this just counter-productive, at some level?

What does correctness achieve? There's only ever more to learn. It reminds me of Hyacinth Bucket, who is probably more correct than the people that wrote the etiquette guides. Codifying things is merely a recording of an echo, rather than being that much that is useful - it doesn't fossilise, it merely influences. That which is useful is precedent, which is shaped by the codifying, but informed by external influence also.
It's not really satisfying - I prefer getting things "right" because of who I am within, than just trying to alter behaviour. I know that changing behaviour alters who I am within, at some level, but, well, I don't know. I guess I'm holistic.
Which is why I can't do a PhD...

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It matters because the existence of the error distracts the reader. The reader has to look at the sentence, think, "That doesn't say what it means to say," and then substitute the intended word. There may be no ultimate doubt as to the intended meaning, but it would be more polite, I feel, to save the reader the effort.

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Indeed. This is partly why I asked whether written medium (eg LJ) was different from spoken, because in speech one moves on and it is gone, but on LJ the error remains.

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However, where the meaning is clear, that one focuses on the error rather than a posting in which there is a great deal of emotional content suggests to the person being responded to that the only thing that matters is the manner in which it was said, rather than the content, particularly where the error is minor and the difficult major.

(

yrieithydd this is emphatically NOT getting at you, but making a more general point)

I'm with caliston further up the page, there's a time and a place for precision in language, and I dislike pedantry where it is being used as a means of control and to enforce a feeling of superiority.

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I was responding specifically to your question as to

yriethydd correcting her own error. I'm not suggesting that we should correct others' errors in all circumstances, but that we should strive to make our own writing as error-free as possible, out of courtesy for those who read it.

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I often end up pedanting myself (by saying something and then almost straight-away correcting it). I can see where the_alchemist is coming from though. If one is trying to have a serious discussion, or just get a simple point across and the other party is ignoring that and only being pedantic that can be very irritating.

I had this issue when I was on placement. I wanted a serious conversation about the charismatic gifts, and the person I was talking to told me in no uncertain terms that I shouldn't use "charisms" when I could use "gifts" even though we both understood what I was talking about.
He did what he intended, which was to divert the conversation from something which had scared him onto something where he had the upper hand.
He had quite an interesting take on pedantry - that it was solely for the purpose of making someone else look stupid. Which is why he used it - a way of controlling people and saying "my language is better than yours because I'm more intelligent than you". His contention is that we're natural chameleons and will pick up the essence of good communication by example. We should only pedant when the meaning is unclear.

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I think there is a difference between pedantry for clarity of expression, and pedantry where the meaning is clear, and the pedantry is a diversionary mechanism.

Why does the cosmetic matter so much to you? I agree that, in order to see the underlying situation, we need to have things presented clearly, but I'm not so sure that cosmetic perfectionism is the best way to achieve that.

Would you be so happy with a different sort of pedantry? For example if you went to an event and you thought you were well-dressed, only to find Trinny and Susannah coming over, telling you that you'd got your details wrong, that your dress-language was all mixed up and you needed to change things immediately.

Perhaps it wouldn't bother you, but it would me. If I had made an effort with the best resources that I had available, then I would feel aggrieved, especially if no one had noticed that I had made quite an effort, and it was small details that were at fault.

If I went to a service that was cosmetically perfect, it wouldn't necessarily enable me to worship. I've been to some quite chaotic services but, because there was sufficient order there, I found that the distractions led me to God.

God made man in his own image and Jesus was wholly God and Wholly Man. If Jesus was wholly man, then by extension, Jesus could make mistakes, indeed making mistakes is how we learn. It's not a sin. The mistakes we make tell us something about God, as well as the good things. It isn't that we shouldn't be corrected, but the parable of the wheat and the darnel suggests that we shouldn't always tear up the field in order to get rid of the 'weeds'. We were meditating on this the other day, and I started thinking about the pesticides in the fields. When we have pesticide/herbicide, we lose the wild flowers which make the scene so beautiful. They provide variety, stimulating the senses. They are not edible, but they have a function - to bring variety to something that would otherwise be dull.

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Would you be so happy with a different sort of pedantry? For example if you went to an event and you thought you were well-dressed, only to find Trinny and Susannah coming over, telling you that you'd got your details wrong, that your dress-language was all mixed up and you needed to change things immediately.

Perhaps it wouldn't bother you, but it would me. If I had made an effort with the best resources that I had available, then I would feel aggrieved, especially if no one had noticed that I had made quite an effort, and it was small details that were at fault.

I think it would depend a lot on the circumstances and how they did it. If as soon as I walked into the room they laid into me publically, I'd be humilated. However, if it was constructive criticism offered privately which would help me get it right in future so people wouldn't be laughing at me behind my back for having got it wrong, I'd appreciate it, though I might feel why didn't they tell me before I made a fool of myself. If I have made a fool of myself, I'd rather know than have people laugh at me behind my back.

If I went to a service that was cosmetically perfect, it wouldn't necessarily enable me to worship. I've been to some quite chaotic services but, because there was sufficient order there, I found that the distractions led me to God.

Yes, things go wrong at services and they can lead us to God, but that doesn't mean we shouldn't try to get it right. God can work through our mistakes but that's not an excuse for not trying. The service where the Rector decided to read a bit of 1 (or was it 2?) Chronicles instead of the Gospel did lead me to God but only with a lot of grappling on my part. It would have been simpler for him to have asked for that passage to be read as the OT and read the Gospel. Equally the servers do make mistakes and at the end of the day it doesn't matter, but we should still strive to be invisible so as not to distract unnecessarily, even though we can then laugh at the things which go wrong (many of which the congregation don't even notice).

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This made me think of something else... you seem to have a well defined sense of right and wrong (I was going to say 'correct' and 'incorrect' there but I'll stick to the wider definition). That's not a criticism, I've mentioned in the past how this has been helpful. But I think other people have the lines less boldly drawn. That's not to say things are more black and white (which is a slightly different point) but of what works for you and what doesn't. So I'd imagine you might find a Quaker meeting unhelpful (I've never been, but understand that silence reigns and any who feels moved to speak stands up, says their bit then shuts up again): there's nothing to say what is correct worship and what isn't. I'd have difficulty with that too. In terms of worship this is something I struggled with for a number of years but decided that if whatever the worship was suited the majority of the people, then it was fine by me (and I'd put up with small difficulties but move if there were more repulsions than attractions).

Maybe what I'm trying to say is that for other people getting things 'right' (whatever that might be) isn't such a big issue? And that insistence on correctness is therefore petty in their eyes because they don't value the correctness so much?

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So I'd imagine you might find a Quaker meeting unhelpful

Actually, I'm not sure that this is true. Silence is something I can deal with. I was also influenced by a book a read about William Penn as a teenager.

there's nothing to say what is correct worship and what isn't.

Spirit and Truth.

And that insistence on correctness is therefore petty in their eyes because they don't value the correctness so much?

Perhaps. I am someone who holds herself to high standards and some of my pedantry is part of that.

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Perhaps more what I was getting at was based on a service where someone at the back would interject "Hallelujah praise the Lord!" at random intervals. At the time I felt distinctly uncomfortable about this but I'm not sure I would so much... I was feeling uncomfortable because I felt embarassed and thought other people would feel uncomfortable. Apart from the minor distraction I wouldn't really have minded that much, especially on the basis that other people might find it helpful and who was I to say without asking them? He turned out to be the visiting preacher.

Perhaps I'm being terribly postmodern but I don't see that there's a right way and a wrong way to do worship... if it's offered genuinely and free from factual mistakes. There is worship that might not suit the audience, which is wrong because it fails the context, but that might suit another. In part this is why I have difficulty with Orthodoxy since my (perhaps prejudiced) perception is that it's a monoculture. Though discarding my postmodernism I suspect it's quite possible to adapt yourself to the prevailing worship so maybe this doesn't apply.

High standards are a good thing in themselves but many people aren't as capable as you are so maybe for them they're unattainable (if they knew they existed at all). And there's a difficult balance between using your talents to help them attain them without rubbing their noses in it. But I suppose that's not an argument not to try.

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My point about T&S is not the medium of the criticism but the fact that they haven't taken the whole picture into a/c, they've just focused in on some small details.

There's a difference between not diminishing from worship and being perfect. In fact, being too perfect can lead us away from God.

I'm too doomed to explain this properly, so I'll leave it for now.

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I think it would depend a lot on the circumstances and how they did it. If as soon as I walked into the room they laid into me publically, I'd be humilated. However, if it was constructive criticism offered privately which would help me get it right in future so people wouldn't be laughing at me behind my back for having got it wrong, I'd appreciate it, though I might feel why didn't they tell me before I made a fool of myself. If I have made a fool of myself, I'd rather know than have people laugh at me behind my back.

People are always going to laugh. There are always going to be people that have a different set of standards, to which we don't fit. I found this poem in Michael Vaughan's autobiography, and found it helpful as a reminder.

The Man in the Mirror

When you get what you want in your struggle for self
And the world makes you king for a day
Just go to the mirror and look at yourself
And see what that man has to say.
For it isn't your father or mother or wife
Whose judgement upon you must pass,
The fellow whose verdict counts most in your life
Is the one staring back from the glass.
Some people may think you a straight-shootin' chum
And call you a wonderful guy
But the man in the glass says your'e only a bum
If you can't look him straight in the eye.
He's the fellow to please, never mind all the rest
For he's with you clear up to the end
And you've passed your most difficult test
If the man in the glass is your friend.
You may fool the world down the pathway of life
And get pats on your back as you pass
But your final reward will be heartache and tears
If you've cheated the man in the glass.

Yes, things go wrong at services and they can lead us to God, but that doesn't mean we shouldn't try to get it right. God can work through our mistakes but that's not an excuse for not trying. The service where the Rector decided to read a bit of 1 (or was it 2?) Chronicles instead of the Gospel did lead me to God but only with a lot of grappling on my part. It would have been simpler for him to have asked for that passage to be read as the OT and read the Gospel. Equally the servers do make mistakes and at the end of the day it doesn't matter, but we should still strive to be invisible so as not to distract unnecessarily, even though we can then laugh at the things which go wrong (many of which the congregation don't even notice).
I'm not saying that we shouldn't get it right.

However, there are times that a point needs to be made, and sometimes that means doing it in a way that discomfits. I don't believe that we should always have the gospel at the Eucharist. 99 times out of a hundred, or 999 times out of a thousand, yes, but I think that setting it in stone that we must never, ever, deviate from a rule is not a helpful thing, nor is it a Godly thing. It's the deviations that give us character and individuality - we are in the image of God because we are unique, not because we are clones.

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As most of you know, I am an incorrigble pedant.

You may be an incorrigible pedant, but consider yourself corriged. :)

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[laughs]

I didn't say I could type!

(But edit is a very useful feature!)

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It was just so I could say corriged. What a fun word. Shame it's not in the dictionary...

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[giggles] Words are fun!

That's the other side of our pedantry; bending language in bizarre ways, like back-forming words. Of course ept is in the dictionary!

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[grins] Indeed, they are!

But being careful to restrict it to people who understand what we're on about. But it can be quite exclusionary if you don't follow - I've stopped bringing poor-English speakers to Methsoc because they just don't understand half what is said :-(

Sorry, I seem to be banging the ESOL drum rather a lot today which wasn't intentional :-) Sometimes I just feel that people don't realise how difficult it is to get on with native speakers. Methsoc is rather worse than this that average, but language usage is a significant barrier to cultural integration especially in a more educated environment.

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It's like rarefied a-c worship...

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But "corrige" would be perfectly understandable to a French speaker! Experience suggests to me that high-flown latinate vocabulary is actually easier for non-native speakers to understand than sloppy informal English, because the words are likely to be similar to words in other languages spoken by the listener.

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I think my interpretation of non-native is different from yours! Most of my friends in this category are East Asians (Indians, Chinese, Koreans, Japanese) where the languages are so different, and they're the ones who tend to have big trouble integrating since the culture is so different too.

You're right though, for Europeans.

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However, it's not correct...

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cartesiandaemon.livejournal.com

I thought of another one. When I think a point of definition is important to a debate, and someone else doesn't.

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