Grammar Pet Peeves

[HitchhikingGhost]

I keep hearing people say 'a' (prounounced 'ay') instead of 'an' when the next word begins with a vowel, for example: we're going to ay event tonight.

 

[mozzarellagirl]

This explanation is also incorrect. Smith's is not necessarily a contraction of Smith is; it can also be a contraction of Smith has or it can indicate the Saxon genitive, aka the possessive apostrophe. It's pretty clear that the poster was using it for the latter, and got the placement of the apostrophe wrong.

The verb to be is also used for far more than "something that Mr Smith or his family would be doing", but that's neither here nor there.

no more smith!!!!!!!!

 

[AliceInWanderLost]

I despise it when people say ‘I’m going gym’ rather than ‘I’m going to the gym’. When did this become a thing?

Similarly, I hate when people say "I'll write you!" - it's "I'll write TOO you", ffs!

 

[Mollywobbles]

Infer being used incorrectly. It doesn’t mean imply, it means to deduce.
Imagine my anger and outrage when it was used incorrectly by that paragon of grammatical perfection, Inspector Morse!

 

[Scorpihoe]

Christmas at the Hobson's

Christmas at the Hobson is what?

If you think that’s bad, this girl grammatically butchered her own surname

 

[Miscanthus]

Arrive TO......

Yer what?

This is a fashionable grammatical error at the moment

 

[Mollywobbles]

Prolly instead of probably

 

[Fledgling Psycho]

"What we done"

 

[Kate1970]

When a partner writes a status after their wife/gf has given birth " She done amazing"!!

When people write "How are use", instead of you!

 

[Pawpaw365]

It irritates me when people say 'give it me' instead of 'give it to me'

 

[TwooTwooTwitTwitTwoo]

Hey Alice, don't beat yourself up about it. I'm a stickler on grammar tooooo, but after reading back some of my posts, I've typed many silly corkers.

Yep me toooooo. I always cringe but I doubt many except other grammar pedants notice.

 

[1001 others]

"Low and behold" instead of "Lo and behold"
"The curtains compliment the flooring" instead of "The curtains complEment the flooring"
"Per say" instead of "Per se"
"Low and behold" instead of "Lo and behold"

... I could go on all day!

 

[Django]

People who start a sentence with 'like' for no discernible reason

 

[AliceInWanderLost]

I get annoyed by Americanisms creeping in everywhere! My phone keeps correcting ill to I’ll. No, I won’t write « sick », as if I say I have been sick, that means I vomited, not that I was poorly/unwell.
Also nail polish instead of nail varnish annoys me no end, as does pants for trousers, said by an Irish colleague!
It annoys me that Brits make the effort to learn the US word ( elevator, trunk, pants…) but if you say lift, car boot and trousers in the US, you are met with blank stares. It just does my head in!

i feel the same way when my spelling of words is queried - my phone etc trying to correct the "s" to "z" in words like organise, or erase the "u" from words like honour and harbour. just STOP.

same with the word "yoghurt" which i still spell with an H, as i was taught as a kid. the americanised spelling of "yogurt" has seemingly rendered the original spelling obselete but it just looks wrong spelt that way. and american terms such as "thru" and "tho" to replace "through" and "though".

 

[Gl1tt3rUn1c0rn]

My pet peeve is this trend of joining words together eg eachother, abit, ofcourse.

Also using breath instead of breathe eg ‘I am struggling to breath‘

And I’m sure @AliceInWanderLost will join me with this one - Tattle should have an eye role emoji but there are non

 

[Pawpaw365]

When people say “I brought this dress from Asda” when they mean they purchased. If you’re bringing it somewhere, it’s brought. If you purchased it, It’s bought.

I’m fairly patient with some of the mistakes as I’m dyslexic so make a few myself but whenever I read that my brain just reads it and I think “you brought the dress to where”… for about two minutes before I’m like ohhhb

I’ll admit it took me years to know the difference. It was one of the words that I don’t remember being taught the difference between at school, whereas their, your, etc were all hammered in!

 

[witchofwestbyfleet]

What is an Oxford comma? And please don't say "Google is your friend." No he blinking isn't!

A comma after the last item in a sentence e.g.

"Tattle discusses influencers, vloggers, and celebrities" = with Oxford comma
"Tattle discusses influencers, vloggers and celebrities" = without Oxford comma

 

[Loubywoobywoo]

I always just say "partner" as I always forget if I'm the é or the ée.

Just had a flyer through from a company offering me a free boiler. Wow, great! Except they've used "effected" instead of "affected", so into the bin it goes.

For a man it’s fiancé and a woman is a fiancée
Similarly I've noticed people not using "of" after "a couple".

E.g. "Can I have a couple days off?"

Male person is a fiancé, woman is a fiancée, if that helps.

 

[emm]

in primary school, our teacher taught the whole class - kids aged about 6 - that the word "friend" was spelt "freind" - to the point that if we spelt it correctly, she would actually cross it out with red pen and alter the spelling. eventually, it was noticed by our parents, who - while waiting in the playground to collect us - must have discussed the fact that their kid was struggling to spell "friend", and suddenly made the connection that all the children in the class had the same issue.

I often hear primary school teachers saying things like "was you" no wonder literary standards are as they are!

 

[Kim Mild]

On the forum list , there is an Instagramer category. Shouldn't it be instagrammer? My phone kept auto- correcting this post.