What is your biggest grammar pet peeve?

[sxr7171]

Originally posted by: Woodchuck2000

Originally posted by: VTboy

Originally posted by: sxr7171

Originally posted by: VTboy
Expresso and Espresso are the same thing. They however are not pronounced exactly the same. Almost the same but different.

I agree that they are the same thing, but both spellings are pronounced "ESS-presso." It is the correct way to refer to a cup of coffee made with pressurized water at a certain minimum pressure. I hate it when the person at the counter at Starbucks likes to repeat my order with the wrong pronunciation. This doesn't usually happen at the better coffee places. In that sense the expresso spelling is not the preferred spelling, it was probably a bad transliteration from the original italian.

WRONG WRONG WRONG. Expresso is NOT pronounced Esspresso I know this for a FACT. I have seen many many dictionarys ALL OF THEM say to pronounce it as ikspresso. NONE of them say to pronounce them the same. LEARN YOUR FACTS BEFORE YOU SPEAK.
On a side note. While most people say fortA for the word forte it really should be pronounced fort. The e should be silent.

We're ignoring the fact that the word Expresso is a corruption of Espresso in the first place, and is no more valid in my opinion than people saying 'Laptop' incorrectly as 'Labtop'.

Also, 'forte' is pronounced, as you put it, 'fortA' - go and speak to an Italian. Next you'll be telling us that the word 'Cafe' should be pronounced to rhyme with 'safe'...

Thank you. There is a lot more to knowing about things than book learning. Just looking up words in a dictionary doesn't give a person the ability to be right about pronunciation all the time.

You are certainly right about expresso being a corruption (I didn't know how to exactly express that it was a corruption), and it shouldn't even be in the dictionary. It looks like dictionaries are trying to be progressive by incorporating corruptions in the dictionary just because it is a widely used corruption. Now instead of helping us pronounce words correctly, they like to tell us how to pronounce words like everybody does whether they pronounce them correctly or not. I couldn't believe I found the pronunciation "iks-presso" in a dictionary. If I ever heard anyone saying that, I would ask them kindly to return to drinking Sanka.

 

[Gooberlx2]

i'm sure SOMEONE mentioned this but......

anyway vs. anyways

 

[VTboy]

Originally posted by: Woodchuck2000

Originally posted by: VTboy

Originally posted by: sxr7171

Originally posted by: VTboy
Expresso and Espresso are the same thing. They however are not pronounced exactly the same. Almost the same but different.

I agree that they are the same thing, but both spellings are pronounced "ESS-presso." It is the correct way to refer to a cup of coffee made with pressurized water at a certain minimum pressure. I hate it when the person at the counter at Starbucks likes to repeat my order with the wrong pronunciation. This doesn't usually happen at the better coffee places. In that sense the expresso spelling is not the preferred spelling, it was probably a bad transliteration from the original italian.

WRONG WRONG WRONG. Expresso is NOT pronounced Esspresso I know this for a FACT. I have seen many many dictionarys ALL OF THEM say to pronounce it as ikspresso. NONE of them say to pronounce them the same. LEARN YOUR FACTS BEFORE YOU SPEAK.
On a side note. While most people say fortA for the word forte it really should be pronounced fort. The e should be silent.

We're ignoring the fact that the word Expresso is a corruption of Espresso in the first place, and is no more valid in my opinion than people saying 'Laptop' incorrectly as 'Labtop'.

Also, 'forte' is pronounced, as you put it, 'fortA' - go and speak to an Italian. Next you'll be telling us that the word 'Cafe' should be pronounced to rhyme with 'safe'...

WRONG. Forte should be pronounced fort not fortA. FortA is just a popular way of saying it but it is not correct. It is derived from the french word fort. Forte is not derived from any Italian word, it comes from french. The word Cafe comes from the french word cafe with an accent on the e. Forte on the other hand comes from the french word fort with no accent.

 

[Kipper]

I hate it when people use apostrophes incorrectly.

 

[Hector13]

Originally posted by: Woodchuck2000
Also, 'forte' is pronounced, as you put it, 'fortA' - go and speak to an Italian. Next you'll be telling us that the word 'Cafe' should be pronounced to rhyme with 'safe'...

and what happens when you speak to a french person? I think forte, when referring to strength, comes from french and is pronounced fort.

For music, I believe it is the italien pronounciation that is used.

 

[Wag]

irregardless

 

[VTboy]

Ain't. Ain't ain't a word.

 

[VTboy]

1. businesses (several businesses) v business's (belongs to one)
2. check (correct) v cheque (money)
3. coarse (crude) v course (race)
4. commonplace (frequent) v common place
5. dependant (noun: a relative) v dependent (adjective: being dependent)
6. practice (repeated performance, custom) v practise (doctor's)
7. principle (source, rule) v principal (head of a college)

 

[Dead3ye]

Originally posted by: Wag
irregardless

Yep. This word drives me up the wall.

 

[edro]

Your dumb.

 

[allisolm]

On a side note. While most people say fortA for the word forte it really should be pronounced fort. The e should be silent.

While you are correct in what you write, things change and, according to the Random House Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, both pronunciations are now considered standard because of widespread use. I hate it when that happens.

Also it it pronounced fortA in music and comes from Italian rather than French, which might have contributed to the confusion.

 

[Davegod]

Blah blah blah. PERIOD.

It's a bit silly when spoken but ridiculous when written. What's annoying about it though is that it's not an accidental or lazy grammatical error, and the effect is worsened because it usually follows some ignorant statement.

 

[sxr7171]

Originally posted by: allisolm
On a side note. While most people say fortA for the word forte it really should be pronounced fort. The e should be silent.

While you are correct in what you write, things change and, according to the Random House Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, both pronunciations are now considered standard because of widespread use. I hate it when that happens.

Also it it pronounced fortA in music and comes from Italian rather than French, which might have contributed to the confusion.

Like Hector13 mentioned the word is pronounced differently in a musical context and in a when refering to a person's strengths. It's just like bass is pronounced differently in a musical context and when referring to a kind of fish. No matter what the dictionary says I don't think that both pronunciations are standard. This is because if someone were to refer to musical bass as bah-ss, then they'd look just a little uninformed. Similarly if someone tried to order Chilean Sea Bay-ss at a restaurant, the server would really have to bite his or her tongue. I guess I agree with you in that it is quite annoying and it misleads people who like to use a dictionary as a sole arbiter of pronunciation.

 

[DuffmanOhYeah]

Originally posted by: Brutuskend
The ghetto talking crap that pass's for English these days....

[irony] hellz yea dawg [/irony]

English really has gone right down the crapper.

 

[Seraphim6]

personally, its when people use "i borrowed my book to someone" as opposed to "i loaned my book to someone". dumb people say that all the time in minnesota. it freaking pisses me off. also, whenever someone says "word". its stupid

 

[prvteye2003]

Originally posted by: Seraphim16
personally, its when people use "i borrowed my book to someone" as opposed to "i loaned my book to someone". dumb people say that all the time in minnesota. it freaking pisses me off. also, whenever someone says "word". its stupid

When people don't use capital letters when beginning sentences. And when people don't use capital letters when using "I." Or when people don't using capital letters when writing the names of states.

 

[daniel1113]

Originally posted by: Ornery

Originally posted by: daniel1113
My favorite pet peeve was already mentioned, but here is another one that I hear all the time.

I hate it when you are in a conversation, and a question is asked, such as "Want to go to the store?"

It's "DO YOU want to go to the store."

I'm no English expert (by a LONG shot), but I believe that's perfectly acceptable.

It's acceptable all right, but it's still a pet peeve that I have

 

[DrPizza]

Well, since someone else has brought up mispronunciations as well as grammatical mistakes, I'd like to add:

mauve

The males in the crowd know there's no such color. We have ROY-G-BIV. None of those letters begins with M. But the sophisticated home decorating types like to pronounce it "mawv." Well, here's news for you: it's light purple, and it's pronounced "moe v" (rhymes with drove).

 

[Zepper]

further/farther - almost every time you hear/read 'further', 'farther' should have been used instead.

My others have been mentioned already...
..bh.

 

[Jzero]

WRONG. Forte should be pronounced fort not fortA. FortA is just a popular way of saying it but it is not correct. It is derived from the french word fort. Forte is not derived from any Italian word, it comes from french. The word Cafe comes from the french word cafe with an accent on the e. Forte on the other hand comes from the french word fort with no accent.

According to dictionary.com, only pedantic snobs pronounce it as "fort." This is kind of like the latin scholar who goes to law school. Yes, we are aware that everyone is mispronouncing habeus corpus incorrectly. This is the way language evolves.

@ bolded words!

 

[oslama]

Oh Really

You Know

 

[Zepper]

The use of 'absolutely' - when nothing close to the meaning of it is intended...

 

[WT]

Constant Valley-girl "like"-ing every sentence. It's like, so stupid and, like, dumb and stuff.

I work in a school, and you can't walk 15 feet without hearing 'like....' or 'ummm....'.

If those words were never brought into our cultural lexicon, you'd think all teenagers would be mutes.


Edit: Added for annoyance' sake: kids from everywhere but the South saying 'Y'all ....'

AHHHHHH !!!!!

 

[rival]

your/you're

their/they're/there

 

[Xionide]

My pet peeve? People who freak out about grammer.