Pedants' Paradise

[vinteuil]

I've never been in tune with grammar anarchists. ::

... read: there is an Alpensinfonie way of judging grammar - and then there is the rest of the world.

[amateur51]

... read: there is an Alpensinfonie way of judging grammar - and then there is the rest of the world.

Cheeky boy, vints

[gurnemanz]

I've never been in tune with grammar anarchists.

Three types of grammar (probably more)

1) Deep structure - the rules by which non-linear thoughts in the brain are unconsciously converted into a linear string of surface structure words and find expression in a specific language.

2) Descriptive grammar - an attempt to standardise the surface structure of a specific language in its current state in terms of syntax (structure) semantics (meaning) and phonology (sound). It can never be fixed or permanent because languages evolve. This happens in an anarchic, pragmatic way. E.g Shakespeare and Milton etc just made up new words if they felt the need. Therefore, if you try to make this grammar prescriptive you will always be on dodgy ground.
7
3) Pedagogical grammar - this is what I used as a foreign language teacher. Because second language acquisition in later life is hard, you start off with simple "rules", deliberately not telling the whole truth and gradually reveal the subtleties as necessary and as the students increase in confidence.

[salymap]

[sings]

You say eether and I say eyether,
You say neether and I say nyther,
Eether, eyether, neether, nyther,
Let's call the whole thing off!
You like potato and I like potahto,
You like tomato and I like tomahto,
Potato, potahto, tomato, tomahto!
Let's call the whole thing off!
But oh! If we call the whole thing off,
Then we must part.
And oh! If we ever part,
Then that might break my heart!

[oh! it's all getting too intense for me!]

Ooh I quite enjoyed that and sang along with it. Must put Fred and Ginger's film on some time.

[marthe]

I realised that, hence the emoticon. However, I cannot recall Americans missing out the "l" in "soldier" either.

Now that's just bad grammar - two unrelated verbs with no punctuation mark or noun between them - just like "Go compare". But we've been here before.

AE: I read "solder" as "soldier" therefore making a silly mistake. I can only blame it on the extra glass of wine that I drank with last night's dinner. I pronounce the L in soldier but not in solder. My dear husband pronounces the L in solder. I won't touch any discussion of "aluminum/aluminium" or the different pronunciations of "laboratory." Oh dear, "go figure" was pushing it a little.

saly: I say tomayto/he says tomahto...though my grandmother always said tomahto but never potahto!

[salymap]

AE: I read "solder" as "soldier" therefore making a silly mistake. I can only blame it on the extra glass of wine that I drank with last night's dinner. I pronounce the L in soldier but not in solder. My dear husband pronounces the L in solder. I won't touch any discussion of "aluminum/aluminium" or the different pronunciations of "laboratory." Oh dear, "go figure" was pushing it a little.

saly: I say tomayto/he says tomahto...though my grandmother always said tomahto but never potahto!

Morning all, especially marthe. I'm sure no-one says potahto, do they? I expect it was invented for the scansion of the song.

Very cold here and overcast too. Please let's have some good weather soon........ if only for Anton's ducks.

Sorry, too early for me. Thought for a moment I was on Stormy Weather. Back to the Pedants.

[mangerton]

Morning all, especially marthe. I'm sure no-one says potahto, do they? I expect it was invented for the scansion of the song.

ISTR there was a Laurel and Hardy film in which Ollie - ordering a meal in a restaurant - asked for "a baked potahto". It may have been pronounced thus for comic effect; certainly, apart from the song, I've never heard it said.

Of course, in Scotland we mostly call them "tatties", or even "to(glottal stop)ies".

[Serial_Apologist]

I won't touch any discussion of "aluminum/aluminium" or the different pronunciations of "laboratory."

Or even "nuclear/nookiller", marthe!

[LeMartinPecheur]

'Sowjer' is a recognised English dialect spelling of soldier. Google pulls up plenty of references to Lancashire, especially Wigan, dialect. I had a feeling that Kipling uses some such spelling but haven't found it in Barrack Room Ballads. It might be in one of his army short stories though.

[Pabmusic]

...I won't touch any discussion of "aluminum/aluminium"...

Much of the blame must fall on Sir Humphrey Davey, who first isolated it. He named it alumium in 1807, which was not popular with fellow scientists, who preferred aluminium (because they felt it was a better companion for magnesium, potassium, sodium and the like). Davey then changed the name to aluminum, and finally, in 1812, to aluminium. In the USA, it was aluminium as often as not until 1925, when the American Chemical Society adopted aluminum (even the Webster Unabridged of 1913 had only aluminium, although Noah Webster himself had plumped for aluminum). IUPAC (the International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry) settled on aluminium in 1990.

[mercia]

I used to like the way President Bush pronounced Putin ........... sort of Poo'en

rooten, tooten, Pooten

[Nick Armstrong]

I used to like the way President Bush pronounced Putin ........... sort of Poo'en

rooten, tooten, Pooten

[vinteuil]

[QUOTE=LeMartinPecheur;158703]'Sowjer' is a recognised English dialect spelling of soldier. QUOTE]

... Irish, too :

http://mariah.stonemarche.org/livhis/bowldsojer.htm

[jean]

Clearly, the 'l' has come and gone over the centuries. This is the OED:

Forms: α. ME sauder, sawder, ME sauldyer; ME sawdour, sawgeoure, ME saudiour, sawdiour, ME–15 sawdyour (ME sawdyor). β. ME souder, ME sowder(e, 15 sowdeer; ME soudyre, ME–15 sowdier, 15 soudyer; ME sowdear, 15 sowdiar, sowdyare, soudiar; ME soudior, ME soudeor, sowdior, sowdyor(e; ME soudour, ME soudyour(e, ME–15 soudeour, soudiour (ME soudioure), 15 soudgour, 16 soujour; ME sowedeur, ME sowdeour, sowdiour, ME–15 sowdyour (ME sowdyowre). γ. ME souldeour, ME–15 souldyour, ME, 15–16 souldiour (15 sowldiour, soulddour); 15 souldiar, souldyar, souldyer, 15–17 souldier (15 souldiere), 16–17 souldjer, 16 soulder. δ. ME–15 soldiour, 15–16 soldior, 15 soldear, soldiar, 15– soldier (15 soilder, 16 soldjere). ε. ME sodiour, sodyour, 15 sodioure, sodear, sodier. ζ. 15 sogear, sogeour, soygear, soi-, sojour, sojar, 16 sojor, 16– soger, sodger.

Etymology: < Old French soud(i)er, saudier, sodyer, soldier (also with different ending soldeier , -oier , etc.), < soude sold n.1 (compare medieval Latin solidārius). The obsolete forms in -eo(u)r, -io(u)r, etc., correspond to the Old French variants soudiour, souldiour, -eour, soldiour, etc. Owing to the variation in both stem and termination, and the reduction of the di to j (g), the number of former spellings is unusually large.

[Serial_Apologist]

Careful, or French Frank'll modjer if you write sodjer!