"Y'all"
I will die on the hill that it's more efficient and neutral than the alternatives.
this post was submitted on 20 Jul 2025
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For years I have said that y'all is the best thing to come out of the south.
I recently realized that wβall needs to be shakespeared too. Following the pattern of other languages, yβall and wβall are missing in English.
Also, I shakespeared the verb shakespeared, in reference to Shakespeare making up new words by following patterns among other words.
I won't argue against w'all. I'm fine with it in principle. But it's not something I think I've ever said, or ever heard anyone say.
All of them, unless there's need to be accurate.
Singular they. I've had this opinion since long before I even knew about non-binary people. Using "he or she" to refer to a person without specifying gender is clunky as hell.
but singular they isn't incorrect in the least. anyone claiming otherwise has some agenda to push in spite of the facts of it's use for a good long while
It's not, but with... Political views as they are, it's gotten a lot of pushback. People don't even realize they use it regularly.
"Someone called for you"
"What did they want?"
Bam. Easy. I was stoked when magic the gathering changed card wording from "he or she" to "they" because it cleans up the wording so much.
Anything that is used colloquially but technically isn't correct because some loser didn't like it 200 years ago. To boldly keep on splitting infinitives is a rejection of language prescriptivism!
Ending a sentence with a proposition is just fine. Picky people whom I've only seen parodies of on the Internet go "oh you ended your sentence with a preposition I have no idea what you mean by 'He went in' maybe you could explain what he went into? A jello mold? A ditch? What did go into?"
You asked if he went into the store and I said he went in, you know what I meant because of CONTEXT CLUES.
I've never met anyone who's ever been this picky but I'm ready to bite them if I ever find one.
Itβs not grammatically incorrect to end a sentence with a preposition. Itβs a common misconception that it is a rule, basically because one guy argued in favor of it back in the 1600s and had some support for formal writing in the 1700s. But itβs never been a broad rule, and even in formal contexts itβs not a rule in any current, reputable style or usage guides (so far as I know, at least).
Some more info on the topic: https://www.merriam-webster.com/grammar/prepositions-ending-a-sentence-with
I only know of this "rule" because of a joke.
A new student is looking for the library and stops a passing professor to ask, "Excuse me sir, can you please tell me where the library is at?" To which the professor responds, "Here at Harvard, we don't end our sentences with prepositions."
The student without missing a beat says "I'm sorry, can you please tell me where the library is at, asshole?"
(Not sure if I remember exactly how it should be written it, apologies if I got it wrong)
Did you mean to say, preposition instead of proposition?
I think that since you're aware of typos and context clues you knew that was the case.
I think they are asking because many people don't know the difference
I love to end my sentences with a proposition, you wanna fuck?
What makes that a proposition and not a simple question?
I'm really sick of people treating AAVE and other dialects like grammar mistakes, is what. Grammar Nazis indeed, protecting the purity of the English language.
I'm of the opinion that so long as it is understandable it does not matter. English was once written as it sounded and there was no spelling consistancy. Those who were literate had little issue with it.
Some related reading: https://ctcamp.franklinresearch.uga.edu/resources/reading-middle-english https://cb45.hsites.harvard.edu/middle-english-basic-pronunciation-and-grammar
Edit: Okay my rant is more related to spelling than grammar but still interesting.
It's not a grammar mistake per se, but I feel like sharing it and it is close enough so here we go.
As a non-native English speaker: How can you have mob and vacuum the floor but not broom the room?! I know it doesn't exist, but I don't care. If we have to phrase it as a grammar mistake: I use verbalisations where they are uncommon.
I agree. I'm going to start brooming the room. Thank you for this insight.
While "broom the floor" isn't common, "sweep the floor" is. Of course, why we use the tool name as a verb in the case of "mop" or "vacuum", but not in the case of "broom", is another case of English being English. But, you shouldn't expect consistency out of English. It's not really a language, it's several languages dressed up in a trench-coat pretending to be one.
It's "mop"
Not if you bring your thugs
Or like to flash
Fair
What incorrect grammar are you completely in defence of?
Ending a sentence on a preposition :3c
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Period AFTER the end of a quote.
My buddy Joe told me βI will live and die on this hillβ.
If the murky depths of my memories of school is correct, the location of the period is dictated by whether or not it is part of the quote. So, if the quote should have a period at the end, it goes inside the quotation marks. If the quote does not include the period (e.g. you are quoting part of a sentence), but you are at the end of a sentence in your own prose, you put the period on the outside of the quotation marks.
So wait, you don't care, or you think it should be done a certain way? OP asked what doesn't matter to you at all.
Absolutely. Anyone who has done any programming should recognize that changing what's in the quote is corrupting the data.
If I'm quoting a question though, then it makes sense to include the question mark in the quote.
I laughed when Joe asked "That's the hill you chose?".
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