Matt defies standardised grammar and teaches a new grammar - part two

If the whole thing about split infinitives wasn't convincing enough that adherence to strict rules can be stupid, here's another:

Which of these sentences is correct?

1. The pack of wolves is hunting the chickens.
2. The pack of wolves are hunting the chickens.

Answer: both. You can decide. The rule is that there is no rule! (But there should be.)

Part two: group nouns are fiddly
What's a group noun?
Words like 'pack' are called group nouns. 'Faculty' is a group noun; 'group' is a group noun. There are thousands of group nouns.

British English tends towards treating group nouns as being plural, and therefore using 'are' in the case above rather than 'is'. Americans favour the opposite. In either dialect, no firm rule has been decided on. While one may be preferred, either is correct.

Personally, I favour logic, and therefore I think that there should be a rule for all cases in which group nouns are used. For the example above, I think Americans have it down pat, but their reasoning (none) is stupid.

Logic begins here.

Like everything in grammar, it's not the exact word choice (is or are) that makes you correct; and it's not really to do with what sounds right, either. Instead, it's what you mean by your word choice - what you're really trying to convey - that determines which word, which rule, you should use. Remember, language is a road, not a destination; so, when you're trying to get somewhere smartly, it's always right to take the smoothest road.

With that said, here is the rule that should exist for the above example:

The phrase 'of wolves' is prepositional; it describes the word 'pack'.
"The pack [of wolves, not potatoes, or fun-size Snickers] is/are hunting the chickens."

Prepositional phrases can be removed without harming the grammatical integrity of the sentence. So, which word would you prefer if we were to remove the prepositional phrase?

"The pack is hunting the chickens," or, "The pack are hunting the chickens?"

An interesting example: "Leonard's family is very big; Leonard's family are very big."
Different meanings entirely, no?

Still unsure about the is/are conundrum? Don't worry; it's less unreasonable than it looks.

Aside from omitting the prepositional phrase 'of wolves', we can also replace the first word of the sentence, 'the', with another, more convenient-for-Matt's-argument, word.

FOR INSTANCE, say we chose to use 'are' rather than 'is'.
"A pack of wolves are hunting the chickens."
"This pack of wolves are hunting the chickens, but that pack are not."
"One pack of wolves are hunting the chickens."

One pack are hunting the chickens.
'One pack are'
ONE, AND ONLY ONE, ARE!

Hmm.

Here's a helpful illustration:

Straight forward, right?

Now, please understand that, while I believe that the 'is' rule applies to this example, it only applies because the intended meaning of the sentence is better conveyed with the word 'is'. The 'is' road is far smoother than the 'are' road for this one.

Now, here are some exceptions that give the 'are' argument, or are-gument, some dignity:

"Leonard's family are real-estate agents," sounds better than, "Leonard's family is real-estate agents."

"The team are conversing amongst themselves," sounds better than, "The team is conversing amongst itself."

But there's a subtle difference between these examples and the one with the wolves. The 'are' works better here because we aren't really talking about the family or the team as a unit; we're talking about the members within the family and the team.

We're really saying: "Leonard's family [members] are real-estate agents," and, "The team [members] are conversing amongst themselves."

So, the rule should be that, when you're talking about members, you should count the number of members to figure out if it's better to use 'is' or 'are', but when you're talking about packs or groups, it's better to count the number of packs or groups instead.

In other words, if you're talking about each wolf within the pack, use 'are', but if you're talking about the pack itself, use 'is'. Therefore, the pack of wolves [regarding the pack itself, as in, "Look at that pack go!"] is hunting the chickens.

Sadly, this isn't the rule. There are no rules. But I guess it doesn't matter too much. After all, we still have common sense, right? I mean, there's no law that says, "Slow down when you see flashing lights ahead," but you'd still be the fool if you didn't.

**********

Part One

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Matt defies standardised grammar and teaches a new grammar - part one

Recently, Al Yankovic (Weird Al) published a song called Word Crimes, which immediately became my favourite song ever, because a) it parodied Robin Thicke's misogynistic Blurred Lines, and b) it promoted good grammar.

Al, in a gesture of poetic irony, took a song that bespoke society's decline in love and respect, turned it on its head and suited it in an armour sturdy enough to take on the almost-as-crucial decline of the English language.

Unfortunately, a meddlesome Third Group of people seemed to notice that Al, in his song, made a grammatical mistake of his own. This group singled out the error over and above all of the critical truths he very humorously conveyed.

What was his error? In one of the last lines, he split an infinitive.

Part One: It's quite all right to split an infinitive

Weird Al's sacrilegious line reads, "Try your best to not drool." Are you cringing yet? Because, according to a rule somewhere, you should be.

What's a split infinitive?
You split an infinitive whenever you slot an adverb between the words 'to' and 'be', or 'to' and 'go', or 'to' and whatever.

The line, "To boldly go where no man has gone before," is a famous example.

What's an adverb?
Adverbs describe verbs or adjectives. 'Run' is a verb; 'run slowly' is a verb plus an adverb. 'Go' is a verb, and 'to go' is also a verb, but it's called an infinitive.

'To boldly go' is a half infinitive, then an adverb, and then another half infinitive. Evidently you're not meant to break infinitives in half (split them).

Personally, I, if at all possible, prefer to soundly reason than to blindly follow.

The commandment that "thou'st an infinitive shall 't be split, else thy head," comes from Latin, from which much of English grammar was derived.

In Latin, splitting an infinitive would render the sentence useless. You couldn't do it and still make sense.

But - and here's where the sound reasoning kicks in - we don't speak Latin.

More sound reasoning:
Language is a road, not a destination, and there's no point having roads if you've got nowhere to drive. It's the meaning that's important, not the density of your silly infinitive. Just look at him! (Above)

My understanding is that language is how we communicate, not what we communicate.

Third Group's counterexample to sound reasoning:
Beyond pretending that English is Latin, in most cases, splitting an infinitive will make your sentence sound awkward. There's normally a better way to write the sentence than to split the infinitive. So, basically, the meaning of your sentence is usually conveyed better with the infinitive left whole.

What this is really saying, though, is that rules exist for a reason. Full stops, for one, separate sentences. Stop signs keep people from crashing. Un-split infinitives, well, they help keep things sounding nice.

The Third Group, however, rant about Weird Al's split infinitive with none of this reasoning in mind. Their argument goes as follows:

"He split an infinitive!"
...
...
...
"Burn him!"
...
...
...

Right. Anyway, in the song in question, Weird Al achieves two important things by splitting an infinitive: humour and rhythm. These things are important because Weird Al is trying to a) be funny, and b) write a song.  Funny things need humour and songs need rhythm. What they don't need are roads with dead ends.

The last three lines of the final chorus, with the emphasised words in bold, read like this:

Go back to pre-school

Get out of the gene pool

Try your best to not drool

A little bit rude, right? That was intentional. The joke wouldn't have been effective had the infinitive not been split and the line read instead, "Try your best not to drool," (preserving the sacred infinitive).

This is because the emphasis on 'not' (rather than 'to') is what communicates the idea that not drooling is an exception to the norm. The only other way that the humour would have remained intact would've been to, I guess, rewrite the entire line and break the rhyme, but that would compromise the rhythm, and in turn the humour... so, actually, no.

Splitting the infinitive made that third line incredibly effective because it achieved exactly what Al had intended.

It should be known: grammar rules work most of the time because, most of the time, following them is the best way to achieve the exact form of communication you intend. For instance, I have followed a heck of a load of grammar rules in writing this blog post.

But the rules do not always help. Take the word 'silence', for example. By itself, 'silence' is just a word; yet, you can find it in many a novel, alone, by itself, acting as an entire sentence. Gasp? Not yet.

The word tells you one thing: that there was silence, but the word being by itself can show you other things, like suspense, tension, fear, and uncertainty. Had the sentence read like a sentence, "There was silence," then the emotions might not have been effectively conveyed.

The emotional value of the sentence is strengthened due to its simplicity (one word); and, if this is what the author intended, then writing "silence" as a sentence was entirely justified.

In saying that, a person should understand a rule before he dares to break it. He should know the rules by heart before he toys with them, otherwise it could very well be his head.

In a way, the Third Group is right. They know that you need a rule book before you can drive, but they're forgetting that no one drives without first having somewhere to go. And for that, you need a brain, too.

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How to sound more intelligent - part three

You know, learning good grammar ought to be a responsibility for all native English speakers. My reasoning goes something like this: if four year-olds should know the alphabet, twenty-four year-olds should understand English grammar.

This third and final part is for those who've read and learned, or who already know, what I explained in parts one and two.

Part three: words you should stop misusing

Like someone who buys two pairs of shoes and over time wears only his favourite pair, so a lot of people neglect to say farther because they think that further does a better job. Even writers get this wrong. Writers of books!

Anyway, if you're one of these people, then, half of the time, you're wrong; you're wearing the wrong pair of shoes!

The words farther and further are not interchangeable.

Farther has to do with physical distance.
"Look there, Marie! The sprinter in first place is farther ahead than the chap in second!" - Captain Obvious

Further has to do with mental distance.
"Mrs Obvious rolled her eyes. Her last name notwithstanding, on the subject of education, she had progressed leagues further than her dolt of a husband."

Imply is the opposite of infer. The writer implies; the reader infers.

"Matt loves to write, but occasionally readers will infer something totally other than that which he was intending to imply."

Comprise cannot be used in place of consist or made up.
Comprise can be used in place of consist of or are made up of.

In other words, you can't say, "Clouds are comprised of water," because doing so is the equivalent of saying, "Clouds are are made up of of water."

Instead, say, "Clouds comprise water."

The Game of Thrones writers got it wrong when, on the subject of the Iron Bank, Tywin said, "A temple is comprised of stones." He should have said, "A temple comprises stones." Tsk tsk, Tywin Lannister. Oh, and Cersei made the same mistake in the same scene.

Now, before you get all funny: yes, I spotted the mistakes as I watched the show, but no, I wasn't trying to scrutinise.

In short
You move farther, you think further; your words imply, your ears infer.
Game of Thrones comprises awesomeness, but the script still needs editing.

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How to sound more intelligent - part two

A lot of people - public speakers in particular - attempt to sound fancy by manipulating the English language in strange and obscure ways. They replace words like 'me' with 'I', saying things like:
"So when that Microsoft representative rocked up to our front door and offered Erwin and I the job, my heart, like, jumped out of my chest. I was so excited!"
Read: it's Erwin and me, not Erwin and I. See Part One.

It's like using a sword as a walking stick instead of a weapon. I mean, sure, it does the job, but it makes you look silly. Also, playing with grammar is a lot like playing with a sword. In a word: don't.

These same people also prefer to use 'myself' when they should have used either 'I' or 'me'. They do it like this: "If you have any questions, please talk to Leonard, Janora, or myself [me] at the end of the discussion." Argh! They remind me of those people who insist that the sun revolves around the earth, and not the other way around. Okay, fine, I don't know anyone who believes that, but you get the idea.

Part two: when to use 'myself' in a sentence

The word 'myself' is a reflexive pronoun. The reason that it's a reflexive pronoun is because it reflects onto an earlier noun used in the same sentence. The earlier noun is like its mother, and they're connected by an umbilical cord, which I can't draw.

'Myself' can be used here because it's referring to the 'I' preceding it. If there was no 'I' acting, then there would be no reason to use the word 'myself'.

All reflexive pronouns are the son or daughter or their mother noun.

As you can see, the reflexive pronoun gets its life from the mother noun to which it reflects. It can't breathe without it.

So, when you use a reflexive pronoun without giving it a mother noun, it suffocates. The reflexive umbilical cord has nothing to attach itself to, and the son or daughter dies.

So many people make this mistake, yet they wouldn't say, "Please talk to myself afterwards"; they'd say, "Please talk to me afterwards". The same applies here. When you add Leonard and Janora, nothing changes. 'Me' is still the correct term to use.

In short
reflexive pronouns come with umbilical cords. They must have a mother noun, or they will die. Moreover, you'll sound silly.

Part three: words you should stop misusing

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How to sound more intelligent - part one

Some of the most common discrepancies in the spoken English language can weaken the best of us at the worst of times like a fatal chink on solid steel.

There are those of us who care enough to fix it, those of us who don't realise it's there, and those of us who don't care either way; after all, it's not like anyone else cares.*

*I do.

But it's one thing to have learnt good grammar before discarding it like a Best Buy circular because you opted for sounding cool rather than smart, and quite another thing to claim to appreciate things like brains, words and fountain pens, only to open your mouth and reveal to every passer-by that you are, in fact, the fountain pen. Don't look at me like you don't know what I mean.

Part one: there's a difference between I and me

At some point in our childhood we were saying things like, "Me and Jimmy are going to the park." But then our parents were all, "Jimmy and EYE," and they'd repeat this phrase a gazillion times like they had grammar tourrettes. Then we hit adolescence and stopped caring about our parents' wellbeings, and about grammar. Okay, fine, we never cared about grammar.

The problem was, thanks to the adults in our lives, the word 'me' was expunged from our vocabulary and replaced with the far more pristine 'I'. So, ironically, for the few brats young adults of us who might have once cared about grammar, there was no room left for 'me'.

Stuff we were taught as kids:

1. Don't say 'me'; say 'I'
2. Put yourself last. Say 'Jimmy and I', not 'I and Jimmy'.

Fun fact #1: rule 2 is table manners, not actual grammar.

Fun fact #2: 'me' still exists.

Stuff I've learnt as an adult:

1. People who say "me and Jimmy" don't care about the rules, whether or not they know them. 
2. People who say "Jimmy and I" do care about the rules, but, more often than not, only know half of them.

Here's the other half:

'Jimmy and I' is correct in this sentence: "Jimmy and I are going to the park."

'Jimmy and I' is incorrect in this sentence: "A man approached Jimmy and I and offered us candy from his van." Such a nice man.

You: Why is the second sentence incorrect?

Me: I'm glad you asked!

Method A - easy answer:

When you take "Jimmy" away from the sentence, you're left with "I".

     "Jimmy and I are am going to the park." :)

     "A man approached Jimmy and I and offered us me candy from his van." :(

The second example sounds silly, right? 'Me' should have been used instead of 'I'. 

     "A man approached me and offered me candy from his van."

Much better, now add Jimmy.

     "A man approached Jimmy and me and offered us candy from his van."

Easy, right? I'm getting goosebumps.

In short 
the phrase "Jimmy and I" is not always correct. To find out which of 'me' or 'I' is correct, simply get rid of Jimmy. He was more a neighbour than a friend, anyway.

Method B - boring/technical answer:

'I' is a subject pronoun; 'me' is an object pronoun. The subject is the thing that acts; the object is the thing that gets acted upon.

"Jimmy and I are going to the park."

In this sentence, Jimmy and I are the subjects. They are going to the park, which is the object.

"A man approached Jimmy and me and offered me candy from his van."

In this sentence, the man is the subject, and he's approaching the objects, which are Jimmy and me.

Other subject pronouns include 'he', 'she' and 'they'. Other object pronouns include 'him', 'her' and 'them'.

In short, stick with Method A.

Part two: how to use 'myself' correctly

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More Betterer

Let's face it. English is too damn demanding. We have to spell words, use commas and full stops, and then decide how many exclamation marks to use at the end of something remarkable!! And then that's not all. Nowadays we're having to contend with… with…  double superlatives! "Say what?" You ask, your tone aghast and your face warped with shock. Precisely.

Let's be clear. Saying things like "more nicer" and "more stronger" don't make any sense. But not saying them is yet another cumbersome task for the burden of speechcraft. All these regulations - it's hard enough as is not to break the law without worrying about the rules of… how do I say it… language! Well, worry no more. For I offer you the most moral code of moral codes: if you really don't want to give something up, justify it!¹ After all, if you can't beat'em, join'em.

The phrase "more better", along with all its variations, has become widely used in today's declin- I mean Western society. It probably stems from the fact that some words allow you to attach "er" to the end, like 'cuter', 'smoother' and 'funnerer', while others don't, like 'satisfied-er' and 'beautiful-er'. In the case of the latter two, one should say "more satisfied" or "more beautiful". Halt! All of a sudden we have two different utensils for the exact same piece of pie, and only one of them ever serves as proper etiquette. It's only natural, therefore, that they sometimes get mismatched, or we simply become too accustomed to our spoon of choice.

There are two main reasons why a man shouldn't say terms like "more better".

1) They don't make sense.

2) They sound retarded. The 'er' in "better" does the same job as the word 'more' preceding it. Forsooth, they mean exactly the same thing and do exactly the same job. Thus, if you say something like, "My new job is a lot more better," it's like saying, "My new job is a lot betterer," or, "My new job is a lot more more bett," to either of which I'd ask, "Who hired you?"

But this phrase, which simply leaves the word 'more' completely and utterly redundant, has been ingrained into your minds like the alphabet. Like how one plus one is two and not, in fact, sixty-five. It's part of the basics, and cannot be simply erased without you questioning the authenticity of your very own childhood. Fortunately there is no such need to wipe your memory. At least not yet.

It should be noted that I'm a man who doesn't just complain, but comes up with solutions as well. In fact, I can think of an entire one reason that completely justifies the use of 'more better'. Take Bobbery, for instance. Bobbery broke his leg last Sunday. It's now Tuesday. Life sucks because he's maimed and can't do much. But he can still talk - and his mouth is now his only remaining source of dignity. Screw that up, and he might as well be a fish.
Sarmeena, one of his good friends, pops in for a visit. "How's the leg?" she asks.

"Well," Bobbery begins, "it's more better than it was yesterday."

"Uh, what did you just say?" she says, her tone aghast and her face warped with shock. Rightfully so.

"Sarmeena, I can explain."

"I'm listening," she concedes, proving her loyalty as a friend through thick and thin.

Bobbery takes a deep breath. "You see, yesterday I was feeling a bit better than Sunday; but today I'm feeling much better than yesterday."

"So?" Hostility is creeping into her tone now.

"So, the amount by which I feel better today in relation to yesterday is greater than that which I felt yesterday with regards to the day before."

The ensuing silence is awkward, and Bobbery senses that the threads of their friendship are wearing thin and farther between. Much to his relief, she simply laughs and flicks her hair. "Oh, why didn't you just say so?" And she proceeds to share her chocolate with him, chocolate that she was about to keep to herself. It's berry and biscuit.

So what did Bobbery mean, exactly? Simple. The improvement in Bobbery's health between Monday and Tuesday was greater than the improvement between Sunday and Monday. Thus, he feels more better today than he did yesterday. So long as this explanation can apply to your uses of the term 'more better' or any of its variants, you will be able to defend ridicule, embarrassment and the Facebook-approved certainty of your friendships.2 You can thank me laterer.

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1.    Sarcasm

2.    This justification actually holds no water at all. "More better" still sounds retarded because Bobbery could (and should) have instead said, "even better," or, "better yet". Fortunately you probably didn't read this far.

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Grammar Matters, Otherwise You'd Still Say 'Brang'

Important: This post was originally a column written for Nexus - the University of Waikato's weekly magazine. However, it went unpublished because, I think, there wasn't enough room in this week's issue what with it being the last issue for the year. It's all wrap-everything-up themed, so they replaced my column with something way less cool (I read it, and decided it was way less cool). Since it didn't get published there, I decided to publish it here! Naturally, this column is aimed at a university audience, but it's just as relevant for them as it is for everyone else. Read on, if you will.

With the end of the year approaching, it's time to look back, to reflect, and to let go. Remember when you let go of that word 'brang'? It's a non-word kids substitute for 'brought', and it's often interchanged with 'brung'. You've probably forgotten, because it's been over a decade since you grew out of it; but I'll try to jog your memory.

One day in your fleeting childhood, you were given a divine revelation. You realised that 'brang' and 'brung' sound like both of two things, and nothing at all like 'brought'.

via Your Daily Portion of lol's page on Facebook

For one, they sound like creative uses for 'bleep' when someone curses on a candid video clip. For instance a man might say, "I'll BRANG you up good." If this was on TV, you'd hear the sound of clanging cymbals instead.

Secondly, these words 'brang' and 'brung' suitably fit onomatopoeias for the violent strumming of a guitar. Onomatopoeia, by the way, means a word formed from the sound with which it is associated. Examples include flap, meow, clap, patter and brang. 'Brung', of course, is simply the past tense. Clap, clapped; brang, brung.

"Tama brung his guitar as he walked to school. The guitar strings snapped from all the branging."

I bet you remember now, right? In hindsight, it wasn't too difficult to grow out of. After all, 'brought' sounds so much better and more sophisticated than 'brang'. So you quickly detached yourself from 'brang' and 'brung', and dumped them in the sewers to float amongst all the others. By 'others', I mean: 'should of', 'ragland', 'alot', 'some-think',misplaced apostrophes. The list goes on. 

You got rid of them, yes? 

What? You say you still use some of them? 

You say you still cling to these foul and pungent mutations? 

You, who stand here at the crossroads of your life; you, who hope to make it to the top someday. My friend, you're still deep, deep underground, where the waste of yesterday churns, where vermin gnaw through decaying flesh, and where unrealised dreams become lost in the darkness.

To this I have but one question. As the season changes from spring to summer; as the cool fog clears for the rising sun, will you forfeit the burdens of the past that hold you down, and rise up out of the ground like a flower through soil? If so, then stay your tongue and sever those foul words; for a flower can be full of potential, but as long as there are weeds, it cannot hope to grow.

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