Comments on: Parsing Fest Continues or Richard Armitage Makes Grammar Fun

By: A Rabid Fan? « RAFrenzy

A Rabid Fan? « RAFrenzy — Sun, 01 Apr 2012 23:28:29 +0000

[...] saw it as a capital, or it jarred you that it wasn’t. No, this isn’t a piece about the grammatical odyssey of being a Richard Armitage fan. But I am going to talk about something that hits me from [...]

By: RAFrenzy

RAFrenzy — Thu, 29 Dec 2011 03:25:13 +0000

Welcome, Kate! I’ve been to LA. It does have its share. I’m from East Texas originally, so I’ve heard chimley a couple of times. LOL! I’ve also heard mirrows for mirrors.

Are you an RA fan or are you checking him out? :D

By: Kate Patrick

Kate Patrick — Thu, 29 Dec 2011 03:11:15 +0000

You don’t know bad accents until you travel to LA (lower Alabama). Try teaching grammar and how to correctly pronounce more words than you can imagine. Many of my third graders were shocked when we had “chimney” on a spelling list, and they discovered it wasn’t “chimley” like they had been saying it for the past 8 years!!

By: RAFrenzy

RAFrenzy — Tue, 27 Dec 2011 03:07:12 +0000

You don’t have much accent left. Mine is much stronger.

By: NovemberBride

NovemberBride — Tue, 27 Dec 2011 03:04:29 +0000

Well I didn’t think I had an aceent either. Either the kid was:
a. trying to be funny
b. trying to aggravate me
c. flirting…iccckkk
d. just stupid
e. all of the above…big iccck

because my voice teacher literally beat the twang of us. I’m headed south in a few days. Just wait till I get back to Yankee Land. They’ll have another good laugh.

By: RAFrenzy

RAFrenzy — Tue, 27 Dec 2011 02:36:14 +0000

I understood. :D

BTW, I have no accent when I sing. I’ve traveled with SO to various parts of the U.S. and sung in several places, and people heard me sing before I spoke, and they were shocked I had an accent. If I could just make myself speak that way… What’s funny is people in Texas think I’ve lost my accent, and theirs is so pronounced to me that I can barely listen to it sometimes. I find myself wanting to say, “Hurry up!” Years ago SO and I were traveling through West Texas and stopped to get burgers. The girl at the drive-thru said, Wooooooooooooooooooould yooooooooou laeik summmm fryyyyy sossssss wiiiiith yewerrrr frenchhhh friessss? I figured she was an anomaly until we stopped at the next place. I could never hear that until I moved away from Texas.

By: NovemberBride

NovemberBride — Tue, 27 Dec 2011 02:17:33 +0000

typo alert…Texas=Texan.

By: NovemberBride

NovemberBride — Tue, 27 Dec 2011 01:41:12 +0000

Serv…your last sentence…right on, right on. Or write on write on. *I crack myself up!* To be honest, it all gives me a headache. I’m not sure I’ve been EVER been so aggravated working on that newsletter. The whole experience assured my career in cake decorating and grandmothering was solid! No chance of the NY Times spiriting me away from the farm. ;)

Frenz, imagine my dismay as a kid from our church up here commented to me after I had done a solo for church, “wow you even sing in Texas!” arggggh!

By: servetus

servetus — Tue, 27 Dec 2011 01:28:49 +0000

Kind of. The style manuals differ on some comma issues, like the serial (Oxford) comma, for example, but they all share some rules; the rule on not joining independent clauses with commas is pretty well standard in all of them. As far as I know every style manual or grammar book I’ve ever read insists on subject / verb agreement. Saying that the main guides differ on some issues is not the same as saying it’s okay to do whatever you want because they don’t agree on anything. The confusing thing is that a style manual like APA / MLA / Chicago (the one historians use, just to horrify you further) is really a list of rules for print publication — these guides will give you some grammatical advice, and there’s some overlap between that and something like Strunk and White or Fowler, which are books which discuss commas inter alia, but also give strong recommendations on how to structure sentences optimally. The question of how to write a great sentence is a different one from where to put your commas.

By: NovemberBride

NovemberBride — Tue, 27 Dec 2011 01:23:55 +0000

The thing is…depending on what kind of writing…like if it’s research…or a journalistic piece…or a term paper..every case seems to call for a different “expert guide”. In high school we lived by the “Plain English” handbook. My college reserach paper required the APA guide. Two years ago when we were working on newsletter for another fandom, the MLA was THE WORD. And all of them differ on junk like commas, quotes, etc. It’s very tempting to junk it all and tawk/write like ya wanna. *ducking and running to corner*

I too was a grocer’s daughter. THAT’S why I was always drawn to Margaret Thatcher!!!? What a woman!

By: servetus

servetus — Tue, 27 Dec 2011 01:05:22 +0000

There’s been some disagreement on my blog about this, but apparently RP is what the southern upper classes speak and “Queen’s English” is what’s taught in elocution lessons. There are slight differences.

If it’s any consolation, he is pronouncing those t’s — just as a glottal stop in his throat than the alveolar t. It’s just a bit odd because he consistently avoids the alveolar flap in a really ostentious way (he pronounces both the t’s in little, better, etc. )

By: kathryngaul

kathryngaul — Tue, 27 Dec 2011 01:00:01 +0000

Thank you.

I’m guessing RP must be what we used to call “the Queen’s English? I’m afraid I’m a bit partial to that kind of speech as it’s easier for me to understand!

I knew you weren’t criticizing RA ;) I get a giggle about his forgetting the occasional “t”, too – one of my main beefs about so many English people!

I always say “No one can massacre the English language quite the way the English can”!!!

Just kidding…but it does amaze me why that “t” on the end of a word is so hard for so many English people to pronounce!!!!

;)

By: servetus

servetus — Tue, 27 Dec 2011 00:29:49 +0000

RP=received pronunciation, the “standard” speech of the upper classes of the UK. He’s pretty good but at least in Sylvester he makes noticeable (regular) mistakes. He has a consistent problem with forgetting to pronounce t in Auslaut, for example, when it proceeds a vowel. This is an observation, not a criticism.

Part of my point was that people in Britain probably perceive class distinctions via accent that are lost on us in the United States. (and potentially vice versa, when you think about how some British actors do US regional accents)

POTUS=President of the United States.

By: kathryngaul

kathryngaul — Tue, 27 Dec 2011 00:25:05 +0000

Hi Servetus…please explain “RP” and “POTUS”.

I’m afraid I’m a little snobbish and hope that Richard maintains he’s current way of speaking because it’s easy to understand and sounds good (ie. reasonably well-educated!).

I’m not too fond of some of the regional English accents…you know the ones who say “it were” but then go on to say “they was”!!!

I know that some actors have managed to carve out splendid careers for themselves almost in spite of their accents but I have to confess that some of those accents grate on my ears!

There, I told you I was a snob, didn’t I? I don’t make any apologies BTW…

By: RAFrenzy

RAFrenzy — Mon, 26 Dec 2011 17:39:47 +0000

I understood you meant the U.K. roles. Having traveled in Europe and U.K. on more than one occasion and having some close friends and co-workers from those places, this is the impression I’ve gotten about class consciousness. Much more prevalent in those places than in the U.S.

One of the ‘hickiest’ people I ever met but also one of the most brilliant was an investment banker from Chase Manhattan. From West Texas originally, he had fluoride stains on his teeth, which is not an uncommon mark of West Texans. He was phenomenal with people and with money and also had an ivy league degree in his pedigree. So yeah, I certainly understand what you’re talking about.