The Complaints of a Pedant
I know and accept that language, being a living thing, has to change - although I do mourn some of these changes: to lose the distinction between “uninterested” and “disinterested” can only encourage sloppy thinking - but when it happens because one group of people simply don’t know, then it is something to be resisted - and complained about loudly!
Such is the misuse of the colon and semi-colon by press officers and others who write press releases. In their desperation to write like the lowest form of tabloid journalist, they actually exceed the tabloids’ twisting of the language and have started coming up with their own mutilations.
It started with writing sentences such as A spokesman said: “We do not…” It’s a comma, boys and girls, not a colon. It always has been and there is absolutely no reason to change it.
And then, because of the half-understood rule that a colon introduces a list, they started writing The cast includes: Joe Bloggs, Fred Smith… No! Not at all! There is no need for that colon: it is included, by implication, in includes.
Now they have started replacing commas in a list by semi-colons, so we get The cast includes: Joe Bloggs; Fred Smith; Anne Onymous… Now there is a good reason for using semi-colons in some lists - where, for example, each noun is followed by a subordinate phrase or clause, so we could write, The cast includes Joe Bloggs, who, at the age of three, played Hamlet; Fred Smith, about whom Peter Lathan, the world’s greatest Shakespearean critic, said, “This man is a rubbish actor”; Anne Onymous… In this situation, sticking to commas only would lack clarity, so the semi-colon is needed, but it isn emphatically not needed simply to separate items in a list, whether a list of things, nouns or verbs.
And while I am on the subject of press release writers, many years ago, before the advent of the personal computer, it was conventional to put names and titles in capital letters, to draw attention to them. But now it is no longer necessary: word processing software allows us to use bold or italics and also allows the release recipient to copy and paste whole chunks of text into the story, thus cutting down on all the tedious retyping that we used to have to do. So why do press release writers feel it necessary to use caps? It just means the names, titles or whatever have to be retyped, thus displeasing the editor/journalist.
And another pet hate of mine: why put the name of the character an actor plays in single quotes, thus creating silly sentences like He played ‘Hamlet’ in the RSC production of “Hamlet”.
Yes, I know you wouldn’t use the same word twice in such close proximity but I am merely making a point.
I know that the voice of one crying in the wilderness will not make a difference, but I just wanted to get it off my chest. And that comma, by the way, is known as the “Oxford comma” and is perfectly acceptable. Just because you have been taught that a comma replaces a conjunction does not mean they can’t be used together. Sometimes we do pause (for emphasis) before a conjunction.
End of rant!
July 13th, 2008 at 06:12 pm
When he was quite sure that the narrative had ended he laughed noiselessly for fully half a minute. Then he said:
‘Well!… That takes the biscuit!’
— James Joyce, ‘Two Gallants’, Dubliners.
In this case, it’s a colon and not a comma. As you can see, I am not disinterested and share your frustrations, especially when bloggers use ‘TEXT speak’ to spell. The progressive ink-slingers, who edit the OED, think it fit to include such nonsense. I am a fossil who, when lost for words, prefers to consult Roget’s Thesaurus from 1911; it has lots of Latin phrases that I like to look up.
July 13th, 2008 at 06:20 pm
A man after my own heart!
I would say that Joyce did tend to take a lot of liberties with language which we lesser mortals might avoid.
And I avoid TEXT speak even when texting! u wll nvr c me wrtng like ths, m8!
July 14th, 2008 at 08:25 am
Well, I don’t think Joyce is taking any liberties here. As for ‘TEXT speak’, one could always play the devil’s advocate. Here is the Prefactory to “English As She is Wrote”:
–
“Anybody,” said an astute lawyer, addressing the jury to whom the opposing counsel had reflected upon inaccuracies in the spelling of his brief - “anybody can write English correctly, but surely a man may be allowed to spell a word in two or three different ways if he likes!” This was a claim for independence of action which so commended itself to the jury that it won a verdict for his client. The same plea may be considered in regard to the truly wonderful way in which the mother-tongue is often written, by the educated sometimes as well as by the uneducated.
A man, it may be urged, has a right to spell as he chooses, and to express his ideas, when he has any, as best he can; while, when he suffers from a dearth of those rare articles, he has still more reason to rejoice in liberty of choice in respect to the language he selects to cover his poverty of thought. Hence there are doubtless good and sufficient reasons for every specimen of “English as she is wrote,” which it is the object of this little book to rescue from oblivion, and which have, one and all, been written with the sober conviction, upon the part of the writers, that they accurately conveyed the meaning they desired. Intentionally humorous efforts have been carefully excluded, and the interest of the collection consists in the spontaneity of expression and in the fact that it offers fair samples of the possibilities which lie hidden in the orthography and construction of our language. Let it be remembered, then, that anybody can write English as she “should be wrote,” and hence that a certain meed of admiration is due to those who, exercising their right of independent action, succeed in making it at once original and racy, and in conveying, without the least effort, meanings totally opposed to their intention, affording thereby admirable examples of English as “she is wrote” by thousands.
–
Well, come back Vicky Pollard, all is forgiven. All this wrangling over colons has twisted mine into a torsion. But this is not the forum for IBS. As a poor man, who cannot afford to visit the theatre, I very much appreciate all the hard work you do in preparing the weekly newsletter; it gives me a real sense of what is going on outside my secluded little life. Keep up the great work. Best wishes,
Nicholas