“Are grammarians losing the battle in the real world?”
I really have no firm basis for categorically answering this question, so I won’t venture a yes or no. All I’m confident of saying is that the efforts of grammarians notwithstanding, we happen to live in a country that’s so lax and so permissive in its use of spoken language, whether English or Filipino or any of the regional languages. How do they say it in the lingua franca? “
Maskipops!”, or short for “
Maski papano!” or, in English, “Whichever way!”
It won’t be so bad if the language misuse is confined to private conversations and other face-to-face forms of social interaction. But as Sphinx points out in dismay, this anarchic use of spoken language soon becomes common fare on TV and radio, whether coming from the mouths of anchors or commentators or from endorsers of product advertising. The bad usage is therefore broadcast over the airwaves nationwide—and in some cases worldwide—and unwittingly acquired by the listening public.
The three specific violations of English cited by Sphinx are serious enough, of course, but they are really as nothing compared to the much more outrageous instant coinage of Taglish or Engalog dished out by broadcast media—particularly radio—day in and day out. All we need to do is to take a 30-minute taxi ride in Metro Manila to involuntarily hear those language atrocities from the taxi driver’s favorite radio stations.
The proper use of language can’t be imposed or legislated, though, and I doubt if the Philippine Senate or House of Representatives will ever find it worthwhile to investigate language misuse in aid of legislation. So all we can really do is to point out bad grammar or usage when it’s committed and then show how it might be corrected, one word or phrase or clause or sentence at a time. All we can really do is to hope that in the long run, the correct usage will catch on somehow.
Let’s begin with the three ubiquitous expressions cited by Sphinx:
1. “Everybody is welcome to join, but must wait their turn.”The sentence above (a) shows the classic disagreement between the grammatically plural “their” and the grammatically singular indefinite pronoun “everybody” as its antecedent; and (b) uses the grammatically erroneous phrase “must wait their turn.”
A usual fix for Problem 1a is to pluralize “everybody” by replacing it with “all.” For Problem 1b, the grammatically correct phrasing is “must
wait for their turn” or “
must await their turn.”
That sentence should therefore be constructed as follows:
“All are welcome to join, but must wait for their turn.”or
“All are welcome to join, but must await their turn.”The following constructions using the “his or her” alternative can also be used, but it has the drawback of needlessly putting the gender issue into play:
“Everybody is welcome to join, but must wait for his or her turn.”or
“Everybody is welcome to join, but must await his or her turn.”Click this link for a an essay of mine discussing
“The grammar of indefinite pronouns.”2. “Avail our credit facilities”The scrupulously correct construction of the above phrase is
“avail yourself/yourselves of our credit facilities”where the reflexive “yourself” or “yourself” is used because “avail” is being used as an intransitive verb in the sense of “to take advantage of.” An acceptable alternative construction drops the reflexive “yourself” or “yourself” but retains the preposition “of,” as follows:
“avail of our credit facilities” It’s grammatically wrong to also drop “of.”
For a discussion of the reflexives, click this link to
“Use the reflexive form when the verb’s object is the doer itself.”3. “Just between you and I”The grammatically correct usage is
“Just between you and me”where the objective pronoun “me” is used instead of the subjective pronoun “I” so it can match the case of the objective pronoun “you.” In English, there’s a grammar rule that pronouns can be compounded—added to one another—only if they are in the same case.
For a comprehensive discussion of case, click this link to
“Lesson #3 – The Matter of Case in English.”So, to Sphinx, if we keep up this process of identifying grammar errors and correcting them as they come, who knows that grammarians might not just win the battle in the real world after all?
