Spelling and grammar

Jim McKenney jimmckenney@jimmckenney.com
Thu, 26 Aug 2010 09:27:22 PDT
Doug Westfall wrote: " PLEASE members, let us stick to the subject of the
PBS. As a former English teacher. I can remember "mistrakes" that I have
made as well as others. Even after becoming an administrator, I had to deal
with these. Our newspapers are the worst violators of spelling "rules".

Unless the mistake leads to a "misunderstanding" of the topic, Let's  
not make such an issue of it. This only leads to irritation and  
unneeded "words"!"

I would be willing to bet that Doug's comments mean different things to
different people. With that in mind, I would suggest that when making
suggestions of this sort it would be a big help if the writer were very
specific about what is meant. And the easiest way to do that is to quote the
offending passage. 

If you are reluctant to point the finger at another list participant's work
on line, reply to them privately. 

Doug, I'm confused. Was it the recent threads involving the permutations of
spelling on the names Masson and Mason which you found irritating? It seems
to me that such discussions are pertinent to this list. 

I have not noticed that we have any self-appointed spelling police on the
list: a lot goes by without comment, if not without notice. When some of us
go off on orthography tangents there is almost always a direct link to
bulbs. 

Isn't that how it should be? 

Jim McKenney


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