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12-03-2020 01:45 AM
I often hear hosts and company reps misuse less. Today the company rep for a beauty product said less lines and less wrinkles. Less is used when an item can be measured: less flour, less love, less hate, less orange juice. If something can be counted, but not measured fewer is used rather than less: fewer baked goods, fewer loving people, fewer hateful tweets, fewer oranges. I do believe lines and wrinkles are counted not measured; however, the intensity of lines and wrinkles is measured: fewer lines, less intense lines.
I just want my favorite shopping network to be the best it can be.
12-03-2020 04:27 AM
If this were an English professor then maybe it would be an issue but this is a shopping channel so as long as the meaning is clear I cannot see how it really matters!!! It has no effect on the products they sell whatsoever!!!
12-03-2020 05:38 AM
I don't really care what they say. They can say this ****** really works and then I would notice. lol
12-03-2020 05:52 AM
I agree. I wasn't an English major, but the one that gets me is using the word utilize in place of use. It happens at work too. Use and utilize have different meanings, but utilize sounds fancier I guess.
12-03-2020 06:15 AM
I didn't know that.
Whether QVC cares or not, I like learning about things like this, so thanks for pointing it out @achat
and welcome to the boards!
12-03-2020 06:43 AM
Hi @achat - You and I care about the structure and form of English, but scholars of English DO NOT.
That being the case (and it is) and adding in a great big mess of cyber speech with all of its irritating abbreviations and linguistic shortcuts, and THEN PILING SPELL CHECK on top (its it's its'??),
complaining about HOW people speak if they're AT LEAST COMMUNICATING, or trying to communicate, comes across as archaic, if not outright pedantic.
I used to enjoy speaking "English", but presently I think back to those days with nostalgia, and as with any "evolving" organism, "our" English of the past is almost certainly obsolete.
When I long to visit it, I return to reading newspapers and books written 50-75 years ago. I think the actual bastardization of the language begin a little later than that, perhaps 20-30 years ago, and at first it was merely throwing the baby our with the bath water. Gradually, and probably rightly, it became a socially nuanced construct. That's where we are today.
I'm very old, and I was actually TAUGHT, IN 3rd GRADE no less, that "thou" was an alternate "proper" form of "YOU". Think of it, teaching the complexities of English Grammar to 3rd graders!
Griping about this stuff reveals my age. I'm willing to talk (not "speak") like most Americans and still sound like I'm 30. At least on phone calls.
12-03-2020 06:58 AM
@violann -
Did you mean to say that scholars of English do not care about the structure and form of English?
That doesn't seem to make sense?
12-03-2020 07:08 AM
@on the bay wrote:Did you mean to say that scholars of English do not care about the structure and form of English?
That doesn't seem to make sense?
I stopped reading it there. Didn't make sense and use of capitalization was rude.
12-03-2020 07:16 AM - edited 12-03-2020 09:56 AM
@on the bay wrote:I didn't know that.
Whether QVC cares or not, I like learning about things like this, so thanks for pointing it out @achat
and welcome to the boards!
I learned something too; thanks!
I agree with you on the proper use of the English language ...especially if you have a job in tv communications (even selling)...and I'm far from perfect always.
For me it's been two things I keep noticing...the disappearance of adverbs: "It fits perfect" ilo "it fits perfectly."
Also, and I may be behind the times here...but in newer dictionaries, did "nother" become an accepted word? Everyone always says "a whole 'nother" now...instead of either "a whole other" or simply "another."
Those of us that love words, or were English or communications majors, (or are just OCD?)...care more, and I realize it's not the "worst thing going on in the world!"
Perhaps it was instilled in me. I grew up with mom being "grammar police" until she left here at 91 she was still saying, (albeit sweetly) to me..."better than I" when I'd say "me." Lol...was always endearing and I wish she was still here to do it.
All to say...thanks for teaching me this....I never knew, and I love learning these things.
12-03-2020 07:53 AM
@amyb -
haha! My mother was the same (as were my teachers).
To this day she has corrected my sister and me(?) over and over on "lay" and lie"- a chicken "lays" eggs lol!
"You lay something down or on something, to 'place.' vs "I am going to lie down."
Or something like that!😀
I think the "nother" and dropping adverbs just comes from slurring together or talking fast, cutting off vowels.
Also in some parts of the south, the language becomes even more slang
in some parts-"don't want no", "ain't" etc.
And I still think better than me sounds better! I bet some of this becomes generational too. And I mean way back generational. Like we don't say thou and thee anymore.
Found this explanation-your mother would approve
"He is younger than me. He is younger than I. Answer: 'I' is more correct in formal English, but 'me' is acceptable in informal English and is increasingly used in formal English too. 'I' is more 'correct' because you're comparing two subjects." Yeah whatever😅
I know to some this is all absurd but I guess some of us could be considered nerds on words and language! I guess I've always found language and how it changes over years and cultures and different countries and US parts of the country, fascinating!
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