[meerkat]

Familiar with Outroduction anyone? (Has it been discussed already?)

If presentations can start with an Intro, why can't they conclude with an Outro as well? (Especially since people are apparently getting quite comfortable with preponement and such)? :-)
.

[GTE]

In my opinion the title itself doesn't seem to be grammatically correct. How to post avoiding grammatical & orthographical errors.

[tilt]

Originally Posted by meerkat

Familiar with Outroduction anyone? (Has it been discussed already?)

If presentations can start with an Intro, why can't they conclude with an Outro as well? (Especially since people are apparently getting quite comfortable with preponement and such)? :-)
.

"Outro" already exists in the world of music. Songs have both, an intro and an outro

Originally Posted by GTE

In my opinion the title itself doesn't seem to be grammatically correct. How to post avoiding grammatical & orthographical errors.

According to purists and pedants these two words that I have made bold do not exist in the English language. Yes, language evolves, and today "OMG" and "prepone" are indeed valid English words; but my point still stands.

The first part of the sentence should be "...doesn't seem to be grammatic. (the word "correct" is redundant.)", and the second should just be "grammar" - as in "grammar error".

Cheers

[Thad E Ginathom]

See, Tilt: I told you that you were better than I am at this stuff

Don't know for sure, but I think that intro and outro come from the jazz world. But the backforming (if that is a word) to outroduction? No, that is clumsy and ugly.

[GTE]

Reminds me of that evergreen song. Why can't the English teach their children how to speak..........

[dailydriver]

The versatility of English often surprises me, as I am sure, it does many. Apart from absorbing words from other languages from across the world, it also finds ways to integrate non-native concepts by using innovative/adapted vocabulary.

The following menu doing rounds on the internet is an example of this.

[Thad E Ginathom]

Originally Posted by dailydriver

The following menu doing rounds on the internet is an example of this.

In some parts of the world, that would be slammed as cultural appropriation!

(and it should probably be all-day breakfasts)

[dailydriver]

One of the non-compromising rules of posting on the forum that is very often difficult to adhere to is the minimal use of ellipses.

Apparently, it is more of a problem for us oldies and not so much for the youngsters.

This report in Hindustan Times talks about the same.

A number of Gen Z internet users have expressed concern about older people misusing ellipses, which they've called "boomer ellipses."

Adam Aleksic, an Instagram user, explained how boomers use ellipses to include multiple thoughts in one single text. He said that when boomers were charged by text messages or SMS, they developed the habit of utilising many ellipses. Boomers used ellipse to divide their ideas apart so they could communicate more in a single text. Contrarily, Gen Z is unrestricted in this way, allowing them to freely compose many texts and infrequently use ellipses to punctuate their ideas.

While there might be some merit in the accusation, one can't turn a blind eye to the fact that the newer generation is found wanting in using proper sentences to articulate their thoughts. Most that I see around are happy with emoticons and abbreviations and seldom take the trouble to frame a proper sentence, specially on the internet. At times, this gets percolated to the classroom too: I have seen a student end an official letter with Thx instead of Thanks/Thanking You!

The only exception is to be found on our own forum where the tweens and the teens write so beautifully and meaningfully and inspire others to follow their footsteps.

[AltoLXI]

Nice choice of words in today's TOI. At first, I thought what the heck and then my son pointed out the absence of apostrophe.

[am1m]

Originally Posted by dailydriver

I have seen a student end an official letter with Thx instead of Thanks/Thanking You!

What is now taken as good formal English language writing has accepted and assimilated far more drastic changes than that. Language evolves, at least healthy languages do. As some conventions begin to make more sense and understood more easily by the majority of readers, things like this too will change. As writers and authors need to grab and hold the attention of a younger audience, they will start to write in a way that makes sense to their audience.

Originally Posted by dailydriver

The only exception is to be found on our own forum where the tweens and the teens write so beautifully and meaningfully and inspire others to follow their footsteps.

That's because most of the mods and forum users who are more vocal about these things are older. And like any new entrant trying to make inroads into an established hierarchy, you tend to adhere to the preferences of those already established. Hopefully that too will change! (I'm in my mid-40s myself and a long-form content guy, but times change, as they should!)

[Thad E Ginathom]

Sorry, but I'm afraid that my view is that the forum has taken a dive to a level approaching that of the English-Language newspapers I regularly read (The Hindu and The New Indian Express). But...

1. This is a motor forum, not an English exam.
2. I do not think that forum language should be formal. It should be, in my view (IMHO as I would like to put it, but the mods won't accept that, despite its decades of age!) it is chatty and should be colloquial. But it should not be wrong.

Originally Posted by am1m

Language evolves

In practice, I agree with what you say, but I disagree with this, because it suggests some improvement. I see it devolving. Very few language changes are elegant (eg prepone in Indian English) are usually the result of not knowing words, inventing words that already exist, misunderstanding/misusing idioms etc. However, I agree that that's life. We could just say it changes.

[am1m]

Originally Posted by Thad E Ginathom

In practice, I agree with what you say, but I disagree with this, because it suggests some improvement. I see it devolving...

I would have agreed with you before. I read one of the Bill Bryson books where he gives a lot of examples from early American writing and common phrases, and I was stunned by how incomprehensible they were. And that was good, formal writing in English 150-200 years ago, employed by the erudite and the elite, who were shaping the very foundations of the great nation. So, to those esteemed gentlemen, even the most correct form of the English language we use today might seem devolved.

A part of my job is communication-related and everyday I see (and attempt to unravel) so many examples of what was taught in the best 'English-medium' schools to so many people of my generation as correct English. Technically correct, grammatically correct, but completely unsuited to modern business communication.

[Thad E Ginathom]

I do think that one can always avoid the totally wrong. Whatever kind of English it is, from the most formal to the most informal. One can, even in marketing, avoid words like upgradation, to mention one that is now firmly rooted in Indian English. All it takes is for someone to say, the word is upgrade: it is a noun as well as a verb.

[tilt]

Originally Posted by Thad E Ginathom

*SNIP*One can, even in marketing, avoid words like upgradation, to mention one that is now firmly rooted in Indian English. All it takes is for someone to say, the word is upgrade: it is a noun as well as a verb.

A rebuttal to this (one I do not subscribe to) could be that "upgradation" is the process (or the actual action) of upgrading

Cheers

[am1m]

Originally Posted by Thad E Ginathom

One can, even in marketing, avoid words like upgradation, to mention one that is now firmly rooted in Indian English.

I actually change/correct this particular usage a lot in the kind of work I do! So as of today, I'll agree with you.

Originally Posted by Thad E Ginathom

All it takes is for someone to say, the word is upgrade: it is a noun as well as a verb.

But again, the word 'upgrade' itself has some origin. One online reference says it's 1873 as a noun, 1901 as a verb. So, its usage has evolved too.

Again, going back to Bill Bryson, he states that Thomas Jefferson "always wrote it's for the possessive form of it, a practice that looks decidedly illiterate today". (And I hope I got both instances correct in the previous para!) Jefferson was certainly not an uneducated man, but apparently in 1776 when Jefferson was working on drafts of the Declaration of Independence no less (formal writing at its most important!) it was just something that just hadn't been formalized yet.

I'm not making a case for lazy writing, I'm just saying that our version of 'correct' English (or any language) is based on simply what we were taught was correct at that time, or what we got used to. (And that's a bit like 'my generation had the best music' )