Grammar Discussions

[Captain Halliday]

Keep fighting the good fight JessicaTam. Your OP in this thread reminds me of the poster promoting a Steely Dan concert circa 1980 where they were to perform "Ricky don't loose that number". Their ability to spell their own song title was certainly loose.

 

[Deleted member 29185]

"Contextualisation" wouldn't have too many uses.

I agree. That's the point. You spend time in the TAFE system and you realise it's a word that's used consistently. Half the time I think the users don't actually know what it means but use it because it sounds "intelligent".

I owned a wholesale outlet at one time and when you need to consider how to minimise theft and speak to varies companies about RFID systems etc, it amazed me how many would say "shrinkage" rather than just be outright and call it theft. Theft is wrong. Theft is a crime. Shrinkage on the other hand is something different. Shrinkage is purpoted to be something that retailers have to "manage" like employee IR issues. I even had one staff member say to me that "shrinkage" is normal in a retail situation and I shouldn't worry too much about it. What a load of tripe. Theft is theft and shrinkage should be what happens when you first wash a pair of jeans.

As for the paedophile, once again it is a product of some intellectual clowns trying to create a seemingly legitimate "disease" by masking the truth with a word. It semi-legitimises something which, if it really is a disease, it should be a terminal one! If society wants to call a child molester something else, the term "arrow fodder" (from Black Adder) makes more sense to me than the word paedophile.

 

[medhead]

For me paedophile does not soften anything. The meaning of the word is clear.

Shrinkage describes the result of theft rather than the act of theft, surely. I'm yet to hear a news report that says "Mr X was arrested for undertaking shrinkage operations."

The email one recently got me. I sent what I thought was a concise summary of a meeting that caused all sorts of BS. Feedback from my boss was perhaps I wasn't lovey dovey enough in the language - using affirmation of their contribution and worth as a person, please if you would kindly consider and that sort of verbosity. It amazes me that a scientist can respond to such rubbish. But they seemed to accept my personal, face to face apology for some imagined slight. Amazing to have to do such things to get a professional person to offer corrections to minutes of a meeting. Without it there was the prospect of face to face sit downs just to agree about what was discussed, before we even got to dealing with the issues.

 

[Warks]

I always understood 'ullage' to mean the air space in a container of some substance for sale. Finished goods, I mean. With liquids I think we (in my previous occupation) were allowed 10% ullage in any liquid but no more. We ran into strife when we produced a hose-on garden spray which relies on water from the hose making up the difference.


But I digress...

 

[JohnK]

Theft is theft and shrinkage should be what happens when you first wash a pair of jeans.

I would love a pair of jeans that stop shrinking after the first wash. Mine have been shrinking the past 10 years.

 

[JessicaTam]

I would love a pair of jeans that stop shrinking after the first wash. Mine have been shrinking the past 10 years.

A common complaint, methinks.

 

[anat0l]

I also despise using language to soften a crime or criminal behaviour.

Speaking of "softening", I realise this is all of off-topic, facetious and not of similar vein, but what about..... instead of "Economy" (or "Coach"), we have "Main Cabin"?

(There's likely at least a technical reason for this 'substitution', but cut me a break..... )

 

[Deleted member 29185]

Speaking of "softening", I realise this is all of off-topic, facetious and not of similar vein, but what about..... instead of "Economy" (or "Coach"), we have "Main Cabin"?

(There's likely at least a technical reason for this 'substitution', but cut me a break..... )

Bit of a difference between commercial marketing and criminal actions though. Surely, one wouldn't suggest a McDonalds approach to criminality. Martin Bryant perhaps didn't commit mass murder, he simply upsized?

 

[JohnM]

Heard on the ABC TV news weather in PER tonight: "... x had y mm rain to 9 am this morning." (It was obvious that today was being referred to.) More tautology/redundancy.

Could be either:

"To 9 o'clock this morning."

or

"To 9 am (today)."

 

[Warks]

Yes I often hear "3 am in the morning" said on radio. Am sure they mean to say "3 o' clock in the morning" but nothing exceeds like excess I guess. Otherwise we wouldn't have PIN numbers used on ATM machines.

 

[Captain Halliday]

Along the same lines, one that annoys me is, "in 15 minutes time." Minutes is a measurement of time people and therefore entirely redundant in this context.

 

[Warks]

Front page of the Sydney Morning Herald right now:

[h=3]Taiwan crash surviver crawled from wreck[/h]

 

[Boris spatsky]

Front page of the Sydney Morning Herald right now:

Yes, SMH has been getting progressively worse over the years...

 

[TonyHancock]

Along the same lines, one that annoys me is, "in 15 minutes time." Minutes is a measurement of time people and therefore entirely redundant in this context.

Minute is also a unit of angle.

 

[Deleted member 29185]

Minute is also a unit of angle.

Ah yes, a bit like a degree.

Is that therefore like 6 degrees of separation?.......except 15minutes to separation?

I'm sure there are lots of couples that wish separation did only take 15 minutes............

Who says the English language is easy?

 

[anat0l]

Minute is also a unit of angle.

Says a lot about my minute steak...it was very thin and flat :mrgreen:

 

[Captain Halliday]

Minute is also a unit of angle.

Very true. But the context makes it redundant in the example I quoted.

 

[Major]

Minute is also a unit of angle.

Hang on a minute...yes,quite correct

 

[medhead]

Along the same lines, one that annoys me is, "in 15 minutes time." Minutes is a measurement of time people and therefore entirely redundant in this context.

I'm sure you mean that 'time' is redundant not 'minutes'. 'In 15 time' means nothing useful to me.

Very true. But the context makes it redundant in the example I quoted.

The context only holds with the inclusion of time. 'In 15 minutes' could refer to angle or time depending on the unstated context.

Front page of the Sydney Morning Herald right now:

Now I'm not sure what you find troublesome about that headline. Seems fine to me.

 

[anat0l]

The context only holds with the inclusion of time. 'In 15 minutes' could refer to angle or time depending on the unstated context.

"In 15 minutes, I want to see how you waltz."

Now I'm not sure what you find troublesome about that headline. Seems fine to me.

I was going to say there's a spelling mistake, except the word in question appears to be in a few online dictionaries. Certainly when I was a lad at school, had I spelt it that way, it would be marked wrong....