Linguistic Pet Peeves
Pet Peeve 1 -
OK, I finally have to say it , and I’m sure this is not unique to me, but I have a pet peeve with the frequent misuse of the word ‘myself’. As in, if I wrote the previous sentence as 'OK, myself finallly has to say it, and myself is sure that this is not unique to myself, but myself has a pet peeve...'
According to the dictionary there are three proper uses for the word ‘myself.’ First, it is used reflexively as the object of either a verb or a preposition. Examples would be “I hit myself in the head with the dictionary” or ‘I bought a new car for myself.”
Second, ‘myself’ can properly be used for emphasis, as in, “I, myself, saw the UFO fly over the back yard.”
And, third, it can be used in an absolute construction. “Elected to office myself, I helped my campaign contributors land lucrative no-bid contracts.”
One way ‘myself’ cannot be used however, is as the subject or non-reflexive object of a verb. Who has not heard the following?
'Myself and John went to the store.'
Question: 'Who saw the accident?'. Answer: 'Myself and my sister.' or, simply, 'Myself.'
'Susie saw Joe and myself at the mall'
Can someone please explain to me what is wrong with a simple ‘I’ and ‘me’?
Pet Peeve 2 –
“Task” as a verb. I know, I know the dictionary says it is proper but it drives me insane when someone says “I was tasked with determining the effect of the misuse of the word ‘myself’ on the mental health of a certain occasional blogger.” The only way that sentence could be worse is if it said “Myself was tasked……” What is wrong with “My task was to determine blah, blah, blah…..?”
Pet Peeve 3 –
Using a complex word when a simple one would be more appropriate. Again, the dictionary is not on my side with this one, but when a co-worker stated that she would contact me when her ‘analyzation’ of the problem was completed, I wanted to jump up and down and yell, ‘analysis, analysis' – a perfectly good word for the point she was trying to make.
One more and then I will stop for now:
Pet Peeve 4 –
Redundancy. I kid you not, I saw this headline yesterday. 'Police Seek Leads in Deadly Murder.' Hmmm…..I wasn’t aware that there were non-deadly murders.
OK, I finally have to say it , and I’m sure this is not unique to me, but I have a pet peeve with the frequent misuse of the word ‘myself’. As in, if I wrote the previous sentence as 'OK, myself finallly has to say it, and myself is sure that this is not unique to myself, but myself has a pet peeve...'
According to the dictionary there are three proper uses for the word ‘myself.’ First, it is used reflexively as the object of either a verb or a preposition. Examples would be “I hit myself in the head with the dictionary” or ‘I bought a new car for myself.”
Second, ‘myself’ can properly be used for emphasis, as in, “I, myself, saw the UFO fly over the back yard.”
And, third, it can be used in an absolute construction. “Elected to office myself, I helped my campaign contributors land lucrative no-bid contracts.”
One way ‘myself’ cannot be used however, is as the subject or non-reflexive object of a verb. Who has not heard the following?
'Myself and John went to the store.'
Question: 'Who saw the accident?'. Answer: 'Myself and my sister.' or, simply, 'Myself.'
'Susie saw Joe and myself at the mall'
Can someone please explain to me what is wrong with a simple ‘I’ and ‘me’?
Pet Peeve 2 –
“Task” as a verb. I know, I know the dictionary says it is proper but it drives me insane when someone says “I was tasked with determining the effect of the misuse of the word ‘myself’ on the mental health of a certain occasional blogger.” The only way that sentence could be worse is if it said “Myself was tasked……” What is wrong with “My task was to determine blah, blah, blah…..?”
Pet Peeve 3 –
Using a complex word when a simple one would be more appropriate. Again, the dictionary is not on my side with this one, but when a co-worker stated that she would contact me when her ‘analyzation’ of the problem was completed, I wanted to jump up and down and yell, ‘analysis, analysis' – a perfectly good word for the point she was trying to make.
One more and then I will stop for now:
Pet Peeve 4 –
Redundancy. I kid you not, I saw this headline yesterday. 'Police Seek Leads in Deadly Murder.' Hmmm…..I wasn’t aware that there were non-deadly murders.
posted by Granny D at
6:08 PM
1 Comments:
Re: pet peeve number 2
As the illustrious Calvin once said:
'Verbing weirds language'
Post a Comment
Subscribe to Post Comments [Atom]
<< Home