GuelphGryphon98

GuelphGryphon98

My name is Devin Cassidy.. I am an academic at heart, I come from an academic family, and I believe deeply in Wikipedia and her potential. I believe, at present, she is, ion the whole (though depending greatly on the subject), more or less as good as any other, paid encyclopaedia out there (Brittanica, Encarta, et cetera). This, I beleive, is due to university academics, and researchers having now clued in to her existence, and now the people who would otherwise be writing for Encyclopaedia Brittanica (or be passed over by it), now have a different forum in Wikipedia, and are logging on and either writing entire articles, or seriously revising existing artciles within their field of expertise. Another reason is perhaps somewhat connected thereto, and that is, because no one person can have the monopoly on ownership of an article unlike in an Encarta entry, eventually a stasis will be reached in which all points of view are equally satisfied with both the information contained within an article, and the articles political slant, or lack thereof.

I am morose, however, over the often puerile grammar and spelling used in many articles. While sometimes incredibly well written, entries in Wikipedia also are often attrocious crimes against the our glorious English Language, so proudly authored in by Shelley, Wordsworth, Milton and L. Ron Hubbard. Here are some of the most common offences, and the ones the most maddening to me:

A Number of Large Amounts

Quantitative

What drives me crazy is when a person will write something like this:

• "A large amount of people bought the album"

What's wrong with this sentence? If you said nothing, you're an idiot! People is a quantitative word, a word that can be expressed in numbers. That is, you can specify exactly how many people there are. Therefore, the sentence should read:

• "A large NUMBER of of people bough the album"

Qualitative

A qualitative noun is one that cannot be specified in specific units, but only in qualities (a lot, a little, much, many, et cetera), thus, you would use a qualifier to augment its size:

• "There was a large AMOUNT of water in the basement after the flood

You're yours

We were ALL taught this in high school, so why can't you people get it straight:

• You're: You are
• Your: Possessive pronoun, meaning "belonging to you"

It's that simple.

They're, Their, There

Again, every 9th gradcer should know the difference between:

• They're: They Are
• Their: Possessive pronoun, meaning "belonging to them"
• There: Directionality, as in "It's over there"

Coulda, Woulda, Shoulda

Next time I see the phrase "could of", I swear I will kill the next living thing I see. It's pronounced "Could've", yes, but that's because it's a CONTRACTION of "Could Have". Same deal with Should have and would have.

"Flavour"

Don't ever, EVER, EVER use the term "flavour" unless you are referring to the actual taste of something. It looks ridiculous in an encyclopaedic entry. It's silly and unprofessional, particularly when discussing technical subjects. The English language has a plethora of synonyms for every native concept, and a little more creativity would render an article less amateurish and more in line with what Wikipedia strives to become, a respected and academic quality resource.

"Till" There Was You

Have you ever had the feeling that most people around you don't pay attention to what they do or say? I often have that feeling when reading Wikipedia entries, and an author has written a phraser that may go something like this:

• "She reigned till her death in 1603."

There are two problems with this, let's deal with the obvious one. "Till" is not a substitute for "until", it is a verb which means, more or less, "to work the soil". What you're shooting for is "'til"

But even that is unacceptable, because "'til" is a slang term, a colloquial abbreviation, thoroughly unwelcome in any, even semi-serious encyclopaedic resource.

Theirs

Their is the third person PLURAL, not a neuter form of the third person SINGULAR. In other words, it ALWAYS refers to more than ONE (1) person, and when you use it to refer to somebody whose sex you are unsure of, it sounds stupid. In a case where gender is uncertain, instead of "their" or "they", instead one is to write "his or her" or "he or she", et cetera

More to come....