Hostile Dialect already mentioned the problems with your proposed history here, but several things in the parenthetical leap out as so profoundly silly as to warrant mention. You think that only just recently have people begun to generally speak with “the grammar of everyday use”, and not, you know, every day in the past? You think that the increased integration into daily life of written English messages in certain media (Internet, cellphones) somehow leads to a diminishing reliance upon written English? Hell, you think there’s a diminishing acquaintance with written English at all? I don’t know when your golden age of respect for “the way things should be” was, but if it was any time much older than yesterday, then I assure you, worldwide English literacy rates were lower. Much, much lower.
(Let me note, though, since the specter of written language has been introduced in contrast to the topic of the OP, that literacy has nothing to do with one’s competence at spoken language. Barring significant mental illness, pretty much everyone from illiterate drop-outs to college professors attains a fluent mastery of their native spoken language, well before adulthood. It’s a completely natural part of human development, unlike written language, which does actually require some small measure of instruction and training.)
I’d be curious to know about the details of your speech patterns. Could you (and anyone else) perhaps answer the question at the bottom of #9? Are there contexts where you sometimes use “who” and sometimes use “whom”? Do you use “whom” in the nominative case in any contexts? Enquiring minds want to know.
There are certain situations where a college-educated person will choose whom over who, especially in writing (specifically, after a preposition). But in relative clauses, most people in speech don’t bother.
If somebody were to publish a small paperback workbook, with thousands of example sentences and an answer key in the back, I would buy it. I want to know the difference, but I can’t figure it out without practicing.
I can’t ever remember its or it’s either.
Infact, maybe a general adult brush-up workbook for common gammar mistakes would be useful. I’m not in any way a grammar fanatic, I would like to keep my language from degenerating too far. Some of things I’ve seen written by otherwise intelligent adults should be embarrasing for them.
Incidently, for a while it seemed I was getting a spell check for this board in Firefox. Does anybody know how to activate it again?
I remember it by reconstructing the following line of thought. I remember that one of them is a contraction. I know “its” isn’t a contraction because there’s no apostraphe in it. “It’s” can be a contraction, because of the apostraphe. It follows, then, that “it’s” is a contraction. So if I mean to contract “it is,” then “it’s” is my word. Otherwise, it’s “its.”
The only thing you have to remember, then, is that one of the pair is a contraction.
And, are people saying “who” when they “should” be saying “whom”? Or is it just that there are so many more situations where “who” is correct that come up in everyday conversation?
More importantly, if Who gets injured, does Whom take over at first base?
I have said nothing of the sort. If you will take your hostility towards prescriptivism and set it aside, you will note that you have totally mis-characterized what I said.
Prescriptivism had to do with English as it was taught, not English as it was spoken. Certain elements of society might use a prescriptivist approach in their use of the language to establish their fitness to be in a given class of society. But I think everyday users of the language have always engaged in their own approach (else why would the bastardized form of the contraction amn’t still be around?). Neither do I think that all people in the Roman Empire spoke Latin like it was written by Vergil, Ovid and Cicero.
But the point I was making, in response to your statements, is that there was a period where English was taught with a prescriptivist approach (perhaps you are too young to remember this sort of teaching; I remember quite clearly learning all sorts of silly prescriptivist rules, from grade school up). These days, it is much less likely to be taught that way; if nothing else the “whole language” approach may have divested us of the notion that there is one and only one way to speak and write English. This does not change the fact that there was a prescriptivist approach, and that, under such an approach, the way things “should” be is not always the way things “are.” Which was my sole point.
I apologize for my hostility. I’m not sure it would be fair to say that prescriptivism has disappeared from English teaching, though (certainly, I learned all sorts of silly prescriptivist rules, from grade school up, as well), and I don’t see how the “whole language” approach to reading instruction (roundly criticized by linguists, incidentally; literacy does require training [see the discussion and links at the bottom of here]) really has anything to do with people’s attitudes on descriptivism vs. prescriptivism, though I suppose people’s attitudes work in mysterious ways.
Yes, my intent with the text you quoted was to emphasize the contrast with the fact that spoken language doesn’t even require a small measure of instruction and training, in the relevant sense.
No, I’d say, “To whom were you just talking?” or “I don’t know about whom you’re talking.” However, I say, “I don’t know who you’re talking about” if that is a better match for the conversational style of the person with whom I am speaking.