>>both “technically incorrect” and “a subjective decision”?<<
That’s unpossible!
Daniel- great post, I agree 100%
However, I though it was a SDMB “no-no” to call anyone a “nazi” or even close to it- even in the PIT? OK, if Walloon was so rude as to correct MY grammar, I’d likely think even worse things about him. Dude- right or wrong- it is just plain RUDE.
Skip- the point is- “we ain’t talking in no latin”. Thus, although it is very nice to point out that “media” wouldn’t be a collective noun in the original latin- we usually “speka da inglish” around here. So how do you pronounce “guillotine”? As if you were french? or as if it is now a word that english “borrowed” and thus now has a legit english pronunciation? This is one of my pet peeves- unless you also pronounce “beef”= “boufe”.:dubious:
It’s not meant to be taken literally. Think Jerry Seinfeld and the Soup Nazi. Anyway, I did a search before posting and turned up lots of prior art in the Pit; I don’t recall any of the threads being locked or users being banned… if the practice has since been outlawed, I plead ignorance.
To call someone a “Nazi” does not neccesarily mean that their beliefs coincide with those of the National German Socialist Workers Party during Hitler’s reign.
If you are unable to see the figurative usage here I severely pity you.
I like Bryan Garner’s entry on media:
From A Dictionary of modern American Usage, p. 423.
Is Walloon British by any chance? I don’t think I’ve ever heard anyone use media- while refering to mass media- in the US as a plural noun before. It’s always the collective singular " the media," since it’s referring to one thing as a whole.
Recently, however, I’ve heard some hyper-correctness on the radio, and certain DJs have bizarrely started referring to singular band names in the plural format. " Incubus are releasing a new cd. " " Seether are going to appear on Letterman." Sure, there’s more than one person in the band, but it’s just one band.
Media, as it refers to TV, newspaper, internet, and other forms of information transmission, is plural. Those are all mediums.
The media, as it refers to CNN, New York Times, MSNBC, World News Weekly, Fox News, etc., is singular. It’s a collective noun. It is a new(ish) usage of the word, as the media hasn’t been a major force until recent years. Traditionalists, whose minds seem to be firmly planted in the time of Shakespeare, are slowly beginning to accept this particular bit of language change, as well as others.
I’m so glad this thread was started. I was reading a thread just the other day and noticed Walloon randomly correct someones grammer. The hell? It’s totally uneccesary and quite rude, IMHO. Most of us here on this board are not children, and would prefer not to be treated as such. :rolleyes:
And yes, I know the above post is chalk full of errors. And I don’t give a flying fuck. Take that Walloon!
Er, that’s ‘chock’…
It looks to me like Walloon just looks for posts that he can correct. The links I followed in the OP seem to support that. It’s not like he was contributing to the thread in any constructive way. The fact that he just pops in with a correction is what bothers me. :rolleyes:
There is a non-trivial reason for questioning the use of media’s number – the assumption that “the media” is a monolithic institution with a particular POV, as in “The liberal media never criticizes the Clintons the way they do the Bushes.”
But it can be used as a collective, which in American usage is singular, or as a grouping of “mediums” (excuse the solecism; the only thing a grouping of mediums would do is hold a collective seance) which is plural.
And the Congress are considering a law to make that official! 
Well, I don’t agree with the judgement that correcting another’s grammar is automatically rude (in the cases where the correcting person is at least trying to be polite), but I can definitely see where you (and others, obviously) might feel that way.
And, yes, I know we ain’t be speakin’ no funny dead jive no more (Vah! Denuone Latine loquebar? Me ineptum. Interdum modo elabitur.), but that wasn’t my point; nor was it ever that the language doesn’t ever change.
My points were thus:
1.) In my opinion, Walloon wasn’t rude in his corrections (from the posts I read), and…
2.) At this point in time, the acceptance of “media” as a collective noun isn’t quite there yet (at least by the majority of those who write the books to which we refer when we have questions like these; and it’s these experts to whom I normally defer), so his correction was, technically, correct.
That said, I really don’t mind that people use “media” as a collective noun; hell, I’m fairly sure I’ve done so myself many a time–and I’ll probably continue to do so in the future.
As I mentioned earlier in this thread: it’s no skin off my back what form of the language you employ. As long as I can understand your intent, it don’t matter to me.
Right. Recently covered in this thread.
Can you make the same statement with respect to books published in the last decade? or the last five years? I don’t know for sure, but I doubt it. The idea of media as incorrect in the singular has been losing ground for almost a century, and many current writers–as mhendo illustrated, citing an authoritative source published in 1998–accept as standard the usage of media as a collective singular. If you go back far enough, you can find a preponderating number of published grammarians supporting almost any outdated notion. But the language is dynamic, not static, as DanielWithrow has already argued very persuasively, and the fact that the older grammars use the old rules doesn’t neccessarily mean that the rules haven’t changed.
Admittedly, brianmelendez, I’m not at work right now, so my access to grammar books and/or guides is pretty much nada; thus I’m unable, tonight, to provide you with original publication dates. Still, I’m including the following links from various educational institutions and professional writers. True, not all of them actually mention the collective noun attribute of “media”, so take from them what you will.
And once again: I don’t disagree with DanielWithrow (or anyone else for that matter) on the fluidity of language evolution.
1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14.
My personal favorite is #9, where the author left out an article and failed to separate “the” from “media” so as to differentiate between the phrase and the word. But I included it because, hey, it agrees with me. I mean, everyone else does it.
Right?
I have nothing to add to the discussion except to say that
Perhaps naturalists are observing the behaviors of semicolons in the wild?
made me laugh out loud!
I laughed at it myself. It rather reminded me of a passage in one of Tom Robbin’s books where he mused about the rectal temperature of a bumblebee, and how, although it’s assumed the temperature is 110.8, no one really knows.
I still can’t believe that you don’t think it’s rude to jump into a thread just to correct someone’s grammar!
Do you correct people in everyday conversations?
Do you send people their letters and emails back with corrections?
Do you complain to the manager in the grocery store when the sign says “potatos?”
Geesh.
Well, no, but I won’t buy 'em either. I mean, if they need the quotes to make it clear that somebody else claims that they’re potatoes but that they won’t guarantee that they are themselves, I want nothing to do with those tubers!