Grammar that makes you cringe

[cygnet]

Or build out

In Usanian retail development-speak, to "build out" means to construct tenant improvements within a "shell building" or vacant space.

If it's within a shell building, that's back to front – you're actually building in from the outside! But at the same time it makes perfect sense.

It's like fit out, but with structure and not just interior design.

[Kim]

Okay, this one does make me cringe. And vomit. Even though it's grammatically flawless.
"Sexually challenged people" as a euphemism (or rather a dysphemism – I'd like to say "cacophemism") for gay, bi, otherwise non-heterosexual people.

I think I remember that one from The Official Politically Correct Dictionary & Handbook, a problematic piece of satire I encountered at a formative age.

[Cudzoziemiec]

I don't remember The Official Politically Correct Dictionary & Handbook but I do remember a fashion in the 90s for describing all sorts of characteristics as "... challenged" eg "vertically challenged" for short. Perhaps that originated with this book? It could also be somewhere like that that this person got the "sexually challenged" phrase, as he was using it in a way which indicated he thought it was a good way to refer to people, and English is not his first language.

[citoyen]

"Sexually challenged" is one of those phrases that says more about the person using it than the people it purports to describe.

[hatler]

See also "woke".

[Cudzoziemiec]

This is interesting. From a Graun article about Korean words included in the OED:

The inclusion of “skinship” is more surprising. Commonly used in South Korea, where it is rendered as seukinsip, and Japan (sukinshippu) it captures the emotional bond that comes from close physical contact between a parent and child, lovers and friends, the dictionary said.

When does a word become Korean (or Japanese or French or whatever)? Do Koreans consider seukinsip to be a Korean word or an English one? Or maybe just a Korean word of foreign origin? See intelligentsia, cul-de-sac, etc. Also, we have ways of expressing the idea of skinship in English, but only in a phrase. Why have we never developed a single word for it on our own?

[T42]

Meanwhile, a New Scientist entry in FB reveals a less-than-PC attitude towards the people who kept up their gout supplies when Napoleon put his foot on the claret pipeline:

"The Azores, some 1400 kilometres off the west coast of Europe, were settled by the Portuguese in the 1400s, but now there’s evidence people had lived there 700 years earlier" (my italics).

[Cudzoziemiec]

I don't think there's anything wrong with that. It just says the first people to settle in the Azores were not the Portuguese around 1400 but some other people around 700.

[T42]

Other makes a difference. But what the hell, PC is a straitjacket anyway.

[citoyen]

Other makes a difference.

I'm with Cudzo on this - I think that's implicit.

[Bluebottle]

249 pages in, and I have not read them all (so cannot guarantee that this has not been metioned before*), but I have always assumed that this thread shoul dhave been titled "grammar what makes you cringe."




*probably has...

[T42]

Other makes a difference.

I'm with Cudzo on this - I think that's implicit.

Yeah. Tend to agree but it was a dull day.

[Cudzoziemiec]

The Oxford comma is a stylistic thing. It's part of the house style of OUP, hence its name. All three of your lists above are correct (IMO), use whichever you prefer – or whichever is the preference of whoever is paying you – just be consistent (within any one text).

[Auntie Helen]

Classic example for use of Oxford comma is in a book dedication:

To my parents, the Queen and God.
To my parents, the Queen, and God.

The second shows you are not a deity/monarch.

Other than that, I don’t like the Oxford Comma at all as it breaks the flow when reading.

[T42]

The Oxford comma is a stylistic thing. It's part of the house style of OUP, hence its name. All three of your lists above are correct (IMO), use whichever you prefer – or whichever is the preference of whoever is paying you – just be consistent (within any one text).

ISTR that Inspector Morse favoured it. That probably didn't come across on TV.

[citoyen]

I agree with Cudzo.

Slightly different point on use of commas but this has reminded me of the popular beat combo called Let’s Eat Grandma, whose name is a grammatical joke.

[Kim]

I reckon the Slovak approach is much more sensible, but the Oxford comma is a mostly harmless and occasionally necessary disambiguation hack.

[hellymedic]

I like and use Oxford commas.

[hatler]

"I like, and use Oxford commas", surely ? 

[Nuncio]

I may be wrong but I'd have thought it only comes into play when you have a list of 3 or more things. There can be no ambiguity - of the type which the Oxford comma aims to avoid - when there are only two items.

[Mr Larrington]

The Gammon  comma ,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, on the other hand ,,,,,,,,, should make everyone cringe.

[The French Tandem]

Have you heard of the Oxford comma?

I learned to speak english in far-northern America, but never heard of this Oxford comma, I rather learned to list things like the way you call British. Maybe it's a relatively new thing?

Apparantly, without the Oxford comma Americans are uncertain as to whether there are three or four items in the list.

For me, there are three items in A, B, C or D, but four items in A, B, C and D, with or without an extra comma. Are the Americans confused between the meanings of "and" and "or" ?

[The French Tandem]

Your example is perfectly clear for me. How can "A, B, C and D" mean 3 items for some people is not clear.

[Kim]

Your example is perfectly clear for me. How can "A, B, C and D" mean 3 items for some people is not clear.

To use a notation that avoids the ambiguity, it's the difference between {"A", "B", "C", "D"}  and  {"A", "B", "C and D"}


"For dessert we have ice-cream, CAKE, cheese and biscuits."  Are cheese and biscuits two items, or one item consisting of two parts?

[Cudzoziemiec]

It's possible to have ambiguity with only two items. "I like macaroni and cheese. But I don't like macaroni and cheese." Though in this example you can avoid the ambiguity by being American and calling the dish "mac and cheese".