The Importance of Punctuation and Grammar Could Be Life or Death!
 

Inspired by Jazuela, I thought it may be fun to add those wonderful miscommunications that have occurred due to small errors.

As George Bernard Shaw said: "The single biggest problem with communication is the illusion that it has taken place".

So, here is my first:

You know your stuff. (substituted stuff for the brown s word).

versus

You know you're stuff. (only works with the forbidden substituted word)

Let's eat grandma.

Let's eat, grandma.

It takes many ingredients to make Burger King great but, the secret ingredient is our people

I think that there are simply too many homophones around and they're causing problems...with their convolutions.




:D

So true - and on the last day of Gay Pride month no less!

I have learned from my professional life, that people who focus on punctuation simply do not understand the topic to make meaningful comments.

I learned from my professional life that people who are sloppy with their grammar, punctuation, and spelling are usually sloppy with other aspects of their work.

Empress Maria Feodorovna, wife of Tsar Alexander III once cleverly used punctuation to save a man from exile. Her husband had written an order that harshly sent a man into exile in Siberia.

It said, “Pardon impossible, to be sent to Siberia”.

All the Empress did was to move the comma:

“Pardon, impossible to be sent to Siberia.”

A book on the topic:
https://www.amazon.com/Eats-Shoots-L.../dp/0399244913

I put this right up there in the same category as Strunk and White's Elements of Style.

nope

Throw the dog over the fence a bone.

11 consecutive "hads". John, where Mary had had "had" had had "had had". "Had had" had had the teacher's approval.

Totally agree, I focus way more on informative content than the formality in wich it was delivered. And to call it life or death, well, that is absolutely ridiculous. Things like cancer are life or death, not punctuation?

Perhaps in your experience but not mine. People who couldn't write well were a liability.

While I tend to agree with those who downplay the importance in everyday speech and writing, we should be cognizant of the incredible importance that punctuation and grammer play in legal documents. As we get sloppier in our speech and everyday communications, I fear that at some point, misunderstanding is bound to occur. Perhaps even more of an issue is the misuse of vocabulary. Every day I hear news people and other announcers on TV use a word that has no correct application in the context it is used.