Women, Grammar, Brothers, and Commas

I loved everything about this NYT piece by Sarah Lyall.*  Mary Norris' Between You & Me: Confessions of a Comma Queen will need to find a place beside some of the other unique grammar titles on my shelf after its release next Monday.

Last night during dinner conversation, I asked a friend if she was the "oldest child".  She responded that indeed she was the "eldest child" (with slight emphasis on the adjective) of her family.

I wonder what Ms. Norris would have to say about that.

*especially the bit about pet peeves

Lolly Lolly Lolly, Get your Adverb Here

Discovery of this article literally figuratively made my day.

'Literally' figuratively destroyed by program to remove the word's misuse: A new browser plug-in displays all instances of the much-abused adverb as its traditional opposite. It's a figurative blast via The Guardian

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Empire State of Mind

Girl in Translation by Jean Kwok was one of the books downloaded for last month's holiday but not started until my return.  Yesterday's luxury was two cafe con leches and a morning dedicated to Kimberly Chang's journey.  A young girl and her mom who leave Hong Kong for Brooklyn in search of a better way of life.  It sounds like a line from a movie trailer but the story is much richer than your typical Hollywood survival.  Long hours in a sweatshop factory with sealed windows, a debt to family who is willing to give an opportunity to move to the US but not to provide adequate living conditions, and a girl who is more brilliant that she allows herself credit through her school years, except for one powerful scene with her headmaster.

There were a number of things I liked about this book.  Kimberly and her mom faced the challenges in a day to day manner.  At the advice of a friend during a challenging period, I adopted this approach and found that days somehow managed to string into weeks and months and you one day find you've survived something you never thought possible when thinking about it in years.  I liked the measurement of items by the number of skirts.  I liked the direct translation of an expression into English.  I liked the characters, and I admired Kimberly's choices.  I'd like to give her mom a hug but perhaps a bow might be more suitable.  Ms. Kwok did a fantastic job of capturing my attention and reminding me of daily gratitude.

I hope you had a great weekend and found a bit of time to read, relax and be grateful.  

Club Conniption

By GBC N@ncy's account, this month's meeting was a success:

May I also tell you how nice I thought the book club evening was....Food was fabulous...and the discussion was especially interesting..Most of all I treasure getting together with this particular group of old friends...Priceless.

Author's Note: To clarify, old = longstanding.  We are all rather young at heart.

With continued inspiration from GBC Carole King (not the singer), yesterday's word of the day featured writers who have all had their time in the GBC reading water discussion circles. Presenting "conniption" via Dictionary.com.

Source: Dictionary.com

Cites Unseen

A friend of mine is tutoring grammar to young minds.  When speaking of verbs that end in "-ing", she sent me to pun jail for the phrase, "He should have gone to gerund."  Oh well, it was probably too obscure for the average middle-school student who is far removed from the diamond engagement.

A few of us are grammar nerds and I was surprised to learn via GBC K1m, that both MLA and APA have a proper format of citation when used as a reference.  [At this moment, my sister is twinging as she already has distaste for the use of Wiki in formal writing.]  While I don't know that this was the exact tweet link, it serves as a pretty neat example of how far we've come for the average English paper.

For further reference, you may want to consider adding A Grammar Book for You and I (Oops, Me) by C. Edward Good to your shelves.  Good is a writer in residence for a group of attorneys (which reminded me of a GBC member or two).

Enjoy the sunshine, and don't forget to punctuate properly. 

Comma Chameleon

One might hypothesize that reading a book about the development of grammar just before sleep might be a good move to lull one into slumber. Rather, I find that I have been staying up later to finish the next chapter. Fascinating to read how language started to find more structure in the 1650s (only to lose it again in the 2000s with the gross acceptance of text [my words, not Lynch's]).

Advice on social manners and on speaking proper English emerged together in the 1700s as more people wanted to differentiate themselves from illiteracy and gain acceptance with the upper classes. Various champions of structure emerged, and one wonders what their wives must have thought of these men who were obsessed by proper use of commas and of spelling. [No love notes laying around certainly.]

As you scan your brain today for the proper word, consider placement of that semi-colon, and avoid ending a sentence with a preposition, know that these rules were not easily forged and that many a writer was a rule-breaker. The Lexicographer's Dilemma, indeed.

[Note: it is quite intimidating to write about grammar when one is a rule-breaker.]

Babble Babel

When I first opened the box to reveal a trio of books, my first thought was, "Oh, I have made a mistake when writing." After discovering the gift note from one of my dear friends and GBC members, I quickly moved to "Presents!" I later learned this NPR review for grammarians was at the heart of inspiration for this package.

A Dictionary of Modern English Usage by H.W. Fowler has four columns devoted to prepositions at the end of a sentence. Even via social media with 140 character constraints, I try to avoid the ending preposition. The tweets where I fail haunt me like the memory of my fourth grade teacher with pencils in her hair. With my morning coffee, I have reviewed onomatopeia and ottava rima.

John McWhorter's Introduction to The Power of Babel compares language to cloud formations. I like clouds so I immediately started skimming to see whether the book included Finnish. (Hyvä.)

The Lexicographer's Dilemma by Jack Lynch is yet untouched save a check of the dedication. He gives nods to three great teachers; I wonder if any had pencils in their hair.

Thanks GBC P@1ge.

Re-wind

At least one of our members (GBC Paige) is familiar with a local writer and hairstylist extraordinaire: Kristin Russell. I wanted to pass along a link to her blog and in particular to her novel: Recovering Ramona. The book is available online through Chapter 17 and thus far has been a really good read.

This intention has now set me on a path pondering the many meanings of recovering:

* the obvious: cover again
* the hopeful: find again
* the well: better again


and the relationship of this word to the character, Ramona, and then subsequently (as I can occasionally be self-absorbed) to me. Recovery is an opportunity and I like the thought of that.

C'est Fini

I had promised you here that I would give you another update on Mango. By last Wednesday, I had used the program 530 minutes to study French and another 223 minutes devoted to Spanish. (No, I did not create my own spreadsheet for this; it is a program feature.) My objective after discovering Mango was to work through the 100 available French lessons and as many of the Spanish lessons as I had time (43). Typically, I would review three or four lessons each day, Monday through Thursday. Initially, I devoted three days to French and two to Spanish, but eventually Spanish was sacrificed in order to complete the French series.

Overall, the program is easy to use and offers a free way to work through conversational phrases using sound and sight in order to encourage learning. My vocabulary did grow, and I was able to practice pronunciation until my tongue was content. I do think I gained additional experience with the languages, however an upcoming field test will give me a better ability to gauge the outcome of these efforts.

On the flip side:

Minor user issue: Learning two languages at the same time is possible, however the lessons typically run parallel (at least in French and Spanish) so there could be some confusion with word choice.

Getting bigger: There are a few instances where the translation follows the wrong word resulting in an error in translation. This might be evident only if you had had previous training in the language. While I would like to cite a specific example, I did not have the foresight to note these slides which brings me to...

I would like to see these issues addressed: The "Bookmark Slide" feature does not work. Additionally, the lessons just end. After completing the 100th slide deck for French, the narrator gives you the impression that there would be another lesson using the familiar "If you feel comfortable with this lesson, move on to the next one." Finally, the order of the lessons seems a bit off for my travel needs. We reviewed "Thanks my love. Come sit by me" (Lesson 94) before lessons on interactions at the post office and customs (Lessons 97-100). Also, in the early lessons, background slides were included for verb conjugation and word usage explanation. At or near the middle of the course, this information is abandoned.

The final issues give me the impression that this program was conceived and built just far enough in order to try to get capital funding, however I will admit that this conclusion might be derived from my personal (software) experience. The quantity and the potential are there, but a few rough edges still remain.

hola!

As promised earlier last month, I spent some time perusing Mango, which is available through our library website. Access is granted with your library card and access code, and the portal is easy to navigate. One has the option to create an account in order to save your lesson progress. Current languages offered are: Mandarin, French, German, Italian, and (Latin American) Spanish. In a fairly short time, I was through the first three lessons which are offered in slide format with audio. The technique is a combination of read and repeat with options to replay any statements which are not clear. I was able to set my own pace and quickly move through any slides which I had felt as if already mastered. My preference was to use the keyboard rather than the mouse for more rapid navigation. [Despite the fact that we have been on a French kick lately with book club, I decided to revive my old Spanish language skills.]

Each lesson is around 85 slides, and it appears as though there are around 100 lessons for Spanish on the "in depth" (Complete) option. There is also a Basic alternate if one is traveling soon or has less time to devote to learning. The site also has a dashboard if you are interested in statistics like time spent, lessons learned, etc. [Ahem, math.]

Overall, I think Mango appears to be a very easy and gentle introduction to a language. I plan to keep moving through the lessons so perhaps another update will be due in a few weeks. Hasta luego!

Spanish Tuba

Friday night I was caught in a myriad of holiday event traffic downtown: Rudolf 5K Run, Christmas Parade, events at the Sommet and Ryman, and anyone else who had a craving for a take-out curry. The holidays seemed to be getting in full swing which left me thinking, "What about the tubas?" For several years each December we had a lunch concert of a Tuba Christmas at the downtown Main library and now, with my current schedule, I just might be able to attend. As it turns out, the Merry Tuba Christmas has changed venues and will play December 15 at the First Baptist Church with dual shows at 11 and 12:30.

Despite the change, my visit to our library website in search of a tuba did not leave me disappointed; I learned about Mango (and a selection of Nutcrackers on display but that's just creepy). Our library offers online learning for seven languages and the service has made New York Public Library's "Best of Reference List". I plan to give it a try just for the experience (and the blogging potential).