Die. Slow.

[channonyarrow]

I can't decide if I'm being genuinely critical or if I just hate everything and it's rubbing off, and combining with previous dislike. I think I'm going with the former, because the structure doesn't fucking work and makes me want to dust off my "This Is What A Story Of Any Length Is" essay that I back-burnered like, fucking ages ago, and then got un-pissed-off and forgot about it and finish it and post it for everyone's edification, and have it on hand to send to authors, and generally sort of rappel around and ninja it into people's faces, right after they say some variation of "Ooh, I'm writing a book, you know."

Seriously, yes. The structure doesn't work. It really, really doesn't work, and you should have more than one reason for telling a story, any story, I don't care if it's flash fiction, fan fiction, published fiction, random scrawling on the wall. I. Do. Not. Care. There must be more than one reason for a story.

And not only do I judge, I'm paid to judge.

So, you know.

In other random news: I now know of two people in the wide, wide world who use "done" where they mean "did", and I don't know how to comment on that, because part of me wants to say, politely, "I've seen that before, and I never asked her, why do you use done like that?" but most of me wants to slam the writer up against the wall, my arm over their throat, and lean real close and hiss "Repeat after me, motherfucker: 'did' is a perfectly valid word. It is the past present tense, singular, second, third, and plural, of 'do'. Why the fuck are you using a past participle like done instead?" And then I will slit the offender's throat and leave their body in a dark alley for the grammar wolves to find.

Or, to put it another way, "The more he done it, the better he got," makes no fucking sense unless your last name is Clampett. "He done this at some point (in the past)" also makes no fucking sense, and probably not even if your last name is Clampett.

And now I have to go done some stuff. It'll be marvy, fab, and far-the-fuck-out.

Comments

[lzz.livejournal.com]

Can I quote your first clause?

I also want a t-shirt saying, "Not only do I judge, I'm paid to judge". Or maybe just, "The Editor's decision is final". A lot of people seem not to have heard of that last phrase, oddly. I'm thinking I might dig out and dust off the old editorial classic: "It's not quite what we were thinking of".

[channonyarrow.livejournal.com]

You certainly may.

You know, I've been looking for a nice way of saying "YOU SUCK" to authors; I like that. "This is good, but it's not quite what I was thinking of."

This is, of course, only because I've finally had to wrest control of the book I'm working on from the author. It's not that I'm trying to "win" some kind of "my life so hard" contest, but...dude, this guy DOES NOT GET IT. He's expanding his answers like I want him to - in comments, not in text. I think he thinks he's going to make so much money on this that he can afford to fly around and explain the book to everyone. Knowing then what I know now, I'd totally have said "This isn't quite what I was thinking of."

I have a tshirt that says "Deathless God of Prose", because the author may think they are the god of deathless prose, but I am actually undead when I edit.

[tacky-tramp.livejournal.com]

"The more he done it, the better he got" makes perfect sense to lots of people. It's just not Standard American English, and therefore is not suitable for publication in a WOTC novel. :)

[channonyarrow.livejournal.com]

Well, since it hasn't turned up in a WotC novel, and since you and I have a long history of knowing that we differ in our opinions on grammar, I'd say, as I usually do, that the colloquial use of "done" in place of "did" makes the user sound like an absolute fucking idiot, but that's fine, it just means that there will be no one competent to argue against me when I finally become supreme dictator of the planet.

[tacky-tramp.livejournal.com]

Disagreeing about grammar is having an academic debate about comma placement or the use of "who" vs. the use of "whom." Declaring that speakers and writers of nonstandard English are "absolute fucking idiots" is about sociolinguistics, classism, and racism. Slight difference. :)

[channonyarrow.livejournal.com]

And? I still say that refusing to learn (or, worse, not being taught) proper grammatical structure is self-defeating. I mean, you can say anything you want to your friends (god knows I do; I'm hardly a model of proper grammar when speaking to my friends) but when you're presenting yourself to others - if you can't do it properly, you betcha I'm going to think you're a flaming idiot. You're presenting yourself as one. Most people in the world have only their word to represent them, whether that word is spoken or written, to people who don't know them. Why would you not put your best foot forward when you're introducing yourself to people who don't know you? I speak in cat macros; I wouldn't write my resume in them.

[tacky-tramp.livejournal.com]

There is a giant, huge, overwhelming difference between "refusing to learn" something and "not being taught" it.

The way Standard American English is taught in our public schools varies wildly from classroom to classroom. I'm sure I'm preaching to the choir if I say that much of our language arts pedagogy is horrid. Tons of parents speak nonstandard English dialects to their kids, and the kids learn those nonstandard dialects as their first language; then our schools do a terrible job building their fluency with SAE. Partially because we're still learning about effective teaching for linguistically diverse populations, and partially because we actively denigrate kids' native dialects. You know, by telling them they sound like "absolute fucking idiots" because they say "ain't" instead of "isn't," even though that diction difference has nothing whatever to do with intelligence.

I also blame "refusing to learn" on poor pedagogy, frankly. Teachers are telling kids they need to talk a certain way because that's The Right Way to Speak. Most kids don't care about that. Why should they? They communicate just fine in their daily lives, and their teachers aren't telling them why it's important for them to build fluency in SAE. Furthermore, significant social pressures sometimes exist to discourage them from speaking SAE, and the reality of the situation is, most kids value peer acceptance over pleasing their teachers. That doesn't make them stupid. It makes them human.

So no, people who speak an English dialect other than Standard American English are not "self-defeating." They simply lack a useful skill. Which is a shame, because there are self-important, privileged, classist, racist assholes out there who don't know the first thing about linguistics or language acquisition, who are going to decide that they're mentally deficient because they can't jump through certain grammatical hoops.

I feel strongly about this, as you can see.

I would really like for all people to be able to communicate clearly to one another. You might say that one barrier to that is the multitude of dialects we have in this country. I don't really buy that, because I don't have any trouble understanding people who say "ain't" instead of "isn't" or "We be goin' to the store" instead of "We are going to the store." No, the big barrier is some folks' insistence that one dialect is "proper" and the "best" way to speak. And their association of all other dialects with the stupid, lazy lower classes. That's not only linguistically unsound prescriptivist nonsense -- it's active prejudice.

[jacesan.livejournal.com]

I can see using "done" for "did" in a sentence, if the character saying it is uneducated, and you want to express that in your story.

Same as using the phrase "all y'all". I LOVE the expression, but damn if it doesn't sound like you've just come down out of the hills to stock up on supplies before heading back up to your cabin in the woods to remain completely isolated from the rest of civilization.

[channonyarrow.livejournal.com]

The main problem here is that it wasn't in a story, it was in a picspam.

Also, I get very Southern when I'm extremely tired, which is weird, but all of my family's "y'all" just comes out of my mouth and plays in the street. Odd, since I'm third-generation non-Southern. But before that? ALL Southern.

[jacesan.livejournal.com]

I use the expression whenever the opportunity presents itself. I had so much fun visiting my friends in Texas, and it's easy to pick up vocabulary and mannerisms when you're around others.

"I'm fixin' on going down to the giddy-up later on. All y'all are invited to come along if'n you want to."

[tacky-tramp.livejournal.com]

So this isn't about resumes or cover letters at all? I'm shocked.