Thread: Prolly????

Actually, we don't have an official language (though we ought to). But I do agree, nuclear oughta be easy to say.

Originally Posted by gugi

Though the two words I've got an issue with are 'nucular' and 'Democrat' used as an adjective. The second is much worse, as to me a desire for political slur can never justify this level of disrespect to one's language. So I have little sympathy for people who complain that they need to 'press 1 for english' yet cannot demonstrate a command of that language.

Kind of like calling someone a 'Republican' as a slur? Is that what you mean?

The one that really irks me is 'pacific' for 'specific'. It makes me want to bludgeon them with a big book of grammar when someone says "I pacifically wanted the red one".

Originally Posted by JMS

Kind of like calling someone a 'Republican' as a slur? Is that what you mean?

Come on you're on a mac it's f12 away
So, here it is spelled out:

Democrat = noun
Democratic = adjective
Republican = noun, adjective

When you call a person Democrat it's correct and fine. When you say the 'Democrat party', instead of 'Democratic party' it is wrong, and the only reason it is used in the US politics of late is because of the ending on 'rat'.

I'm surprised US doesn't have an official language, but may be that's true. How do students in school get graded then? Based on "Webster's" dictionary? Or is it at the full discretion of the teacher?
After all if you can imagine only one way to spell a word, you're clearly lacking an imagination.

In my country there's an institute at the national academy of sciences that decides what is correct and what isn't. They publish a dictionary, and even though nowadays everybody can publish whatever they want, that dictionary determines what is correct and what is not. There are rules where you put the commas, etc.. I used to have a book on correct (american) english grammar. It was written by a professor at one of the Ivy league schools, although he's long dead and I imagine that there's more development. Hmm, speaking of which, wasn't there a book 'Eats, shoots & leaves'? Anybody read it? Where did she get the rules from, has to be a preface or something?

prolly is a shortened form of probably. for whatever reason, the word probably is more difficult to type on a qwerty keyboard than other words of a similar length, most likely due to letter placement.

because of this, as typing culture became more evolved, this became an accepted contraction, akin to cannot->can't, etc. Many people don't actually say "probably" they say "probly" and from there the progression is easy to see.

I am a software engineer, and I see this word all the time in official documents that programmers have created. I am also inclined to use it myself, most of the time I don't really notice it. It should be noted that many people in my trade actually speak typing contractions from time to time, although the majority of these takes the form of TLAs. Sorry for any confusion

Think we could make any money opening a diction academy?

prolly nt imho

Originally Posted by gugi

Come on you're on a mac it's f12 away
So, here it is spelled out:

Democrat = noun
Democratic = adjective
Republican = noun, adjective

When you call a person Democrat it's correct and fine. When you say the 'Democrat party', instead of 'Democratic party' it is wrong, and the only reason it is used in the US politics of late is because of the ending on 'rat'.

I'm surprised US doesn't have an official language, but may be that's true. How do students in school get graded then? Based on "Webster's" dictionary? Or is it at the full discretion of the teacher?
After all if you can imagine only one way to spell a word, you're clearly lacking an imagination.

In my country there's an institute at the national academy of sciences that decides what is correct and what isn't. They publish a dictionary, and even though nowadays everybody can publish whatever they want, that dictionary determines what is correct and what is not. There are rules where you put the commas, etc.. I used to have a book on correct (american) english grammar. It was written by a professor at one of the Ivy league schools, although he's long dead and I imagine that there's more development. Hmm, speaking of which, wasn't there a book 'Eats, shoots & leaves'? Anybody read it? Where did she get the rules from, has to be a preface or something?

I misunderstood.
Your use of the word slur through me off! You know, using the word to to be insulting, Like saying "your such a democrat"

Sorry.

Originally Posted by gugi

Come on you're on a mac it's f12 away
So, here it is spelled out:

Democrat = noun
Democratic = adjective
Republican = noun, adjective

When you call a person Democrat it's correct and fine. When you say the 'Democrat party', instead of 'Democratic party' it is wrong, and the only reason it is used in the US politics of late is because of the ending on 'rat'.

I'm surprised US doesn't have an official language, but may be that's true. How do students in school get graded then? Based on "Webster's" dictionary? Or is it at the full discretion of the teacher?
After all if you can imagine only one way to spell a word, you're clearly lacking an imagination.

In my country there's an institute at the national academy of sciences that decides what is correct and what isn't. They publish a dictionary, and even though nowadays everybody can publish whatever they want, that dictionary determines what is correct and what is not. There are rules where you put the commas, etc.. I used to have a book on correct (american) english grammar. It was written by a professor at one of the Ivy league schools, although he's long dead and I imagine that there's more development. Hmm, speaking of which, wasn't there a book 'Eats, shoots & leaves'? Anybody read it? Where did she get the rules from, has to be a preface or something?

For some reason, it is considered racist for us to insist upon a national language. Sort of flies in the face of the whole integration and melting pot thing.

Originally Posted by Quick Orange

It's punk/text speak for probably. If you hang out with younger, lazy people enough, they actually do use it in conversation. It's enough to make you tear your hair out.

Maybe you should use a razor!

Originally Posted by Utopian

Maybe you should use a razor!

I think strop would do. At least it has proven track record as 'attitude adjustment' device, as seen here

I'm not sure why insisting on using english for official purposes is racist though. Unless there isn't really a formal official language in US. It's a federation though, so if there were never rules on what language the federal documents ought to be, it makes sense that once there is a large minority among the citizens that has different language it's got to be taken into account. As far as I know virtually all countries including federations have official language(s) that's written in laws.
But it seems that people here prefer as minimal federal regulations possible.

Here's the government data on US population:

Languages: English 82.1%, Spanish 10.7%, other Indo-European 3.8%, Asian and Pacific island 2.7%, other 0.7% (2000 census)
note: Hawaiian is an official language in the state of Hawaii