Klarinet Archive - Posting 000053.txt from 2000/12

From: Karel Vahala <vahalakv@-----.au>
Subj: Re: [kl] War of the Tony`s
Date: Fri, 1 Dec 2000 21:11:22 -0500

Neil, I think it is you who is getting emotional over over the apostophe.
When I thanked Tim and Gavin for their support, I was referring to the
factual information they supplied. Don't get so petulant about being found
wrong, it happens to all of us.

To illustrate the ridiculousness of your idea that "Tony's" can mean the
plural of Tony, please interpret to yourself the following: "Tony's
clarinet's tone is rich". How many people and clarinets do you understand
this to refer to? Then again: "Tonys' (or Tonies') clarinets' tone is dark"
?The point of complaining about the apostrophe is that its misuse alters the
meaning of words, and the wrong application of it misinforms the reader.
Context does not excuse an error, which may lead to wrong interpretation in
more significant instances. Language has progressed from grunts to precise
meaning through application of rules, and disregard of these rules is a
backward step.

I wonder if Tony Pay could get one of his Oxford friends to give us some
help?

Karel.

PS Neil, this is not a personal "vendetta". I do feel strongly about the
loss of precision in the use of language.

Neil Leupold wrote:

> --- Karel Vahala <vahalakv@-----.au> wrote:
>
> > Tim and Gavin, thank you for your support.
>
> Support? This is not an issue where the number of people you
> can sway to repeat your assertion has an impact on the correct
> answer. In fact, no issue should be subject to such dyamics,
> in my opinion. Such emotion over a simple linguistic techni-
> cality -- remarkable -- but facts, in general, are immutable.
> I misled nobody with my original statement and, for the record,
> English is not a second language to me. An apostrophe is not
> merely a grammatical device to denote the possessive case in
> the English language, nor merely for grammatical correctness
> in the cases of contractions and ommissions. You're clinging
> to grade-school dogma, drilled so thoroughly into your psyche
> that it is doubtless difficult to accept that English is not
> nearly as concretely defined or applied as you were originally
> led to believe. 'Frustrating, I know, although in this partic-
> ular case, the correct usage is very concretely defined and not
> subject to debate. I, too, was perplexed and puzzled through-
> out elementary and middle school by this apparent abuse of Eng-
> lish -- in textbooks, in written comments by English instruct-
> ors, and in other printed media of innumerable sorts.
>
> Gavin Rebetzky alluded to the correct answer when he parsed the
> dynamics between proper vs. common nouns. Converting 'pony'
> to 'ponies' is correct usage. Converting 'Tony' to 'Tonies'
> is not, and simply tacking an 's' onto the end of a proper noun
> is also incorrect relative to the plural form , i.e.; Tonys.
> The only solution in the English language for this inconsis-
> tency between common and proper nouns is to use the apostrophe.
> Hence, Tony's -- and Neil's, believe it or not. If there were
> two of me, there would not be two Neils standing before you.
> The key issue here is context, not a set of dogmatic rules
> that were set in concrete by Ms. Wizbicky back in the second
> grade. Q.E.D. In the case of "War of the Tony's," the context
> makes it plain that the writer intended to pluralize a proper
> noun, and she "properly" did so. Get over it.
>
> -- Neil
>
> P.S. This application of the apostrophe also applies to plurals
> of: numbers, letters, and abbreviations.
>
> Do You Yahoo!?
> Yahoo! Shopping - Thousands of Stores. Millions of Products.
> http://shopping.yahoo.com/
>
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