I caught Channel 5’s The Wright Stuff earlier on today — not literally, but while I was eating a late breakfast with the TV on. Doh!
The presenter, Matthew, was asking for views on the coalition’s plans to mark down pupils for poor grammar and spelling as part of the education reform proposals. As a practising wordsmith who verges on the anal side of being pedantic, my ‘editor-antennae’ had no choice but to switch themselves on automatically.
For once, I wholeheartedly agree with the coalition. Pupils should get a rap for not being ‘bovard’ to use correct spelling, punctuation and grammar. However, teachers, past governments, and the current ‘mamby-pamby’ teaching system should share some responsibility. Let’s face it, the dismal standard of teaching in our schools during the last few decades has a lot to answer for.
Case in point: it has been reported that most employers are increasingly concerned about the poor standard of literacy among job applicants, the majority of whom don’t seem to be able to construct a simple sentence correctly, let alone consider the implications of a misplaced apostrophe.
The point is, if your copy is going out into the public realm and is to represent either yourself or an organisation, it really shouldn’t be riddled with errors. While the occasional typo needn’t be the end of the world, inattention to detail and sloppy copy will confuse readers (and even annoy them).
As one reader referred to as ‘Jaded’ perfectly sums up (in response to an online forum debate): “Poor grammar and spelling, whether intentional or not, are like CAPITAL LETTERS. They slow down comprehension. ”
The English language is wonderfully rich and meant to evolve, but that doesn’t mean it should be abused because of simple ignorance (or even pure disdain). Attention to detail always counts.
“But who cares if people can get the general meaning across?” you might argue.
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