I should probably apologize ahead of time, because this post is a complaint, and I learned long ago that nobody likes complaints. My mom's usual reply to grumbles like "Are we having peas again?" was "There are children starving in India," and when I was stupid enough to say something like "I'm bored," Dad always replied, "Oh, I can find you something to do." Having now grown old, I still complain, but my wife has become so used to it she pays no attention.
My complaint here, though, isn't about aches or pains or the weather. This one involves grammar, and language. Here it is:
I'm tired of people saying "for you and I" or "of you and I" or "to you and I" or "from you and I," etc. To phrase it as my high-school English teacher would've, you shouldn't use a subject pronoun when it's an object, and specifically a subject pronoun after a preposition. And it happens a lot.
I think I know why. Throughout childhood, we're taught not to say "Susie and me met at the park" or "Bob and me are going fishing" or "Dad and me like movies." It's supposed to be Susie and I, Bob and I, Dad and I. So when we have the need to say or write things like "They were shouting at Jane and me," we're tempted to substitute I for me, and say "They were shouting at Jane and I." Which is wrong.
What really bothers me is when this grammatical crime is committed by people who should know better. If the farmer being interviewed on TV after his barn's blown away says "And a dern tree almost landed on Stella and I," I don't mind that a bit. Not only has the man had a hard day, he's just a regular guy. But if the reporter who's interviewing him makes that kind of mistake, that's another matter. And believe me, I've heard this kind of screwup by politicians, news anchors, teachers, talk-show hosts, pastors, and salesmen, all of whom supposedly received an education and are now paid to get up in front of others and speak. That's their job.
NOTE: As most of you already know, the handy test for which pronoun is correct ("I'm rooting for you and me" or "I'm rooting for you and I") is to change the sentence a bit and say "I'm rooting for you and for ____." The answer's obviously for me, not for I, and if you say it aloud you immediately see that.
It especially irks me to see this mistake--a subject pronoun used instead of an object pronoun--in writing. The most common crime scenes, I think, are Facebook posts and Amazon product reviews. As a fiction writer, I don't mind (mis)using it in dialog because that's my character talking, but I wouldn't want to goof up that way in the rest of my story. Thankfully, we don't see it often in published works.
But it has happened. I can remember the me/I error occurring in both a song and a play. The song was "Hungry Eyes," by Eric Carmen, who at one point feels "the magic between you and I." (I like the song, but I guess me didn't fill the bill, in terms of rhyming.) And the play was The Merchant of Venice, in which one of the characters says something like "All debts are cleared between you and I." Even when the author is Shakespeare his ownself, between is still a preposition and the sentence is still wrong.
I saw a "don't" list long ago, when I first started writing for publication, of the seven worst grammatical mistakes. I can't recall all of them, but it included things like its/it's, lay/lie, less/fewer, etc. And high on the list was for you and I. This was almost thirty years ago, and I suspect that mistake would still be a top contender.
Question: Is this particular misuse irritating to anyone else? Do you tend to shrug it off, instead? As a writer, I make plenty of grammatical errors myself, so I'm not sure why this one bothers me so. (I wasn't even an English major--I graduated in electrical engineering.) But it does.
In closing, and in recognition of the fact that we should all complain less and be more tolerant of things we don't like, here's a piece of particularly elegant poetry:
If you must say "Between you and I,"
I won't stop you--I won't even try.
So just say it; feel free,
But don't say it to me
Or I'll shoot you and leave you to die.
Far more egregious to my way of thinking is the use of "me" as a subject in a sentence. "Annie and me went to the store." "Me and Joe shared a pizza." I hear this all the time, everywhere, from newscasters and media personalities to most of the younger generation. It's like fingernails on a blackboard to me. I know the language is meant to be fluid and ever-changing, but dear Lord, don't change in that direction!
ReplyDeleteI know. Being taught from childhood doesn't seem to matter, Jerry--folks still do this. Funny thing is, the same test works here: if you break up the sentence and say Joe shared a pizza and me shared a pizza, it's obvious you need an I instead of me.
DeleteAgain, I make a LOT of grammar mistakes--but I don't think I make this one.
You get no arguments from me, John. Something I am hearing more and more these days that really bothers me is the use of him or her when he or she would be correct. For example: Her and I went to the store. Her obviously should be she, and when I hear it, it grates terribly.
ReplyDeleteHey Barb. Glad to know this kind of thing bothers other folks too. (It does come in handy, though, in dialog . . .)
DeleteWhen I hear Hungry Eyes, I also notice that error every time. But the error that I hear lately that annoys me more is the usage of "myself" instead of "I." I keep hearing people say, "So-and-so and myself went to ....." Why are people suddenly saying "myself"?
ReplyDeleteMyself has been wondering the same thing. Seriously, Noreen, I have no idea why people are using it that way. Like Jerry, I suspect language may be changing in the wrong direction.
DeleteThe most fascinating thing to me, lately, is that EVERYbody seems to be using impact as a verb. In weather reports, news broadcasts, everyday life, etc. I know it's not grammatically incorrect, but I swear it bugs me. It's adding excitement and strength and pizzazz to things that sometimes just don't need it. A fiery, screaming meteorite might impact the earth, but a Saturday-night drizzle doesn't impact my dinner plans. It might affect them, but that's about it. Oh well--this should be filed in the pet peeves department.
Sigh. I used to be the secretary of a local theater group, and the President was a CEO who loved to use "myself" instead of either "I" or "me." Once she told me, "Be sure to forward that content to Gene and myself when you get it," and I replied "Will yourself read it?"
ReplyDeleteNobody in the room got it. Sigh again.
And don't get me started on "lie" and "lay."
It's enough to make my grammar roll over in her grave.
HA!! I love it. I wonder if herself did read it. I must remember that.
DeleteI'm sure my sweet 11th-grade English teacher, bless her soul, is rolling over like your grammar.
I was taught "you and I" in elementary school. Still use it, despite my grammar being criticized for other things.
ReplyDeleteIt's fine to use it, Justin--just don't use it the way we've been talking about here. I's a subject pronoun, not an object pronoun.
DeleteI once heard George W. say, in an network TV interview, that "an invitation was sent to Laura and I." President or not, it should've been "Laura and me."
What bothers me is that many of these who say, "John went to the meeting with Harry and I," think they are showing that they are "educated" and are too smart to ever use the word "me." Or they will substitute "myself." "Myself and John went to the store." "He said to myself . . . ."
ReplyDeleteIn the end, John, you may agree with I that you are downloading fluid against the tide.
Yep, I agree, Jim, and I realize it. And you might've just hit on one of the reasons people seem to be substituting "myself" for "I" quite a bit, nowadays. Maybe they're not sure whether me or I is correct and they're using myself to hedge their bets.
DeleteI'm probably blowing all this out of proportion--this has no great importance--but the fact remains that using phrases like "with Harry and I" IS annoying, and I wish folks who are probably smart in other ways would just stop doing it. Sighs and more sighs.
What I learned teaching grammar to adults as well as college kids: Nobody, and I mean nobody, knew what I meant when I said subject vs object of a sentence. So that was lesson one. I so agree, John. We are writers. We need to know our tools, just as carpenters need to know theirs. Melodie
ReplyDeleteMelodie, I honestly hated to even use the words subject and object in this post, because you're exactly right. The eyes of students (of all ages) seem to glaze over when you use those terms to explain something. Examples work a lot better, and I usually made sure my writing students knew "Talking to you and me" is RIGHT. "Talking to you and I" is WRONG--and don't write or speak that way.
DeleteBreaking grammar rules is okay sometimes, and we fiction writers are often required to--but we first have to KNOW the rules. (I'm sort of glad I'm no longer teaching . . .)
Well, I wouldn't shoot them - but it always bothers me.
ReplyDeleteTrue, Eve. What's surprising is that I hear it so often, in so many places, from so many different people. Also surprising is that I don't think things like this used to bother me at all. Can you spell "old and cranky"?
DeleteJohn, please tell me it wasn't Shylock who said that. Jewish children are taught better! On the other hand, George W. never surprised me. When Charlie says, "Give it to Lucy and I," I sometimes say, "Forget Lucy. Would you say, 'Give it to I?' or would you say, 'Give it to...'?"
ReplyDeleteThey probably are taught better, Liz!
DeleteAnd yes, you're right, forget Lucy! When it's said that way, it's so obviously wrong. Another test is, switch them around in the sentence. Nobody would ever say, "Give it to I and Lucy." Sighs, sighs, and more sighs.
I agree, John, that when hearing it from just a guy on the street, I can let that go. But people who make their livelihoods from language do the same thing, and repeatedly, so that it is more than just a slip of the lip. Then there are those who use you’re when your is called for, or those who believe every plural is formed by adding apostrophe s. And what bothers ne more is the apparent cavalier attitude toward the error. “. Doesn’t matter, you know what I meant.” But it does matter, especially coming from one who is supposed to know better.
ReplyDeleteGlad I'm not the only one who feels that way. Thanks for chiming in, here!
DeleteJohn, how much time and space do you have? Just this week, a member of my writers group misused the word lay, and not for the first time. The same writer frequently misuses pronouns. Grammar is no longer taught. A teacher in the city where I live said, "We're not allowed to teach grammar. We have to sneak it in." Plenty of teachers are grammar ignoramuses. Older folks who should know better butcher the language. Many of our elected officials should be thrown in prison for life for desecrating English. This would overcrowded our prisons, but at least we wouldn’t have to listen to them. The news anchors habitually slaughter the language. Newspapers must have fired all their editors and proofreaders. The examples of misspellings and grammar gone awry would fill a large library. Then there’s all the pronoun nonsense. You want to force me to use bad grammar to feed your ego? I don’t think so.
ReplyDeleteCouldn't agree more. I'm having a REALLY hard time adjusting to the use of "their," as in "Everyone goes their own way"--to me, that's mixing singulars and plurals. Yes, I know "his or her" or "his/her," etc. is clumsy, and I also know some prefer not to specify whether it's male or female at all . . . wow, I get weary just thinking about all this.
DeleteAs for schools not teaching grammar, all I can say is, that's a mistake. I even think not teaching cursive is a mistake. I keep picturing some archeology student a hundred years from now unearthing a stack of old handwritten letters and saying, "What the hell is this?"
So many disturbing language on the street that one can easily overlook 'me or I'...sometimes I think okay...it wasn't 'f--k I'. Sorry, if that's crude but what we hear and read now is so pitiful I can hardly believe they passed sixth grade. I confess, I don't think subject/object/prepositions/danglers or not when writing or speaking a sentence. Sometimes the character speaks like a fool and that works, too. But my angst is over what isn't being taught in schools anymore. It's embarrassing when the teacher's vocabulary is so limited/bad that some kids, groomed by parents, speak more intelligently than the educators. Some will say 'exaggeration'...but really, I've heard it now through two generations of kids. At any rate, 'I's happy with what 'me's' learned in school.
ReplyDeleteKnuckles cracked, most of the lessons stayed with me.
I'm forgiving too, unless it's somebody's job to write/speak correctly, in which case I think they need to know enough to do their job. And I agree that much of what we learned in school has stayed with most of us.
DeleteThanks for the thoughts!
So much disturbing language on the street....see I goofed. George W and I need to be forgiven.
ReplyDeleteI received an email last night from my friend and Criminal Brief colleague James Lincoln Warren. Our blogger system somehow wouldn't allow his comment here, but he told I could post it for him. Since JLW has forgotten more than I'll ever know about the English language--I've often gone directly to him for opinions on this kind of thing--I'm copy/pasting his comment in here:
ReplyDelete##########
English grammar is not fixed, but there are conventions. With regard to personal pronouns, in English, there are several to take into account. Pronouns in English operate differently from proper and regular nouns, i.e., they are still inflected according to their synthetic roots. They have subjective as well as objective, reflexive, and even possessive forms, that other nouns completely lack.
In grammar, when a verb connects a noun to a condition, that verb is called a “copula”. By far, the most common copula in English (and other languages) is “to be”. When using a copula in English, the proper convention is to use the pronoun object in the subjective case, i.e., “It is I”, and not “It’s me.”
Another exception to using the objective form is when making comparisons, e.g., “between you and I” as opposed to “between you and me”. But this is slippery.
Idiom should take precedence. In French, for example, “It is I” is completely wrong—it’s “C’est moi”—“it’s me”. I almost never use “It is I.”
Regarding reflexive pronouns, i.e., those terminating in “-self”, these should only be used when they follow a subjective pronoun and when used as an amplifier, e.g., “I went there myself” and not, “It was given to myself” when it should be “It was given to me.” But its completely correct to say, “It was given to me myself.” (Noting that the reflexive here refers to the objective “me” and not the subjective “I”.)
But the bottom line is to use whatever convention is best to convey a clear meaning to the reader, and when in doubt, to use the more proscriptive rule.
I feel your pain, comrade. I suffer from it every time I type.
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Thanks, Jim, for this comment!
Except when you say, "It is I, Vito Corleone." In this case, it's a Francis Ford copula.
ReplyDeleteBravo!
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