Learning English, especially as a second language, can be a little like standing on dinghy in a thunderstorm, shooting soggy paper arrows at a herd of squirrels stampeding across a faraway shore shrouded in fog. In other words, it's not easy. That's in great part because the English-speaking world doesn't have an ultimate language authority guarding it, which means new usages, new spellings, and (far less commonly) newly relaxed grammar rules that are useful or necessary naturally find their way into common use. This malleability is the feature that, more than any other, makes English unique. And the verbal adoption process is valuable because it constantly makes our language richer, more flexible, more interesting, and more expressive.

I accept this. And I tend to have a somewhat tolerant attitude toward English's changing rules. However, not every "new and improved" way of speaking and writing English works for... Click here to read the rest of this post at the Sunny Words Blog.

The Sunny Words Blog is authored by VAF member AnnaLisa of Sunny Words Writing Services.


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