Tag Archives: survey

Introvert pedants?

Posted on March 29, 2016 by Carmen Ebner

Robin Queen and Julie Boland, both from the University of Michigan, recently conducted a study on attitudes towards spelling variation, which has now been picked up by The Guardian. What they call “typos” and “grammos” are errors everyone has come across when using the internet … Continue reading →

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The descriptive backlash

Posted on January 31, 2016 by Morana Lukač

Last month The Independent published a story featuring an email etiquette rule by Jonathan Tisch, a hotel magnate. According to Mr. Tisch, the one word you should never use to start emails is “I”. Referring to mentors, teachers and your own … Continue reading →

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What are your thoughts on the Microsoft grammar and style checker?

Posted on November 23, 2015 by Viktorija Kostadinova

In the past two years, we’ve been publishing a series of interactive features in the journal English Today as a way to engage more readers in issues of interest to our research project. (Past features can also be found on … Continue reading →

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Fresh from the English Today press: The dangling participle – a language myth?

Posted on November 19, 2014 by Carmen Ebner

The December issue of  English Today contains the latest feature article from our project in which I am discussing the acceptability of the dangling participle. Here are some of the main points addressed in the article The dangling participle – a language myth?: … Continue reading →

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Appropriate Usage – You decide!

Posted on February 18, 2014 by Carmen Ebner

The moment of truth has come. It is time to find out what YOU think about the English language and its usage? Is it fit as a fiddle? Or is it going down the drain? What do you consider acceptable and appropriate … Continue reading →

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Which online sources on language use do you consult?

Posted on April 9, 2013 by Morana Lukač

In 1995, Deborah Cameron made an observation which was years ahead of its time: “[The Internet] is an ideal arena for swapping linguistic trivia and debating matters of usage”. By now it is more than obvious that Cameron was right; … Continue reading →

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English Language Usage on Facebook – Survey

Posted on October 31, 2012 by Viktorija Kostadinova

In the beginning of the last century, some notable linguists and scholars, George Philip Krapp, Sterling Leonard, and Fred Walcott, to name a few, expressed their cogent views on the relativity of linguistic correctness. Correct language is not something absolute, … Continue reading →

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Better questions, better surveys…

Posted on May 29, 2012 by Robin Straaijer

In our usage polls we use the same criteria of acceptability as those of the survey from which they are taken, Mittins et al.’s Attitudes to English Usage. We ask you to rate usage items according to whether they are … Continue reading →

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