Wednesday, April 29, 2009

Italics and the English Language

One of our commenters---and one I could live without ever hearing from again---once mentioned among her criticisms of meself that I regularly use italics for a word in a sentence, as if this makes me some sort of language snob, or a soapboxer.

Actually, it's an attempt to make myself understood, imagining how a sentence might be understood by the casual reader. The written word, and the internet itself, creates so many misimpressions, especially when people don't read your whole thought, don't care to understand your thought, but are only interested in finding some petard to hoist you upon.

I ran across this, which explains it all:

"I never said she stole my money" has 7 different meanings depending on the stressed word...


Hehe. There are only 7 words in that sentence, and you need to stress one of them. Word up---italics are good.

4 comments:

Phil Johnson said...

.
You might qualify as a NeoCon in some certain sense.
.

Naum said...

Wow, a post criticizing a poster for not using italics.

What's next? An article decrying the usage of CAPITALS.

Maybe you can craft a AC STYLE GUIDE and publish it too.

A-DISGRUNTED-READER-BECAUSE-OF-TVD said...

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!! Perfectly said, Naum. I for one am so tired of Tom Van Dyke's arrogance. He's the most self-absorbed person on this site and he drives virtually everyone mad with his self-righteous banter.

I agree with Naum and Pinky 100%.

Tom Van Dyke said...

Disgrunt away, Mr. Pseudonym.

And no, I didn't criticize anyone, Mr. Naum. It was I who was criticized for using them. It's amazing how people can jump down my throat for virtually nothing, because they're frustrated that they can't come up with intelligent arguments against my POV. You compliment me, sir.

That was funny, Pinky.