To the editor:
Re: "Evolving English can be grating 'on accident,'" May 29.
Bravo to Mr. Claxton for "flipping out about grammar and word usage," expressing his lingual discomfort with the increasingly common misuse of the phrase "on accident." I sympathize with Mr.
Claxton, cringing as I do at another much more widespread grating grammatical assault on the English language, namely the ever so pervasive violation of the "subject-verb-agreement" which as a basic grammatical rule states that a singular subject takes a singular verb, while a plural subject takes a plural verb.
To wit: There is ways to save money (incorrect). There are ways to save money (correct) .
Sadly, said grammatical error (whether "by accident" or "on purpose") has been spreading over the past few years to the spoken word and this language malady has now started to infest even the printed word.
With the growing trend of language delinquency in our increasingly careless vernacular, I challenge Vancouver Courier readers to listen carefully to the spoken word on radio and television. You will discover that 'there is' (instead of 'there are') not many voices (if any) paying attention to this particular grammatical rule.
What's worse, I find myself occasionally falling into the same grammatical trap I am complaining about.
Edward Bopp, Tsawwassen
