"Trendy" illiteracy, where will it all end, and what are its consequences ?

[Justin Smith]

You are confusing design with illiteracy.

 

Everyone is welcome to, and should have an opinion on design, but it is still not illiteracy.

 

Eh, no, it`s illiteracy, under no circumstances should Derbyshire be written derbyshire, not by those who should actually know.

But worse, far far worse, it`s encouraging, or at least not discouraging, those who don`t know better, that its "correct English".

Which it isn`t.

[Obelix]

Indeed they do. (And I can read and understand Chaucerian High English in the original) but when I was hiring people, I didn't give twopwenny damn about their understanding of OHG (or OHE, if you like.)

 

I expected the people I hired to be able to speak the language which was in common use during the 1960s. If they couldn't, they didn't stand a chance of getting hired.

 

If U spk txttlk n U wrt 2 me 4 a job, don't hold your breath.

 

I'm retired (so you can let the breath out) but I suspect that there are more employers who would prefer literate employees than there are who will 'Just take anybody off the street'.

 

The proof of the pudding?

 

 

I work a simple premise. If you can't be bothered to write it properly, then I can't be bothered to read it. Whilst the occasional spelling and grammar error is perhaps inevitable, if you send me a string of incoherent words that has no structure then I'll just bin it.

 

If that's a job application, that's your loss not mine. If you can't even write with a modicum of care in something as formal and important as that then I surely won't let you loose on a customer where you will do the self same thing again.

[Kaimani]

Eh, no, it`s illiteracy, under no circumstances should Derbyshire be written derbyshire, not by those who should actually know.

But worse, far far worse, it`s encouraging, or at least not discouraging, those who don`t know better, that its "correct English".

Which it isn`t.

 

think it's more design than illiteracy. like people calling themselves Tre Songz, Thugz, or things like Phones4U sort of stuff.

[Justin Smith]

think it's more design than illiteracy. like people calling themselves Tre Songz, Thugz, or things like Phones4U sort of stuff.

 

Whatever it is, or isn`t, they should hang their heads in shame.

Actually, I`ve just thought of an amusing sidelight to this.

If the particular design consultancy got a job application from a yoof who writes in all lower case, what would they think ?

Would they possibly grasp that they had, in some small way, contributed to the yoofs illiteracy ? ! ?

[Kaimani]

Whatever it is, or isn`t, they should hang their heads in shame.

Actually, I`ve just thought of an amusing sidelight to this.

If the particular design consultancy got a job application from a yoof who writes in all lower case, what would they think ?

Would they possibly grasp that they had, in some small way, contirubted to the yoofs illiteracy ? ! ?

 

they most certainly would trash the application!!! i get what you mean, J.

like they say, to break the rules you must know what the rules are. you know, i know. but the problem is the yoof don't seem to be learning the rules so they can break them with better flair, i think.

[Chris_Sleeps]

Would they possibly grasp that they had, in some small way, contributed to the yoofs illiteracy ? ! ?

But they haven't contributed to youth illiteracy. I like playing with words. I've written "Happy Mudder's Day" on my Mum's card. If she thinks Mother is really spelt 'Mudder' then I'm not responsible for that. The only case that would be relevant is if I was her only teacher, and I had taught her that "this is correct way to spell Mudder".

 

You can't be responsible by proxy.

[Tony]

The job applicant to a design consultancy may well submit work in lieu of a CV. It might say "derbyshire" in it and be thought wonderful.

 

That's the thing about design y'see, it's not illiteracy.

[spindrift]

Oh I agree, spelling and grammar is getting worse all the time, what really gets my goat though is people who can't tell the difference between your and you're!

 

there is no excuse for any adult to make this rudimentary error.

[Eater Sundae]

there is no excuse for any adult to make this rudimentary error.

 

In a previous role at work, my responsibilities included the checking and approval of technical reports and similar documents, before they were issued to clients and other external organisations. I recall one such report where the writer had used terms such as 'would of' instead of 'would have'. I corrected these and then had to actually explain the problem to the writer. He simply didn't know it was wrong.

 

This was a professional engineer. He is someone with a Master of Science degree and memebership of the associated professional body, which requires additional training and responsibility. However, a fairly basic mistake had been allowed through the education and training net. At the time I was surprised, but as time has gone on I have become less so.

 

I also used to be involved in the assessment of job applications. As others have said, badly prepared applications were unlikely to be successful. I didn't actually just bin them as some others would, but when shortlisting from a large group, bad grammar and spelling counted against them. An employee would be expected to write reports and letters which would be read by Clients. How the company appears to these Clients is critical for future work. We simply cannot afford to appear unprofessional and incompetent.

 

Forums, personal emails etc don't matter. Employment often does.

[denlin]

Just seen on other thread somebody put could of instead of could have. I thought it was script for an episode of Coronation Street. You ought to see some of the notes some of my colleagues add to customers details. Phone speak, no capital letters, no apostrophes, no full stops. You need a degree to decipher them. The idea of putting any notes on system is for it to be clear and concise so that others can read and understand it:roll: