Slovenly speech, incorrect grammar etc.

Can I ask you people? In death in paradise the island is Saint Marie. Should it not be Sainte Marie?

This business of people answering the question "How are you" with "good" I feel like asking "good at what". Then "quite unique", it's unique or it isn't. "Different to" drives me mad. "Reflect back" - can one reflect forward? Ending sentences with" from" ire Where did it come from" should be" From where did it come", don't end sentences with prepositions. I could go on for pages but will stop now.

I saw a notice at the local leisure centre which said 'please may you put your belongings in the lockers provided.'
'May you' !!! Whatever next!!!

There's a lot of confusion between 'may' and 'might' nowadays and it can only get worse, though primary school children are learning more grammar than ever with the recent emphasis on SPAG (spelling, grammar and punctuation) in SATS.
The rule about not ending a sentence with a preposition is completely out-dated. Imagine meeting a stranger and asking, 'From where do you come?' I am sure you'd get some very strange looks.
I quote none other than Sir Winston Churchill: ^ When criticised for occasionally ending a sentence on a preposition, h replied, "This is the type of errant pedantry up with which I will not put." Churchill's reply satirizes the strict adherence to this rule.^

Fings ain’t wot they used ter be! .......i luv all wot u has posted.

On the matter of teaching children the difference between the "f" and "th" sounds – as in fink and think – I once chatted to small boy who told me that he had collected some tadpoles and now he had "thour throgs".

Defiantly instead of definitely!

But the way people speak is partly to do with where they grew up and the local accent, nothing to do with poor parenting!

Magrithea - I have to disagree. As children develop they often mispronounce words. It is up to the parents to correct speech in the same way as we would correct any other mistakes.

"One pence" has me foaming at the mouth! It's singular, for goodness sake. One PENNY, please! I heard Jeremy Vine say this on R2 yesterday and was so busy shouting at the radio that I completely missed the rest of the item.

Oh, and when did "signpost" become a verb? (He was signposted to the Customer Service department, etc)

People that have 'windows' in their diaries tickle me too!
Also 'it is what it is' to me states the blatantly obvious but 'I know where they're coming from' so I'm 'good'

My DC talk about having 'issues' when they mean problems. Sounds vaguely medical to me ! And alternate for alternative as well as in Ive got an alternate plan.! Sounds as if he changes his plan every other day. An Amercanism I think!

Looking back in retrospect
Forward planning
Very unique

All of these leave me cross

She "was sat on the floor". No. She was sitting on the ground!

She "laid on the bed". No. She lay down on the bed.

I think it is always valuable to know the rules before you decide to break them. Many poets, including Shakespeare, broke rules about the use of language to great effect. Just as many painters and musicians knew the rules before they broke them. It is important to know what you are doing.

mabon1. Do you really say “from where did it come?” That should be “from whence did it come?”, surely? I’m an old rebel, I say “where did it come from?” ?

Pollyperkins I do agree especially about "issues". 'Issues' is a metaphor which has become debased by inappropriate usage. 'Issues' meaning problems or troubles is still a good metaphor when the word refers to a source problem from which the other problem or problems issue. Like a wound issues blood or pus.

My most hated speech defect is the glottal stop, or missing "t". E.g. par*y, nine*een, li*le etc.
"Would of" and "should of" both give me apoplexy.
At grammar school in the 1950s I was taught "similar to, different from" but apparently it no longer applies.
But the worst is "HAITCH". As in HaitchBos, HaitchR2,
HaitchIV etc. OMG, whatever happened to Aitch?

I'm a bit of a glottal stopper. but I never say would of or could of.

Some of the examples quoted are, I agree, examples of incorrect speech - such as prostrate for prostate. However, language does evolve. If you listen to recordings from the 1950's, people speak completely differently. Many people had cut-glass accents which, by today's standards, sound very affected.

I like to speak reasonably well so I can be understood by anybody but without a posh plum in my mouth.

I love the variety of accents we have in the UK and other English speaking countries.

My favourite is Chester draws

grannyben ?
My current irritations when it comes to spoken English on the BBC are ter for to and beginning a sentence with So
When My DC went to school in Scotland they had to relearn the alphabet. Aitch, Eye, Jay became Hitch Eye Jeye (to rhyme with eye)
Nostalgic strains from Rex Harrison in My Fair Lady and why can't the English teach their children how to speak and to set a good example to people whose English is painful to your ears. The Scotch and the Irish leave you close to tears. There even are places where English completely disappears, In America they haven't used it for years.

grannyben I don't know where your GCs went to school in Scotland but at no time did I learn or teach Hitch Eye Jeye!

Pacific instead is specific

Long and thin instead of long and narrow always makes me yell at the tv. I've never seen a thin room or garden, any more than I've seen a fat one!

I am stood here, I am sat here, and worst of all, every time I turn on radio 4 there is a wretched American speaking, I use the term lightly, we have wonderful regional accents, we have Welsh, Scottish, Irish accents, why do we have to have loud opinionated yank voices that grate and irritate, stay in America and leave us to our own melodious accents.