This week in grammar news, some schoolkids decided to make Twitter slightly less annoying by correcting celebrities' Tweeted grammar mistakes.
DON'T WORRY! THIS IS NOT BEING DONE IN AMERICA, where we long ago stopped caring whether our kids "learn" anything at "school," just so long as the deficit is only increased by the amount of drones we build to secretly target citizens for death without due process. (That's how budgeting works.)
This is being done in Brazil, where, surprisingly, they care about American celebrities and English grammar. I say "surprisingly" because if you Google Image Search "Brazil" you will find...
... I just realized that if you "Google" the word "Google," as I did to begin that search, that "Google" is not the top result for a search for "Google." Instead, "Google Maps" is the top result for a search for the word "Google" which means, if I understand how Google works (I don't), that most people searching for Google Maps type the word "Google" into their search bar.
Which means that people who want to use Google Maps are too lazy to type the entire phrase "Google Maps." This is in a country which 150 years ago saw our forefathers and foremothers and foresons and foredaughters-- lots of people forget about our Founding Foresons -- saw those people crossing an entire continent using a large wooden box on wheels, without maps because how could they have maps? Nobody had been there before! Also, there were not convenience stores, or, if there were, they were out of BBQ Fritos. Talk about hardships.
Anyway, now we're a country that can't even be bothered to let our fat fingers type the rest of the phrase "Google Maps," letting our future computer overlords (or, to be grammatically correct, our postfathers)(PostOverlords) finish that phrase for us.
Which is not why it's surprising that Brazil is interested in American celebrities' grammar. That is surprising because if you Google Image Search "Brazil" you get as the top result, this:
which, okay, that didn't work. When I began that sentence, I was pretty sure that I would not end up with the Brazilian flag as the top result. REALLY? Most people searching for Brazil are looking for the flag? THE FLAG? And not, say, this?
Which is the top result you get if you search for "Brazilian." I HAD THE SAFE SEARCH ON, which is recommended if you try that.
So there is this English school in Brazil that's having kids correct celebrity tweets. Like so:
They also correct spelling...
...although in that case it's probably a lost cause.
Said the teacher about the program:
“We have celebrities that are not really worried about the language. Concerning education, it’s really bad, because when [children] see their idols speaking like that they come to us and say “but this is right, he’s American, he’s using it!”
The saddest part about all this?
The report on how Brazilians are making sure American celebrities use proper grammar didn't even make the news in the US. I got that story from a Canadian website.
I would right an outraged letter about this to someone, but Google wouldn't autofinish the address, so I gave up and buried myself in BBQ Fritos.
1 comment:
Yes, we're so lazy that Google has decided that we don't want to finish anything, so it guesses what we want and finishes it for us.
Sigh.
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