The 10 Most Annoying English Grammar Errors by Jose Carillo (A Book Review)

If you approach a snake-oil vendor, he will tell you, without a moment's hesitation, that something's wrong with you, and that you better take his medicine. A medical doctor, by contrast, after performing a battery of tests, not only will tell what ails you, but also explains what causes your ailment. Then he will recommend the best cure possible.

Jose Carillo, the English-usage columnist of The Manila Times, is like the latter---he does not only point out the flaw(s) in a sentence, or in a paragraph, or in an entire composition, he explains as well how come it's wrong, and prescribes an antidote to avoid committing the same mistake again.

With a clinical eye of a doctor, Carillo diagnosed the recurrent---so recurrent that the author finds them annoying---grammar errors in his second English-usage book, "The 10 Most Annoying English Grammar Errors." (The first being "English Plain and Simple: No-Nonsense To Learn Today's Global Language"---which was given by the Manila Critics Circle a National Book Award.)

The case for English proficiency

In the previous post, I have raised concerns why others---especially Filipinos---are scrambling to be proficient in English when other countries like China are making progress, economically, and yet their English is far from passable.

Over at Jose Carillo's English Forum, Jose Carillo, the English usage columnist in Manila Times, made the case for English proficiency:

Is the 1987 Philippine Constitution's Preamble ungrammatical?

The Preamble of the 1987 Philippine Constitution goes:

"We, the sovereign Filipino people, imploring the aid of Almighty God, in order to build a just and humane society and establish a Government that shall embody our ideals and aspirations, promote the common good, conserve and develop our patrimony, and secure to ourselves and our posterity the blessings of independence and democracy under the rule of law and a regime of truth, justice, freedom, love, equality, and peace, do ordain and promulgate this Constitution."

The subject, which is ‘we,’ is far removed from the verb phrase ‘do ordain and promulgate . . .’ Could it be that the Preamble is one stellar example of an annoying English grammar error?

Read Jose Carillo's column to know the answer.

Everyone should learn to write well

Judging from the book card---it's usually found at the back of the book---of On Writing Well, I am, at least in our school, what you might consider its most frequent borrower. Written by William Zinsser, it's a valuable book for people who want to learn to write well, with lessons ranging from the principles of writing to the methods of writing a memoir, an interview article, a travel article, a science article, etc. In fact, I have borrowed it for four times already, while some borrowed it only once. And still others haven't heard of the book.

My female friend once noticed my fondness for the book. She wondered why I always borrow it. Then she asked me, "Do you want to be a writer because you seemed hell-bent on learning to write well?" I didn't know then what to say. It wasn't until several months after my friend asked me that I came up with an answer.

Yes, I want to learn to write well. But no, I don't want to be a writer. That is to say, I don't want to earn my living just by writing though I want to write just like professional writers do.

It's true that to learn to write well is what professional writers badly need. Their very survival depends on their ability to write lucid and readable product---either in the form of a newspaper article, or a feature story, or a short story, or a novel. Otherwise, they'll find it increasingly difficult to survive---financially and professionally. But it doesn’t mean other professionals should be exempted from learning to write well.

But, one might ask, is there a need for others to learn to write well?