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Grammar pedants - help please.

95 watchers

RichHL Aug 2016 11:00am, 29 Aug 2016 12,050 posts	Quote Pin RichHL "He or she" can sound clumsy and "s/he" is just awful. I much prefer "they" although that isn't wholly satisfactory either.
Dvorak Aug 2016 11:11am, 29 Aug 2016 12,107 posts	Quote Pin Dvorak Maybe it's suggesting "pemmican" as it is giving you something to chew over?
Columba Aug 2016 9:38pm, 29 Aug 2016 11,074 posts	Quote Pin Columba I think s/he is ok in writing; depending, perhaps, on the type of writing. Unpronounceable in speech, of course.
GordonG Sep 2016 9:50am, 6 Sep 2016 6,950 posts	Quote Pin GordonG this was a link posted on the 'jokes' thread, but it really needs to go here... i.imgur.com
Columba Sep 2016 11:46am, 6 Sep 2016 11,124 posts	Quote Pin Columba
beebop Sep 2016 9:56pm, 6 Sep 2016 750 posts	Quote Pin beebop Help, please! Punctuation question - I'm trying to explain why "Some people you can live with, some you can't. She's one of the can't's" is incorrect. It is reported speech, and I'm sure the second inverted comma shouldn't be present, but never having had a thorough education in punctuation I cannot come up with anything more convincing than the assertion that said second inverted comma is not representing an elision. Am I right?
JenL Sep 2016 10:11pm, 6 Sep 2016 27,386 posts	Quote Pin JenL I think you mean the second apostrophe. The inverted commas (speech marks) are fine. In your sentence, you've made "can't" into a plural, so it doesn't need another apostrophe before the final s because there is no grammatical possession and, as you point out above, nothing has been missed out. The correct version should be: "Some people you can live with, some you can't. She's one of the can'ts"
Columba Sep 2016 10:42pm, 6 Sep 2016 11,134 posts	Quote Pin Columba Agreed. Looks awkward, but is correct.
Dvorak Sep 2016 11:33pm, 6 Sep 2016 12,122 posts	Quote Pin Dvorak Are you really wanting to call "her" a "can't"? Maybe depends if it's a Lahndahn audience or not.
Dvorak Sep 2016 11:37pm, 6 Sep 2016 12,123 posts	Quote Pin Dvorak I just loled as GordonG's link. Now I'm tortured over "loled" and "lolled", but.