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big_giant_head
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« Reply #240 on: October 23, 2009, 01:52:19 PM » |
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From the same stack of papers, from a student who wants to become a funeral home director:
"They wheel the bodies into the morgue where they are stored. Later they put on their clothes and makeup."
Do you see, Folks, why pronoun reference is SO important?
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carthago can haz delenda
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barred_owl
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« Reply #241 on: October 23, 2009, 01:54:11 PM » |
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From the same stack of papers, from a student who wants to become a funeral home director:
"They wheel the bodies into the morgue where they are stored. Later they put on their clothes and makeup."
Do you see, Folks, why pronoun reference is SO important?
Ack! I going to need therapy to remove that image of nude funeral directors wheeling bodies into a morgue! |
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...I can't help rooting for the underdog underbird. |
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big_giant_head
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« Reply #242 on: October 23, 2009, 02:20:49 PM » |
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From the same stack of papers, from a student who wants to become a funeral home director:
"They wheel the bodies into the morgue where they are stored. Later they put on their clothes and makeup."
Do you see, Folks, why pronoun reference is SO important?
Ack! I going to need therapy to remove that image of nude funeral directors wheeling bodies into a morgue! Your mental image is less scary than mine, maybe. I was picturing the bodies dressing themselves. |
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carthago can haz delenda
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fosca
Peripatetic Professor
Senior member
Posts: 596
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« Reply #243 on: October 23, 2009, 03:58:48 PM » |
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I've got a bunch of . . . um, very interesting writers of English in my online class.
Some examples:
"Does the dog’s sit"
"The Gator fans would be watching their favorite college football team, while the other fans wouldn't have their ."
Nice to know I'll be teaching English this semester as well as Psychology.
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They equate learning with "understanding magically everything that [the professor] teaches us because it's all so easy" not "expanding their knowledge and ability to apply that knowledge to new situations and problems." |
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airball
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« Reply #244 on: October 23, 2009, 04:27:38 PM » |
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"Galenic medical theory was as flexible as hell's dancing flames."
What I like best is that (based on Google), the student came up with this on her own. Indeed, "Hell's dancing flames" has only three hits - as close to a Googlewhack as I'll likely get!
airball
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History would kick your ass around the Bodleian Library, and then it would smile and laugh.
-scheherazade
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smallways
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« Reply #245 on: October 24, 2009, 10:22:19 AM » |
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From a paper that lays out the process of becoming a teacher, in the section about the resume:
"Wake them with something that will be a refreshing change of pace, not "out there" strange, but excellent in manner and uniquely in charge. Do not attach a Starbucks coupon, to blatantly bootlick is never a good idea."
Should I move this over to "Job-Seeking," comma splice and all?
I don't know which is funnier--the bad writing, or the belief that a free latte is an appropriate bribe for a professional job. |
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barred_owl
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« Reply #246 on: October 24, 2009, 10:25:52 AM » |
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From a paper that lays out the process of becoming a teacher, in the section about the resume:
"Wake them with something that will be a refreshing change of pace, not "out there" strange, but excellent in manner and uniquely in charge. Do not attach a Starbucks coupon, to blatantly bootlick is never a good idea."
Should I move this over to "Job-Seeking," comma splice and all?
I don't know which is funnier--the bad writing, or the belief that a free latte is an appropriate bribe for a professional job. I kind of like that last clause ("...to blatantly bootlick is never a good idea."). It reads like a forum signature line. |
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...I can't help rooting for the underdog underbird. |
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mystictechgal
Happy in my "full, rich adulthood", and as a
Member-Moderator
Distinguished Senior Member
Posts: 9,403
One step at a time
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« Reply #247 on: October 24, 2009, 12:52:57 PM » |
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From the same stack of papers, from a student who wants to become a funeral home director:
"They wheel the bodies into the morgue where they are stored. Later they put on their clothes and makeup."
Do you see, Folks, why pronoun reference is SO important?
Oh, NOT NICE! I've been laughing so hard since I read this that I'm crying and the librarians and others in the reading room are starting to stare. Bwahahahaha! |
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If a pouting pluot ploughman planted pluots in a plot, and the plot were ploughed on Pluto, would his pluot ploy play out?
"Is all the same, only different" -- Dr. H. L. |
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sonnet_sequence
Junior member
Posts: 50
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« Reply #248 on: October 24, 2009, 09:50:45 PM » |
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From the same stack of papers, from a student who wants to become a funeral home director:
"They wheel the bodies into the morgue where they are stored. Later they put on their clothes and makeup."
Do you see, Folks, why pronoun reference is SO important?
Oh, NOT NICE! I've been laughing so hard since I read this that I'm crying and the librarians and others in the reading room are starting to stare. Bwahahahaha! I agree--I keep thinking about Silence of the Lambs. My funny student sentence is really a title. The student first submitted her paper with the title "Analysis Paper." I had asked them to come up with interesting titles, so I reminded her of that when commenting on the paper. In her revision, she changed her title to "Nancyyyy Clutterrrr"--I'm not sure if she's going for a "Here's Johnny" moment or a WWF intro. |
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mountainguy
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« Reply #249 on: October 24, 2009, 10:26:47 PM » |
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In her revision, she changed her title to "Nancyyyy Clutterrrr"--I'm not sure if she's going for a "Here's Johnny" moment or a WWF intro.
If it makes you feel any better, I got a paper entitled "Stylistic Analysis Stuff." Oh, and the same stack of papers contained this gem: "Robert F. Kennedy faced a steep uphill battle to become the first Catholic president of the United States in 1960." Argh! Why do students keep thinking that Robert and John were the same person? Several of them made the same mistake on their last exam. |
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galactic_hedgehog
Procrastinating, Python-quoting, Blue Blazer-drinking, chocolate-chip cookie-eating, Pastafarian, Not So
Distinguished Senior Member
Posts: 17,915
Mind Ninja
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« Reply #250 on: October 24, 2009, 10:35:37 PM » |
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"Robert F. Kennedy faced a steep uphill battle to become the first Catholic president of the United States in 1960." Argh! Why do students keep thinking that Robert and John were the same person? Several of them made the same mistake on their last exam.
Well, wouldn't the fact that John was gathering lots more delegates than Robert mean that Robert had an uphill battle? |
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« Last Edit: October 24, 2009, 10:35:56 PM by galactic_hedgehog »
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"A pun is primâ facie an insult to the person you are talking with. It implies utter indifference to or sublime contempt for his remarks, no matter how serious." -- Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. Hedgie loves to read. |
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concordancia
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« Reply #251 on: October 25, 2009, 10:34:15 AM » |
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Nature is something that [the author of this book about the Amazon] mentions in his work.
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I like money. I like to buy stuff and experiences with money.
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concordancia
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« Reply #252 on: October 25, 2009, 11:00:00 AM » |
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Anyone know of a nice way to tell a non native speaker who admits to not feeling entirely comfortable with the language that perhaps she is not the most qualified to decided that the syntax and lexicon of a novel are difficult for many readers?
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I like money. I like to buy stuff and experiences with money.
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european
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« Reply #253 on: October 25, 2009, 04:08:48 PM » |
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Anyone know of a nice way to tell a non native speaker who admits to not feeling entirely comfortable with the language that perhaps she is not the most qualified to decided that the syntax and lexicon of a novel are difficult for many readers?
There are more people who do not have English as a native language than there are people who have English as a native language. She does not have English as a native language. Therefore, she is perfectly qualified to determine that many people will find the syntax and lexicon of the novel difficult. There's logic in there! |
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mended_drum
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« Reply #254 on: October 25, 2009, 04:13:34 PM » |
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Anyone know of a nice way to tell a non native speaker who admits to not feeling entirely comfortable with the language that perhaps she is not the most qualified to decided that the syntax and lexicon of a novel are difficult for many readers?
If you mean that the student wrote this in a paper, I tell my students that this is one of the five "no, don't go there" rules from writing college essays. It's okay to tell a professor that you find a novel difficult or boring, but it's not usually relevant to a formal assignment. On the other hand, if the problem is the breadth of her comment, then you make your response about unsupported generalizations and leave the content alone. |
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