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Crusade for proper English

While my English may not be proper at all times, it is still a great peeve to me when the English language is continually misused and mistreated. Part of the crusade is for me to learn better English and the other part is to spread this attitude more widely to others as well.

I have divided this page into three parts. The first part deals with common misusage of the language. The second part describes the differences of International English and the variant spoken in the United States of America. The third part is directed to my Finnish friends and colleagues and everybody else with less extensive knowledge of how to use English. It is a kind of FAQ section where I shall include all (or most) questions people ask me of how to use proper English.

1) "Please, don't misuse the English language"

One of the best examples of how English language is raped is the treatment of third person pronouns. Naturally I refer to the thoroughly ridiculous and clumsy 'he/she' that some people seem to use as a general term, and the even worse 'they'. It may be slightly odd that there are no pronouns that would immediately distinguish a male or female person, as the meaning of the word 'he' is:

"he /hi: pers. pron., 3. sing. masc. subjective (nom.), n., & a. [...]
A pron. 1 The male person or animal, or the person or animal of unknown or unspecified sex, previously mentioned or implied or easily identified. 2 ... 3 ... 4 ... 5 ...
B n. 1 The male; a male. 2. A person, a man. 3 ..."
from: The New Shorter Oxford English Dictionary

And that of the word 'she' is:

"she pers. pron., 3. sing. fem. subjective (nom.), a., & n. [...]
A pron. 1 The female person or animal, or the person or animal of unknown or unspecified sex, previously mentioned or implied or easily identified. 2 ... 3 ... 4 ... 5 ...
B adj. Female ...
C n. 1 The female; a female. 2. spec. A female person, a woman, a girl."
from: The New Shorter Oxford English Dictionary

So, as a pronoun either 'he' or 'she' means 'a male or a female person'. Therefore the clumsy 'he/she' means literally 'a male or a female or a male or a female person'. Admittedly there is a certain prejudice against male gender in the noun treatment of the words because 'he' as a noun does not explicitly give away the gender of the person in question whereas 'she' is always female. Perhaps men should get justice in this matter, but on the other hand the language has worked nicely for centuries and we should use the language properly instead of trying to change it according to ideologically adolescent whims.

The even worse outrage is to use the word they (which is the plural of 'he', 'she', or 'it') to substitute a singular pronoun 'he', 'she' or 'it'. This use makes language totally incomprehensible as you never know who people are talking about. E.g.: "A group of people surrounded John. They were armed with a gun." Now is it John or the group of people with the gun. If English is used properly, there is no mystery and we know it is the group of people. Simple and clear. So please, never use 'they' to indicate one person or thing.

The problems of these kinds seem to arise from a huge misunderstanding that language would hold or impose any value system. This is simply not true, and clearly understood by anybody with the slightest sense and ability to think for himself. However, existing political and social value systems soon contaminate the new words used as "politically correct" replacements of the words some people might have thought dubious. Social and scientific damage caused by changing languages is far worse than any imaginary values in those languages.

2) "Differences between English and American"

Differences of word spelling:
English	American	N.B.
ardour	ardor
armour	armor
behaviour	behavior
colour	color
favour	favor
flavour	flavor
honour	honor
humour	humor
labour	labor
neighbour	neighbor
odour	odor
rumour	rumor
saviour	savior
savour	savor
valour	valor
vapour	vapor
centre	center
litre	liter
metre	meter	Please do not confuse meter, the American metre, with meter, an instrument to measure quantities of distances, times, etc.
saltpetre	saltpeter
analyse	analyze
palaeo-	paleo-
jeweller	jeweler
marvellous	marvelous
towelling	toweling
traveller	traveler
axe	ax
catalogue	catalog
dialogue	dialog
goodbye	goodby
programme	program
grey	gray	grey is also sometimes used in American
light	light	lite is also used in American
night	night	nite is also used in American
schedule	schedule	sked is also used in American
autumn	fall	Please do not confuse fall, the season, with fall, the verb, or fall, the noun derived from the verb.
lift	elevator
post	mail	This is tricky because both post and mail are used in both English and American. The usage is, however, slightly different.
sunrise	sun-up

3) "English FAQ"

Everybody (everyone), nobody (no-one), and anybody (anyone) are singular words; i.e. the verb used with them should also be singular (e.g. Everybody is happy to learn proper English.)