Quote:
Originally posted by LaurieJay:
What are you talking about? I've used English,there are sentences and full stops,commas,capital letters.How more CLEAR can i be? geeeez!
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Well, I am a foreigner, and English is not my native language. That said, I can mention just a few examples that might trouble others:
1.) Proper capitalisation helps for example to distinguish between names (Jack) and verbs (to jack) or even nouns (jack). Have you ever helped your uncle Jack off his horse? Then you'll see how this can be important.
2.) Foreigners often have to rely more on grammar than native speakers do to understand the meaning. For example, people might be quite used to "clearer" as comparative for "clear" and be confused as to what "more clear" means. Is clear a noun there, and you want more of it? Of course, after some time, one will understand you. But the point of a post here shouldn't be to display a riddle for others.
3.) Correct spelling is quite important too. Foreigners don't know every one of the about 600 000 words the English language offers. Even a person who is quite fluent in English as a foreign language knows only about a tenth of that amount. So what about the words he doesn't know? He looks them up in a dictionary. As you may expect, dictionaries only contain the correct spelling of words. If a word is spelt in a different fashion, it either can't be found, or - even worse - it might coincidentally be a completely different word with a different meaning. You do want to be understood, don't you? So, for example, not everyone might know what you are trying to say with "geeeez".
Nobody is perfect. But paying attention to using proper English is a form of respect. When communicating, you do want others to understand you as much, as you want to understand them. Spelling, capitalisation, grammar and various other means are an important part to achieve that goal.
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