Language Rantypants

[changeling]

I'd like to say a little something about one of my least favourite language quirks out there. Folks, meet "off of". It's a lazy construction, and it doesn't actually mean anything.

You didn't "base my project off of this idea I had". You base it ON an idea. It's like saying that your house is "based off of the ground". It isn't. It's based ON the ground. You don't sit off of a chair. You don't serve your meal off of some plates. The cat did not sit off of the mat. It's ON the chair, ON the plates, ON the mat.

Similarly, you didn't "get this off of some guy I know". You got it FROM some guy.

Prepositions. They are your friend. Don't beat them up and leave them in an alley for dead.

Comments

[youraugustine.livejournal.com]

We use both, depending on context, interchangeably. The latter definitely suggests older non-North American (specifically British) and so is also more "stuffy" in flavour (at least, to my ear) - I would use it in essays for certain teachers, and in certain tones of fiction - and NOT for other profs, and not in other tones. It all depends what colours, metaphorically, I'm trying to paint in.

(I are language dork - less for proper usage, and more for "how can I manipulate this tongue . . . ")

[delirieuse.livejournal.com]

[Language geek]
I think that different constructions like different from/different than can be really useful in delineating characters in fiction. This is one of the reasons I try to keep my language as "clean" as possible, actually. I'll rail against using slang constructions like "off" partly because I write a lot of stories set in England or an analogue before present day. I want to be conscious of what slang/dialect I'm using so it doesn't turn up where it shouldn't.
[/Language geek]

[youraugustine.livejournal.com]

Heee. Yeah, there's definitely that, although I'd argue even "clean" language is its own dialect - it's just the one a certain authority has decided is Correct. So while I try to keep my dialects definitely separate, I also try to stay aware that there's not reeeeeally a "neutral" as such.

[delirieuse.livejournal.com]

Oh, it definitely is. But when you're mostly writing British stories, the Queen's (or King's) English is the closest thing to neutral there is. ;)