Nouns – Pronouns Drive me NUTS*
It is happening more and more today. A total sign of illiterateness from otherwise educated people.
It is linguistic laziness. It is not being aware of what a person just said they have to say it again a different way.
It drives me crazy to hear this over and over and over again. Especially from news anchors and other people who actually talk for a living.
Have you ever paid attention to Sean Hannity? I stopped watching Fox News and all of its non weekend evening talent weeks ago. But before running for the safety of nothing to do with media, my constant aggravation with Hannity was his speech habits. He constantly employs verbal crutches. Bad speaking habits. Very bad.
It was a center of attention of mine while programming radio stations centuries ago. If you do not know how to use the language why pretend? It is an obvious fake. Get a job in the fast food industry. Nobody will attack you for being ignorant of what you should have learned already.
Just what is a noun?
According to The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition: a ‘noun’ is the part of speech that is used to name a person, place, thing, quality, or action and can function as the subject or object of a verb, the object of a preposition, or an appositive.
The word ‘weapon’ is a noun. How nice.
Just what is a pronoun?
According to The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition: a ‘pro-noun’ is the part of speech that substitutes for nouns or noun phrases and designates persons or things asked for, previously specified, or understood from the context.
The word ‘it’ is a pronoun.
“Chuck, your weapon, it will cut!” (https://dougmarcaida.com/ the main and primary star of Forged in Fire.) Amazing character. Other than always saying ‘here’ after everything he reviews the continuous overuse of the noun-pronoun disaster can drive anyone crazy.
Hannity is obsessed with one following the other. He is constantly performing grammatical destruction on his show.
It is even worse when he follows a proper noun with a pronoun.
What is a proper noun?
According to The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition: a ‘proper noun’ is a noun belonging to the class of words used as names for unique individuals, events, or places.
“According to Bill, he says life stinks.”
The word ‘he’ is a pronoun. There is no logical reason to say the same thing twice just a different way. And it is beyond aggravating to hear it repeatedly used as a verbal crutch. [2]
In fact pronouns are used to one does not have to repeat the noun.
“According to Bill, like stinks.”
According to The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition” ‘he’ is a personal pronoun of the third person.
The use of Smith and ‘he’ violates the basics of the Noun-Pronoun Agreement [1]. “The purpose of a pronoun is to take the place or refer back to a noun in a sentence. Just like subjects and verbs, nouns and pronouns should agree in number within a sentence.”
“Bruce Ohr’s wife Nellie she worked for…. ” YIKES! A pronoun is to replace a noun not duplicate it.
Such rules are made from centuries of the use of the language and should have been taught in grade school and ingrained in the mind of the speaker from the start. It is a natural way of speaking the language. Hannity and quite a few other people who have the same problem are duplicating the point. For no reason.
There are far worse examples of the violation of the Noun-Pronoun Agreement in news-speak. Luckily I am unable to recall most of them now.
The next time you wish to subject yourself to grammatical pain watch Hannity, to a lesser degree Carlson as well and most of the news anchors of most of the news-casts in this country and you will hear this obnoxious bastardization of the language over and over again.
Listen for the set up, the subject established, then hear the repeat JUST LIKE the speaker forgot what the topic was and started over in the same sentence. Illiterate!
While you’re at it, pay attention to how many times a sentence or a sentence fragment ends in a question mark.
It will drive you nuts too. If you are aware of it. If you are not aware of it. You should be.
For a great primer on the use of pronouns see https://www.wikihow.com/Use-Pronouns .
At least read this: https://www.grammarly.com/blog/pronouns/ .
* This entire exercise is what likely will be a vain attempt at settling the issue personally. It won’t work. It will always make me tilt.
[1] https://academicguides.waldenu.edu/writingcenter/grammar/nounpronounagreement
[2] https://www.differencebetween.com/difference-between-noun-and-pronoun/