Aspergers and Pedantry, Anyone?

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08 Nov 2005, 6:33 pm

So, I never considered myself a pedant. Arrogant yes, but pedantic is an adjective I would never have applied to myself. But, after reading the quote below, I am not so sure now. Is there anyone here willing to admit to their pedantry?

Quote:

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A pedant is a person who overrates or overuses book learning or pure technical knowledge. Such a person values simple knowledge (in the form of often obscure facts and rules) over common sense and more general knowledge.

Some pedants are ostentatious in their pedantry, as if displaying their knowledge, and pointing out the errors of others, gives them great pleasure. Such pedants would be more likely to expound at length on subjects, taking every opportunity to demonstrate the breadth of their knowledge.

Some pedants are simply nit-pickers, people who are annoyed by what they see as egregious errors. They take no pleasure in correcting your mistakes, yet they cannot let such mistakes go uncorrected. Such pedants will correct your pronunciation in conversation, and the bolder (or less socially adept) pedant might even correct your use of grammar while you converse with another person.

The on-line community has spawned a whole new breed of pedants, allowing free platform for ostentatious pedants to hold forth, and ample opportunity for the nit-pickers to comb for trivial errors that seek correction.

Being called a pedant, or pedantic, is considered insulting. People who wish to make a correction often preface it with "not wishing to be pedantic, but ..." or "without being a pedant, ..." in order to indicate that the correction is made in good spirit and implies no criticism.

Pedantry can come about as the overzealous application of intellectual rigour, but equally can just be an annoying habit brought on by lack of social interaction.

Pedantry can also be an indication of certain developmental disorders. In particular those suffering from Asperger Syndrome, or Higher Functioning Autism, often have behavior characterized by pedantic speech [1]. Those with Asperger tend to obsess over the minutiae of subjects, and are prone to giving long detailed expositions, and the related corrections, and may gravitate to careers in academia or science where such obsessive attention to detail is often rewarded.

Obsessive Compulsive Personality Disorder is also in part characterized by a form of pedantry that is overly concerned with the correct following of rules, procedures and practices.[2] Sometimes the rules that OCPD sufferers obsessively follow are of their own devising, or are corruptions or re-interpretations of the letter of actual rules.

Nomaken
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08 Nov 2005, 6:58 pm

I always figured it was a bit rude to correct people, but sometimes if someone was having trouble coming up with a word, or finding a good way to say something i would help them. And lately i've been thinking that i really just shouldn't correct people anymore. About anything. One might say it would be best to only correct someone when it is important, but i've decided that it really just isn't my place to correct someone in all the situations i currently find myself experiancing. When i become a teacher it may become important to explain proper knowledge to someone, but seriously most of the time it will ALWAYS fall on deaf ears unless they WANT to know the true knowledge.

I find that often when people argue about politics they get just about everything wildly wrong, and just hope the other person is ignorent enough to not know how much theyre exaggerating. Now if i did put in my two cents and correct them, they would just get defensive and deny its accuracy. Because they are really not interested in objectively considering a politician and the dynamics of politics, they are interested in saying so and so is an idiot, and such and such policy or action was stupid, and crap like that.

Or suppose the situations when two people are talking about some economic issue, or perhaps even the merits of using astroturf versus real grass. If they are just talking back and forth unseriously, it is adding a degree of seriousness i dont think is really important or kind to their conversation to make a correction.

I understand some people feel serious cognitive dissonance when somebody makes an "error" but personally i do not feel correcting people most of the time to really be productive. In anyway but pissing off that person.

It is unfortunate that people go through life picking up oodles and oodles of incorrect or inaccurate information, but trying to correct s**t is just not going to help. It only pisses off people. You may also feel that if you dont correct them, how will they learn?

Well they will learn when their incorrect information does not suit them. Otherwise they can go their entire life with incorrect info and never be hurt by it, or necessitate humiliation from some superior intellect.

And chances are they will only change their mind about some bit of knowledge when they are genuinely curious about the right answer, which they almost NEVER are.

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nirrti_rachelle
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08 Nov 2005, 7:17 pm

Oh, pul-lease! :lol:

Whoever wrote that is just mad because they're not exactly the sharpest pencil in the box and they're just jealous they don't have the smarts to be "pedantic". I think society, as a whole, is intimidated by anything they have to use multi-syllable words and deeper thinking than a sit-com episode to explain and harp on others who can. It's as if it's become "cool" to be dumb (see Paris Hilton, Britney Spears, prime-time TV, most Fox News reporters) and if you act like you have letters behind your name, you're looked down upon instead of being lauded as you would've been years ago.

Oh, and I am pedantic and have been since first grade when I would correct my grandmother's incorrect grammer and even today, it's like nails on a chalk board when I see words spelled wrong or incorrect punctuation in people's posts online. And the worst part is my spelling is atrocious. Of course, nowadays, I wouldn't call any attention to other's inaccuracies since it would be rude and pretentious. But sometimes, my mouth looks like a fish's I'm trying so hard to hold my tongue.

And the next time someone else calls the planet Venus a "star," I swear I'm going to strangle them...... :lol: :lol: :lol:

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Last edited by nirrti_rachelle on 08 Nov 2005, 7:33 pm, edited 3 times in total.

ghotistix
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08 Nov 2005, 7:23 pm

Am I still a pedant if I don't speak up? When people butcher the English language, either in speaking or writing, it drives me up the wall. I rarely correct them, though.

NeantHumain
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08 Nov 2005, 8:52 pm

This should clarify my position on pedantry and grammar naziism in particular:
From Funny Slashdot Posts, Honestly

NeantHumain wrote:

Here's some random humor. I posted this as a response to someone's anal correction on Slashdot.

NeantHumain wrote:

BTWR (540147) wrote:

Ahhh! You ended a sentence with a preposition!

Anality (to the pedants out there in Slashdotland, obsessive-compulsive personality) is a very important quality to possess. Consider that the New York Times has included articles about Supreme Court candidates Roberts and Alito, mentioning their conservatism and characteristic anality.

On the other hand, you have these rebel but admittedly cunning linguists who vouch that language is as we use it. In their fog of grammatical relativism, a split infinitive is just as good as an unsplit one (and, presumably, split undies are equals to the uncleft variety); slang is how the vocabulary of a language evolves; and they say worse while calling it all science! No, thanks. I'll side with the prescriptivist grammarians like my good friend BTWR and scan all my writing for misplaced commas and make sure I am using my words with etymologically correct connotations. Plus, renowned cunning linguist Noam Chomsky is a damned hippi.

In short, back off from His Royal Anus!

Oh, by the way, post some funny/interesting/insightful Slashdot posts of your own or just that you like.

mjs82
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09 Nov 2005, 1:47 am

I have been called pedantic so many times by so many people it's just second nature for me to be called it.

Sarcastic_Name
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09 Nov 2005, 12:53 pm

I say: "If people want to be an idiot and butcher English, let them."
I'm not pedantic, just good at spotting mistakes.

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09 Nov 2005, 1:23 pm

ghotistix wrote:

Am I still a pedant if I don't speak up? When people butcher the English language, either in speaking or writing, it drives me up the wall. I rarely correct them, though.

I correct people. However, part of this is due to being trained to help grade high school English papers, so some of it has been acquired over the past few years...

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vetivert
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09 Nov 2005, 1:32 pm

ghotistix wrote:

When people butcher the English language, either in speaking or writing, it drives me up the wall. I rarely correct them, though.

yes, yes, YES!! !

(bit of overexcitement, there, but it is one of my pet hates).

i only don't correct people if:

a) i'm in serious danger of getting a smack in the gob.
b) there is no hope of them ever learning how to speak/write correct english.
c) i fancy them like mad.
d) i'll get told off if i do.

which is more or less all the time, then. this leads to severe problems with frustration and sublimated grrrrr-ness. i alleviate this by smiling sweetly, and imagining myself poking them, quite severely, in the eye. several times.

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