Sorry, but that's shite. Yes, sometimes such things are a matter of dialect, but often they're simply mistakes. It's only a dialect feature if other people in the individual's region consistently use the same construction.

Redwolf

A different example I can think of, which I've seen in English newspapers, involves the word "couple." For example, I've seen "the couple are honeymooning in Italy," whereas we would say "the couple is honeymooning in Italy" (right before we faint with jealousy!). Perhaps it's a "high-register" journalism thing there.

Redwolf

You might think so, if you've always grown up thinking there's only one type of "correct" English. However, there's not. If a native speaker uses it, it's correct for their idiolect. For example, double negatives aren't "mistakes" - they're a valid part of several dialects of English, my own included. A basic tenet of linguistics is that, apart from performance errors, native speakers speak their language perfectly. It doesn't even matter if they're the only one in their region who uses it, if they do so consistently.

Yes, that's not how it's taught in schools, and it's led to a lot of dialectal prejudice, but that's how it is. Now, I'm not talking about spelling, or punctuation - those are just means of expressing language and not language itself; I'm talking solely about speech.

When a native speaker is not speaking in a manner consistent with his or her dialect, because he or she has never fully grasped a particular form (which does happen frequently in English), it IS a mistake. If it weren't, every individual would have his or her own unique "dialect." I'm not talking about deviations from "standard" English here.

Redwolf

That's exactly the point. Every speaker does have their own dialect. They use their own speech consistently, therefore it's not a mistake. It's called an idiolect in linguistics, and to actually generate a dialect, you have to generalize over a bunch of idiolects. No two people have the exact same English. It's not a mistake, it's just how languages are acquired and change.

What's the point in learning grammar or correcting "so-called" incorrect speech if it's all thrown under the blanket of an ideolect?

Check out linguistic register. This prejudice exists, and there are times where it is appropriate to use the standard, such as an interview or an academic paper. Now, whether this is a good thing or not can be debated (if oftentimes leads to prejudice and an association with certain dialects as "uneducated"), but it does exist; you won't see any linguist claiming it doesn't. You also won't see any linguist claiming it's not a wise thing to learn the prestige dialect. It's also good for foreigners to learn, especially in a language where dialects are associated with low intelligence, such as most English dialects are.

But, you're right, it's only "so-called" incorrect, and it's erroneous to assume there's one monolithic English. Every talks differently - it's how languages change.

It sounds like if I spell the same word incorrectly, but consistently incorrectly, that's o.k. Why should spelling or punctuation be separate from 'incorrect' grammar? Of course, there are dialects in languages, but surely they are on a regional level not on an individual level?

_________________

The difference with writing is that writing is taught, not naturally acquired like spoken language. There are standard ways for writing, that everyone learns. That's why spelling and punctuation should be separate from speech. The issue here is that grade-school "grammar" is really different from what linguists describe as "grammar" (a person's knowledge of their idiolect). Though, personally, it doesn't bother me as long as I can understand what you're saying.

"Dialects" can be on just about any divide: there's ethnolects, sociolects, genderlects. These are generally just called "lects", with "dialect" being a regional division. They're all different than idiolect which is an individual's variety of the language (and note, it's unlikely, if not impossible, that any two share the same idiolect).

I take the point about the written versus the spoken. There is a lot more formality associated with the written word, but..... would you consider, 'Tá mé bean' correct as long as I use it regularly?

_________________