[imagii]

This is going to get worse.

Walk into a high school classroom, write a sentence on the board, and ask the students to label the parts of speech.

Don't be too surprised when only two or three students even bother to raise their hands.

[RiderOfGiraffes]

While I have sympathy with this comment, it's not the same thing. Knowing the names for bits of a sentence is different from being able to comprehend a sentence. You might know what an adverbal phrase is, without knowing the name for it. To say otherwise suggests the strong form of Sapir-Worf, which is generally discredited (while still actually being contentious).

This article isn't even talking about the ability to name the different grammatical components, though. It seems to be talking about comprehension of sentence forms. There is a hint that using "every" can sometimes be misinterpreted.

But we see that linguistic shift anyway. Things like "I could care less" are regarded as conveying the speaker's meaning, while the linguistic analysis of the form suggests a meaning opposite to that normally inferred, or implied.

"Every" is frequently misplaced, and people seem to assume they know what the speaker means. Following logical analyses we often find that the speaker didn't actually say what they meant, and the listener understood something different again.

[kenj0418]

Right, kick ass. Well, don't want to sound like a dXXX or nothin', but, ah... it says on your chart that you're fXXXed up. Ah, you talk like a fag, and your sXXX's all retarded. What I'd do, is just like... like... you know, like, you know what I mean, like...

[RiderOfGiraffes]

Not sure if that's supposed to be informative, clever, funny, or something else. It's certainly not communicating anything to me, except something about you - something I'm sure you didn't intend to say.

[jeebusroxors]

His comment is a quote from the movie Idiocracy (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0387808/).

Of course I can't speak for him, but the premise of the movie is a slow steady decline in education leading to the above quote, which is given to the protagonist (after he wakes up in the future) by a doctor as a diagnosis.

[bradleyland]

It's a quote from Idiocracy; a Mike Judge film from 2006.

[shawndumas]

http://vimeo.com/3829682