In a similar vein, "do the needful" has become so entrenched in some of my friends' vernacular that it's now used almost completely unironically.
Also, "like such as," from the old "Miss Teen USA" viral video, has stuck in my craw to the point that its use is unconscious (though still intended humorously).
"do the needful", "please revert back to me"-- phrases like these are not 'invented' by some Indian speakers. These are the stuff Indian savants picked up from the old English books. Then, these savants taught this stuff to fellow Indians and this dynamic gets reproduced everyday.
See an entry from Charles Scholl, Geroge Mcaulaly et al's "A Phraseological Dictionary of Commercial Correspondence in the English, German, French & Spanish Languages, with an Appendix Containing Lists of Commercial Abbreviations, Geographical Names, the Principal Articles of Commerce", published in 1891:
"Needful: he will do what is needful under the circumstances. We rely on your doing the needful for the protection of our interests. With which will you please do the needful. With which we shall do the needful, and credit you for the amount in due course. I shall do the needful at maturity. I enclose draft for 100 pounds at two months, to which I will thank you to do the needful"
Another entry from a law journal published in 1833 in UK: "The letter was immediately given by the bankrupt to the defendant, with directions that as the voyage was altered, he, the defendant, would do the needful."
It's interesting to see where it came from, but why does it persist? Is consuming English language media and the largest internet sites uncommon for English speaking people in India? I imagine I'd notice pretty quickly that English speakers in TV, movies, and on youtube, don't speak the way they did in the 1800s.
So, India inherited the British civil services system wholesale. The formal pseudo legal language used in the system, instituted by the British, continued. It was different enough from the language taught in schools that when someone was exposed to it or had to use it tried to conform to it's idiosyncrasies.
Over time, isolated from the cultural changes happening to the English world, it developed in it's own way. Like the albino and blind animals evolved in the seclusion of an isolated cave system.
Today, the best way to observe this secluded language branch is to read official Indian government announcements.
It has started to meld back into the main branch [0][1] as younger and younger, more exposed to the global English culture, take over responsibilities.
These are a class of mistake mainly made by native English speakers, but I've ended up using words like "irregardless" and "misunderestimated" unironically because I used them ironically for so long that I forgot
Along similar lines, expect a spelling convergence of "wary" and "weary" in the next 5-10 years due to so many people not knowing the difference between the two, not bothering to check, and perpetuating confusion by using the wrong one in their own writing.
"Envious" has all but completely been absorbed by "jealous" in the vernacular. People just use "jealous" for both things. Good thing there can never be any ambiguity about which sense is intended.
"To comprise" is deployed incorrectly more often than correctly. Which is silly since, when used incorrectly, you could have simply used "to be composed of" (which is the thing people are confusing it for)—there's no benefit to using "comprised" there, all its elegance and subtle shade of meaning are lost anyway when you jam it into that clunky phrase as a perfect synonym for "composed". I think that's one of those fake-fancy abuses of language from business folks, leeching into everyday language. What synergy!
The apt adjective, rather than various words and modifiers expressing degrees of good or badness—many of which used to express more, but no longer do, as "massive" or "awesome"—seems to be an endangered species.
Awkward use of "less than" inexplicably replacing the word "inferior" in some circles. "We must ensure none of the children feel 'less than'". In the words of my generation: "LOL WTF?"
Anyone have handy any studies on vocabulary among Americans? It looks to have markedly decreased over the last few decades, but I worry I may be falling for the same kind of bias that seems to make everyone think everything's getting worse all the time. Popular writing gives me the impression it's written for an audience with a smaller vocabulary than in, say, the 1950s or 1960s, though.
It's weird how people mix these up, I think it's due to incorrectly assuming it's related to the verb "to wear".
While we're on the subject - more then and less then are becoming very common due to the similarity in how than/then are pronounced in US accented English.
I wonder if this particular mixup is due to people using voice dictation instead of typing. iOS makes that particular error all the time when I dictate.
This particular spelling mixup seems unlikely to persist because people know and understand both words, and it's considered basic knowledge, like your/you're, and I would expect similar memes and derision for people who don't attempt to distinguish them.
My understanding is that chitterlings is the correct spelling and chitlins is the correct pronunciation, but so many people spell it chitlins that it has become an acceptable form of the written word.
"Perpetrate" and "perpetuate" are two words frequently confused by native speakers (in this context, you could have meant either, and I assume you meant "perpetuate").
When I first started working I thought this was normal business speak. Thankfully my bosses noticed and when I told them it was definitely not spiteful or ironic, they tactfully educated me on the finer points of Indian phraseology.
> One of my Iranian colleagues back when I worked in an office had many entertaining phrases, like:
> "I go make some shoppings"
As a Romanian living in the London, I hear English mistakes from various nationalities and I'm surprised how similar some are to Romanian, even when there's no connection. In this case, in Romanian we also word-for-word say "to make shoppings".
It often feels like English is the odd man out. :)
As an example, a Lithuanian was showing me a shortcut. He said "press alt plus ii". So I press "Alt+I". He chuckled and said "No, alt plus the English ii". So I pressed "Alt+E". The great vowel shift left vowels unrecognizable to other languages (/iː/ became /aɪ/, /eː/ became /iː/, ...).
Not in the same vein as the link, but I had an Iranian colleague tell me his wife was working occasionally as a babysitter, in technical violation of her visa... but he couldn't think of how to say this in English. He moved his finger back and forth under his nose and said in Iran he'd say she's working "under the mustache". I thought this was hilarious and told him how we'd say she's working "under the table".
I have never independently confirmed if this was an actual saying in Iran or not. (Google is not helpful.)
Also, "like such as," from the old "Miss Teen USA" viral video, has stuck in my craw to the point that its use is unconscious (though still intended humorously).