Proofreading DOES help

[Chromatix]

Technically, Shakespeare is written in dialect. It was fairly standard English at the time, but the language has changed so much in the interval that it is now very difficult to understand unless you're used to it (ie. have learned the dialect). Since they are plays, and therefore almost entirely dialogue, it's hard to get around that without actively translating it into modern English. Which isn't impossible - I think at one point there were two film versions of Romeo and Juliet that took completely opposite approaches, one using original dialogue in a modern setting (WTF?) and the other using modern English with a period setting.

It's far more common for the prose (describing the scenery and the action) to be in standard English, and the dialogue in whatever dialect the character happens to speak. If done well, the reader gets an education on the dialect just from reading it. I can think of at least two good examples of that using Yorkshire dialect - which contains a lot of Old Norse left over from the Viking invasions.

[Pagan]

subcultural mangling of English that needs to be erased with proper education (like y'all, doncha know, and amon').

Hey, now. I'm properly edumacated (got two pieces of paper on my wall to say so), but I use y'all on a regular basis.

I see your point.
Still, I read a short (REALLY short) sci-fi story in Scots that is absolutely fantastic. Need to find it...

I've only been to Scotland twice and don't get much of a chance to mingle with transplanted Scots here. However, for some reason, I can read Scots and I understand it when I hear it spoken. Should that scare me?

I thought that Ebonics, like a heavy brogue, tended to be more of a spoken language than a written one.

A brogue is an accent, not a dialect. Are you talking about Lowland Scots (which is more of a dialect) or Gàidhlig, Scots Gaelic (which is a separate language)?

Lowland Scots - http://www.scots-online.org/
Scots Gaelic - http://www.savegaelic.org/

Ebonics, while there is usually an accent associated with it, is actually a dialect.

I absolutely agree that dialects written into a story can add color and really flesh out the depiction of a culture. I am one of the few people I know who actually enjoyed reading Robert Burns' Address to a Haggis in school!

Ah, Rabbie Burns, how I love him! Those were written "Chiefly in the Scottish Dialect"!

"Address to a Haggis" is one of those that you need someone that can really recite it well and has a flare for the dramatic. While I like that one, it's not my favorite. It's a tie between "My Heart's in the Highlands" and "A Red, Red Rose".

And of course, there's "To a Louse"!

[Exaspera]

it's simply a subcultural mangling of English that needs to be erased with proper education (like y'all, doncha know, and amon')

Hey! Hey!! HEY!! Them's fightin' words!!!

[EvilEmpryss]

Oh yah? Well all y'all can kiss mah grits if y'all think I'm gonna give up on trahin' t' civilize you Southern folk. That dog jus' won't hunt!

I love writing the way my characters speak when I roleplay online... it grates on my sensibilities to not spell words properly, but it gets across so much more about my characters' backgrounds. The worst one was one with a Naw'lins accent. Nothing she said was spelled correctly.

[Shalom]

Geez, you guys, there are some classics you need to read. Would it have been less annoying if it was something other than 'ebonics'? Dialect writing is a legitimate form, and it takes practice to read it if it isn't your dialect. Some damned good books have been written like that -- have you ever read Alice Walker's The Color Purple, or Trainspotting or anything else by Irvine Welsh?

Or Joel Chandler Harris.

Or George Washington Harris.

Or Milt Gross.

[Exaspera]

Oh yah? Well all y'all can kiss mah grits if y'all think I'm gonna give up on trahin' t' civilize you Southern folk. That dog jus' won't hunt!

But Y'all is so all-encompassing! It just fits better when addressing groups.

[Marmalady]

But Y'all is so all-encompassing! It just fits better when addressing groups.

A bit like the Norfolk dialect use of the word 'together' when addressing more than one person (of any combination of ages, genders, whatever) - hence for example, 'Your coffees are on the table together'. Substitute the word 'y'all' for 'together' and that's more or less how it works.

[Pagan]

But Y'all is so all-encompassing! It just fits better when addressing groups.

And "all y'all".

[RecoveringKinkoid]

A bit like the Norfolk dialect use of the word 'together' when addressing more than one person (of any combination of ages, genders, whatever) - hence for example, 'Your coffees are on the table together'. Substitute the word 'y'all' for 'together' and that's more or less how it works.

Hm. We would not use it that way here. We would use it thus: "Y'all's coffee is on the table."

It is a contraction for "you all", and can be properly used as "you all's" as a possessive (did I explain that right?" )

You can even say "all y'all's coffee is on the table" if you really want to lay it on thick.

To use it the way Maralady says (at least in the American South ) would require the use of a comma, as in "Your coffees are on the table, y'all."

Just do us all a big favor and never call a single person "y'all." that is the mark of a true poseur.

You mean y'all use the word like "together"?

[LadyAndreca]

I use "y'all" when I'm referring to one group of people and "all y'all" when referring to multiple groups of people. And I don't care how 'Suthun' that makes me sound when I do it, because I cannot, CANNOT stand the New Jersey equivalent of "youse". Gah. It makes me cringe just HEARING it! It about killed me learning Irish when the professor used you/youse to distinguish between the singular and plural 'you'...

[RecoveringKinkoid]

Bet you would love the southern "yourn" (yours).

[Marmalady]

Hm. We would not use it that way here. We would use it thus: "Y'all's coffee is on the table."

It is a contraction for "you all", and can be properly used as "you all's" as a possessive (did I explain that right?" )

You can even say "all y'all's coffee is on the table" if you really want to lay it on thick.

To use it the way Maralady says (at least in the American South ) would require the use of a comma, as in "Your coffees are on the table, y'all."

Just do us all a big favor and never call a single person "y'all." that is the mark of a true poseur.

You mean y'all use the word like "together"?

Ah... I didn't know about those subtle differences. I didn't put a comma in front of together because when I hear this word used there doesn't seem to be a comma there, if that makes sense? It's hard to explain, but the Norfolk dialect is notoriously hard to put down on paper accurately, so I tend to hear it more than I see it.

I'm going to stop there because I can feel my brain pleading with me to....

[RecoveringKinkoid]

Oh. I can't explain grammar and punctuation. I just sort of know what's what. They whys and hows of the actual rules flumox me a bit. I will score very high on a grammar test UNLESS you ask me why something is the way it is.

I was thinking you all up there use "y'all" a different way we do. It just means "you all" or "all you folks" down here.

[Magpie]

Technically, Shakespeare is written in dialect. It was fairly standard English at the time, but the language has changed so much in the interval that it is now very difficult to understand unless you're used to it (ie. have learned the dialect). Since they are plays, and therefore almost entirely dialogue, it's hard to get around that without actively translating it into modern English. Which isn't impossible - I think at one point there were two film versions of Romeo and Juliet that took completely opposite approaches, one using original dialogue in a modern setting (WTF?) and the other using modern English with a period setting.

Hold on a sec. "Romeo + Juliet" (the one where the guns were "swords" and "daggars", right?) had to have been using modernized dialogue. It wasn't any harder to follow than the copies of the play we used in class. (Oxford editions, the cream and maroon covers).

A brogue is an accent, not a dialect. Are you talking about Lowland Scots (which is more of a dialect) or Gàidhlig, Scots Gaelic (which is a separate language)?

Thank you, I meant the Lowland Scots. I had something nagging at me that I had the wrong word (why it was only nagging and not yelling at me I don't know), but I couldn't for the life of me remember the name of the dialect.

[KaeZoo]

I'll throw out Heinlein's "The Moon is a Harsh Mistress" as an example of a novel (science fiction, no less!) written in a dialect form of English. In this case, it's an invented dialect for a penal colony on the moon. When I read it, I was surprised at how quickly the writing started to seem natural to me.

Of course, there's a huge difference between a well-written dialect and poorly-written English.