My Inner Pedant Calls: Quotation Mark.

Alt Title: Needless Responsibility of a Grammar Nazi Pointing Out Flaws in a Needless Rage of Upholding Proper Usage of Language Such as Basic Punctuation. How's this for pedantry?

Spotted these horrendous, eyewatering abomination vanity banners littered hanged around campus during mini-convocation in a shameless, desperate plea to appease Dear Leader about a week ago. Needless to say, my inner dismissive pedant bubbled up and took over me as I furrowed my eyebrow, gave it a scornful squint before taking pictorial evidence of these damning vanity banners in bemusement.

The clinical blue background of the banner glaringly contrasted with the pinkish-purplish red block wording as well as the pinkish-purplish baju Melayu of sheepishly smiling hurr hurr hurr Dear Leader PM's portrait.

Personal vendetta against overly used 1Malaysia logo, Aspirasi USM and shameless boot-licking to Dear Leader aside, it's fairly obvious even to passerby that the quotation mark has made needless presence on that banner sticking out like a sore thumb. According to various style guides quoted in the Wikipedia page about quotation mark, the quotation mark is used to quote speech or dialogue (duh). If this is what the designer intended to do (in a way as if a USM student said that. It's a stretch though. A very LONG stretch. Almost doubtful.), then it could have been done clearer by adding a smaller print around the lower right corner with a phrase "-daripada seluruh warga Universiti Sains Malaysia". In fact without that phrase to identify it's the voice of USM student, the presence of PM's portrait right beside the needlessly quoted admiration can be inferred that it was PM himself that said that line, irrespective of how self-contradictory and self-referral it could be if we look at the whole slogan.

If anyone of you think that I am needlessly picking bone, please take a look at this absolute clincher. By the way, this was hanged outside the campus gate and all too exposed to public scrutiny about how inappropriate usage of quotation  mark could result in inevitably bemusing situation.

"Thank you", Dato' Seri Najib. That's all I want to say.

Another common usage of quotation mark in stylistics for connotative function is to indicate irony or the quoted word meant exactly opposite of its original, usual denotative meaning. Hence presented without any further justification, "Terima Kasih" Dato Seri Najib (sic). (That's the very first thought that I have upon seeing that banner). After much pondering, I can safely deduce that the needless existence of quotation mark on these banners is intended by the designer of the banner to provide emphasis of some sort which is considered non-standard usage, disregarding the more general function the people tend to associate quotation mark with and hence should be refrained. The banner, with its large title and serve to distract attract attention, could have make do without those needless quotation marks and just use CAP, underline or bold (or in fact, any punctuation mark at all) and I would just ignored it as shameless boot-licking to Dear Leader...but NO, they just have to add it in. If it's really intended to add emphasis, I can say it certainly did...and not in a good way. The designer of these banners (namely Aspirasi USM and Sekretariat 1Malaysia) could really use a "Idiot's" style guide in copyrighting and branding especially if they really want to design a banner to impress and glorify. *See what I did with the quotation mark?* I wonder how many people do noticed about these misplaced quotation mark for the one whole week it has been hanging around campus.

Akhir sekali kepada sesiapa yang ingin menafikan hujah saya dengan mengatakan bahawa penggunaan tanda petikan sebagai penekanan: walaupun saya tidak terjumpa sebarang rujukan tentang gaya penulisan dan penggunaan tanda wacana dalam Tatabahasa Dewan dan PRPM, namun jika kita rujuk kepada masukan Wikipedia bahasa Indonesia tentang tanda petik dan pengaruh gaya dan sintaksis bahasa Inggeris dalam perancangan bahasa Malaysia, saya boleh rumuskan bahawa penggunaan tanda petik untuk penekanan adalah tidak sesuai. Jangan cuba guna alasan bahawa rujukan yang saya gunakan di sini adalah berdasarkan bahasa Inggeris hanya kerana anda kurang peka dalam penggunaan tanda wacana dan gaya bahasa yang betul.

Next time probably on A Pedant's Observation Log of Improper Usage of Language and Translation: Why the word "home" shouldn't be translated as "rumah" in BM and is there any proper translation in BM for the word "home". Spotted one of those vanity banner/billboard by a Penang State Assemblyman (probably N24 Kebun Bunga) around Scotland Road/Macalister Road (the part where the rich lives in their opulent bungalows) while I was on my way over to KOMTAR using  RapidPenang 304. The said banner, in its green and blue theme (following the theme of Cleaner, Greener Penang) and plastered with the assemblyman's and Dear Leader CM Lim's face, emblazoned with a slogan in three language namely in English (Penang My Home. Mostly likely the first slogan they came out), Chinese (我的家园槟城 if I am not mistaken but this is not the main focus now.) and BM (Pulau Pinang Rumah Saya). Tunggu sekejap. Rumah? Tak rasa...janggal, terjemahan ini?

Unfortunately however, I couldn't react fast enough to capture the moment on my mobile phone camera as the bus is moving quite fast and I was caught off guard by that anyway. So until I get my photo evidence of the banner in question, let's think about whether is there appropriate translation for the word "home" in BM...and I immediately reminded myself about semantic component analysis/analisis komponen makna. *BATIan at work: always vigilant.*

Meanwhile while pondering about non-standard usage vs dynamics of a living language, how long does it take for a seemingly non-standard usage of language (in both form or style) to be repeated in common use until is it possible for the non-standard usage to supplant current standard usage of language that we have now and become "standard" usage of language of the future? Being one living language, "standard" usage certainly changes and evolves according to the speakers themselves and it's a definitely fact that what we have now as "standard" actually doesn't exist as standard back then and we can see "standard" changes even within a short span of a few decades. While form (in the case of syntax) of language is definitely much more rigid then style (the reason Shakespeare is great is because how he influenced the style of English), who knows if enough people repeat "mistakes", it might end up becoming "correct"...and whether should we stem it or just let it be. Is standard = correctness? Ahh, endless possibility of language in the hand of human.

Epilogue: Spot any typo in this? Feel free to point it out it comment. Actually, I still have a few more evidence of grammatical mistakes in public place but I think I would reserve it for next time. Who knows if I have enough material, a new label for my blog may emerge. Oh I almost blithely forgot about the upcoming EVENT tomorrow. All I want to say is: Good Luck (especially those in KL). I am sure all of you are equipped with First Timer Guide for Protest (tm), right? I agree in principles Bersih's demand but I just can't help to scrutinize their demands and their action. So I will be staying back in the comfort of my room and keep myself updates with all those live Tweets and Facebook snaps around Ground Zero while expecting a media firestorm the day after tomorrow.