And this raises a supplementary question. Does awarding 'bad grammar awards' really encourage people to get interested in grammar, or simply perpetuate the idea that grammar is about not making 'mistakes'.

It has been estimated that English grammar has anywhere between 1,500 and 3,000 rules, of which only maybe thirty are in the slightest bit controversial and turn up in these pages. Some of you may not know that if someone says 'She's bought an expensive new red silk headscarf' they are following a specific rule about adjective order. Native speakers simply wouldn't say 'A new silk red expensive headscarf'. This is the sort of grammar we have to teach foreign learners.

Many of the spelling mistakes made by native speakers, especially things like confusing 'your' and 'you're' or 'He must of forgotten' are just not made by foreign learners, because they usually have a better grasp of the theory of English grammar than native speakers. This is the sort of grammar learning we should be encouraging: understanding how English works, not worrying about the 5% or less of rules where there is a difference between the formal rule and everyday speech.

@HS - broadly speaking you're right with your analogy, but there is also 'more' where we make no distinction. And unlike less/fewer, there is no tradition of using one instead of the other. As has been said several tines before, until 1770 (and even later - see my quotes from two well-known early nineteenth century grammar books), the division between less and fewer was much less strict - although fewer is almost never used instead of less - 'I've got fewer money than yesterday' - I would suggest sounds far worse than - 'I've got less coins than yesterday'.

Incidentally, you missed out one important category from your grammar lesson - distances, numbers and money when seen as amounts rather than quantities -
less than ten miles (it could be eight and a half, for example) - the temperature was less than 10 degrees. - it cost less than $20 ($18.95, possibly), 'a few years less' (Byron), and countable nouns seen as amounts - 'they pay less taxes now' etc

In fact the rule is much more complex than at first sight - in maths, for example it always 'less' - 8 times 2 is less than 6 times 3. Numbers follow 'no less' more often than 'no fewer, eg: 'No less than 1,800 slaves' - (Times Literary Supplement), and some usage writers find this quite acceptable. 'One' is followed by 'less' - 'That's one less thing to worry about'. Wouldn't 'one fewer thing' sound rather strange there? And sometimes it's used just for variety - this is from the Illustrated London News - 'There are fewer industries and less job openings'.

In books, 'no less than N times' is much commoner than 'no fewer than N times'. And even more so before around 1800.

http://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=no+less+than+*+times%2Cno+fewer+than+*+times&year_start=1600&year_end=2008&corpus=15&smoothing=3&share=&direct_url=t2%3B%2Cno%20less%20than%20*%20times%3B%2Cc0%3B%2Cs0%3B%3Bno%20less%20than%20three%20times%3B%2Cc0%3B%3Bno%20less%20than%20four%20times%3B%2Cc0%3B%3Bno%20less%20than%20five%20times%3B%2Cc0%3B%3Bno%20less%20than%20seven%20times%3B%2Cc0%3B%3Bno%20less%20than%20six%20times%3B%2Cc0%3B%3Bno%20less%20than%20eight%20times%3B%2Cc0%3B%3Bno%20less%20than%20ten%20times%3B%2Cc0%3B%3Bno%20less%20than%20nine%20times%3B%2Cc0%3B%3Bno%20less%20than%20twelve%20times%3B%2Cc0%3B%3Bno%20less%20than%20eleven%20times%3B%2Cc0%3B.t2%3B%2Cno%20fewer%20than%20*%20times%3B%2Cc0%3B%2Cs0%3B%3Bno%20fewer%20than%20four%20times%3B%2Cc0%3B%3Bno%20fewer%20than%20three%20times%3B%2Cc0%3B%3Bno%20fewer%20than%20five%20times%3B%2Cc0%3B%3Bno%20fewer%20than%20six%20times%3B%2Cc0%3B%3Bno%20fewer%20than%20seven%20times%3B%2Cc0%3B%3Bno%20fewer%20than%20eight%20times%3B%2Cc0%3B%3Bno%20fewer%20than%20ten%20times%3B%2Cc0%3B%3Bno%20fewer%20than%20nine%20times%3B%2Cc0%3B%3Bno%20fewer%20than%20eleven%20times%3B%2Cc0%3B%3Bno%20fewer%20than%20fourteen%20times%3B%2Cc0

All this, together with the fact that we also use 'less' in constructions like 'less well prepared than last time' makes even the occasions when strict grammarians would insist on the use of 'fewer' a lot less common than those when we would normally use 'less'. Which is also perhaps why 'fewer' can sometimes sound awkward to some people - we just don't use it that much.

HS - I would probably agree with you about 'in more elegant speech', but I'm not particularly concerned about being elegant in my speech, unless I'm in a formal situation (which is virtually never). In normal conversation I simply want to use natural, idiomatic English. And in casual speech I often catch myself saying 'less people', and I don't think I'm alone.

As well as the formal rules, we teach our students about register - different ways of talking or writing in different contexts - in other words degrees of formality (or elegance, if you like).

My argument with those who object to "Ten items or less", is that they seem to recognise only one register - formal. And when I'm in a supermarket, I'm not particularly looking for formal language.

But your bombshell is at the beginning - "I often wonder if idiomatic is sometimes being confused with idiotic." Just as well you put a double smiley after that one! This is Oxford Online's definition of 'idiomatic'

"Using, containing, or denoting expressions that are natural to a native speaker:"

And that's exactly how I use it. This is from Arrant Pedantry:

"It used to be that people used less when it sounded natural and nobody worried about it, but then some guy in the eighteenth century got the bright idea that we should always use one word for count nouns and one word for mass nouns, and people have been freaking out about it ever since."

And he goes on:

"Baker’s rule is appealing because it’s simple and (in my opinion) because it allows people to judge others who don’t know grammar."

And when I see some of the reactions to grammar 'mistakes' like this I think that last bit's exactly right. A those who judge are often completely ignorant as to how it became a rule in the first place.

One of the commenters on his blog suggested that "the less/fewer distinction, along with who/whom and other similar rules, strike me as needless — they don’t provide any information. They’re strictly niceties." - Which is fine, if niceties are what people feel is important. But some of us aren't so fussy.

http://www.arrantpedantry.com/2008/12/23/less-and-fewer/

@HS - I think that could qualify as a double whammy.

I wonder what the etymology of 'Okay Idiots' as a salutation is. In fact, 'hey' as an interjection goes back rather further than that, to 1200, apparently.

http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?allowed_in_frame=0&search=hey.

As a Brit I really shouldn't get involved in this very American question. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I have the vague memory from American movies that 'I could care less' is stressed differently from 'I couldn't care less', with the accent in the former on 'I', while in the latter it's on 'couldn't'. So I think that porsche is probably right in that it's an ellipsis of 'As if I could care less' - which has much the same meaning as 'I couldn't care less'.

It may well often be used sarcastically, but I think it is also possible to make the case that it is in fact quite logical if we take that unspoken 'as if' into account.

@joy - as some of our sillier rules (for example not using split infinitives or ending a sentence with a preposition) have resulted from grammarians trying to align English with Latin, I would say no.

But I think what Brus is trying to do is show an analogy rather than prove a point, and I think it's always interesting to compare languages. At Wikipedia, they say:

"in answering to the question "Who wrote this page?" The natural answer for most English speakers in this context would be "me" (or "It's me"), parallel to moi (or C'est moi) in French."

But they go on to point out a big difference. While 'pronoms disjoints' (or stressed pronouns) are an accepted form in the most formal of French grammar (eg: L'état, cést moi), 'disjunctive pronouns' (the standard term) do not have the same status in traditional English grammar. Many traditional grammarians don't accept this form as correct, and you won't find the term 'disjunctive pronoun' used much in English grammars at all, whether in traditional prescriptive or modern descriptive grammars. Disjunctive is usually used in connection with conjunctions, as is copulative, incidentally. For example all references to 'disjunctive pronoun' in 19th century books at Google Books is for French.

So I think that when they flock to the bookshops, Brus's friends might be rather disappointed.

As an English teacher, I'd rather just go with this type of explanation (from Practical English Usage, by Michael Swan):

'In informal English, we use object forms not only as the objects of verbs and prepositions, but also in most other cases where the words do not come before verbs as their subjects. Object forms are common, for example, in one-word answers and after be:"Who said that?" - "(It was) him"; "Who's that?" -"(It's) me". In a more formal style, we often prefer to use subject form + verb where possible: "Who said that?" - "He did" (but not "he")'.

There are also problems with calling this use the 'disjunctive pronoun'. Firstly, because we don't have a separate form, as in French, secondly because it is not universally accepted, and thirdly because it is used in French in ways we can't use it in English, for example -

Lui seul a travaillé hier.
He alone worked yesterday.

Eux aussi veulent venir.
They want to come too.

I know we have 'Me and Johnny went to the pub last night' - but that's very controversial, and is only used in joint subjects with 'and'.

It's interesting that another use of pronoms disjoints is in comparisons, another controversial area in English:

Il travaille plus que moi. - which could be translated three ways in English:

He works more than I - very formal and old-fashioned but keeps the purists happy:
He works more than I do - neutral and more 'polite'
He works more than me. - informal

Here is one grammar book that does use the term 'disjunctive pronoun', but it points out that 'Unlike in French, where such constructions are considered standard, English pronouns used in this way have caused dispute':

http://books.google.pl/books?id=R6IiDRF5utAC&pg=PT88&dq=%22disjunctive+pronoun%22+english+grammar&hl=en&sa=X&ei=Tc9kU_XmAu_T7AaUhoHQAg&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q=%22disjunctive%20pronoun%22%20english%20grammar&f=false

So on balance I prefer to explain these things within the (real) rules of English. We already have all the terminology we need, although with my students I will obviously compare structures with their language when it makes things easier.

I haven't really answered as to why not, but I think that I've shown that similar constructions are often used in very different ways in different languages. The grammar of each language is unique.

@Blue piano man - there certainly seems to be a bias towards using 'everyone' when talking about people present, and 'everybody' might possibly be used more to talk about people in general, but this distinction, seems to be largely disappearing. Even in your first example, 'everyone' is much commoner (in books, at least) that 'everybody', although admittedly, the difference is even bigger in your second example. It looks to be much more about changing fashion, than about subtle differences in meaning.

http://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=everyone+is+equal%3Aeng_us_2012%2Ceverybody+is+equal%3Aeng_us_2012%2Ceveryone+is+equal%3Aeng_gb_2012%2Ceverybody+is+equal%3Aeng_gb_2012&year_start=1800&year_end=2000&corpus=15&smoothing=3&share=&direct_url=t1%3B%2Ceveryone%20is%20equal%3Aeng_us_2012%3B%2Cc0%3B.t1%3B%2Ceverybody%20is%20equal%3Aeng_us_2012%3B%2Cc0%3B.t1%3B%2Ceveryone%20is%20equal%3Aeng_gb_2012%3B%2Cc0%3B.t1%3B%2Ceverybody%20is%20equal%3Aeng_gb_2012%3B%2Cc0

http://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=everyone+agreed%3Aeng_us_2012%2Ceverybody+agreed%3Aeng_us_2012%2Ceveryone+agreed%3Aeng_gb_2012%2Ceverybody+agreed%3Aeng_gb_2012&year_start=1800&year_end=2000&corpus=15&smoothing=3&share=&direct_url=t1%3B%2Ceveryone%20agreed%3Aeng_us_2012%3B%2Cc0%3B.t1%3B%2Ceverybody%20agreed%3Aeng_us_2012%3B%2Cc0%3B.t1%3B%2Ceveryone%20agreed%3Aeng_gb_2012%3B%2Cc0%3B.t1%3B%2Ceverybody%20agreed%3Aeng_gb_2012%3B%2Cc0

If you include 'present' in the second graph, 'everybody' drops out altogether, but the sample is so small as to be pretty meaningless.

I think you were probably right about the rise since the sixties, but this was after a drop since 1880, which is easier to see when you take 'different from' out of the graph. The use of 'different to' is about 50% higher than it was in 1880.

http://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=different+to&year_start=1800&year_end=2008&corpus=18&smoothing=3&share=&direct_url=t1%3B%2Cdifferent%20to%3B%2Cc0

But the use of 'different from' has risen even more since around 1900, which is very apparent on those graphs you've just linked to, so the ratio of 'to' to 'from' was actually higher in 1880 (around 10%) than it is today (less than 9%), as I pointed out in an earlier thread..

"Prior to that no English teacher would have dreamt ...."

We've been here before. I have no idea what my English teacher said, as I really don't remember the subject coming up. But as that generation of teachers were heavily influenced by Fowler, I imagine at least some of them will have agreed with him that 'different to' was perfectly OK. But there is no way that either of us know what other English teachers were saying. And didn't you once say that you weren't interested in hearsay (something about someones's granny).

Anyway I'm not particularly bothered what English teachers may or may not have said in the past (mine taught us quite a few things which I'd rarely use today). The fact is that virtually every authority on British English sees 'different to' as an acceptable alternative to 'different from'. And of it was good enough for those writers I've mentioned at least three times now, it's good enough for me. Nobody's asking you to use it, just to recognise its validity and stop looking down on those of us who do.

And why this on earth this need to speculate on why or when I started using it? (In any case you're well out). Why did Jane Austen use it? Why did Thackeray use it? Given its history, who used it in the past, and its declining total share, I don't think television or the sixties had an awful lot to do with it. But I'm never going to convince you of that, so perhaps we should just drop it.

@HS - OK, so that apparently makes me affected and part of a contrary bunch who want to be different, even though as far as I know I've been using 'different to' since childhood, and wasn't even aware I used it until you pointed it out. I'm sorry, but that's absolute rubbish.

Statistics actually show quite a considerable use in the nineteenth century, declining between 1880 and 1960, before rising again. Were all those writers I mentioned, which you scrupulously avoid discussing, also part of this contrary bunch? I hadn't realised that the telly had had such an impact in the nineteenth century.

I wonder, were the people who first dropped 'thou' in favour of 'you' also a 'contrary bunch'? Was Shakespeare affected for introducing so many expressions into English? Did Thackeray simply want to be different? I suppose it's one way of looking at it.

Sorry to come on strong like this, but if you will assign motives you can't possibly know about to me and other people who don't use your approved options, and label us as affected or contray, I will feel free, honour bound even, to reply. I also don't think this way of looking down on other people's motives for adopting certain ways of speaking is a very useful way of looking at language change, or even anywhere near reality.

Neither do I share your (and Neville Gwynne's) idea that the rot set in in the sixties. I would be tempted to simply call this rear-view mirrorism - and every generation has their cut-off date. No doubt people in the fifties were blaming it all on 'the wireless'. And incidentally, when I listen to some of the old stuff from the forties and fifties still available on Radio 4 Extra on the iPlayer, I'm very happy we don't talk like that any more!

Personally, I simply enjoy the English we have, and am endlessly fascinated by all its varieties and little variations. Without all these little idiosyncrasies we wouldn't have a lot to talk about here, would we now? Now don't take this the wrong way, but please HS, come down off your high horse occasionally. :)

@jayles - I would agree that 'Did you forget already' is more likely to be found in spoken language, but that doesn't necessarily make it a sign of being less educated.

For example, try doing an Ngram of 'I have a new' and I've got a new' in British English books, and not surprisingly 'I have' is commoner than 'I've got a new'. But that's in books. 'I've got a new' is likely to be used rather more frequently in spoken language, and certainly has nothing to do with being less educated.

http://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=I+have+a+new%2CI%27ve+got+a+new&year_start=1800&year_end=2000&corpus=18&smoothing=3&share=&direct_url=t1%3B%2CI%20have%20a%20new%3B%2Cc0%3B.t1%3B%2CI%20%27ve%20got%20a%20new%3B%2Cc0

This is from Lynne Guist's Separated by a Common Language:

'There is nothing unAmerican about the present perfect. We can and do use it in the ways that the British do. We just aren't restricted to it. There is something unBritish about using the preterit with certain temporal adverbs in particular and perhaps also more generally to refer to recent-and-still-relevant events. The difference between Did you eat yet? and Have you eaten already? is, in AmE, mostly a difference of formality, possibly also of emphasis. '

She quotes two sources as giving a ratio of present perfect in BrE in relation to AmE as 4:3 and 1.7:1. In one study 'Virginia Gathercole (1986) looked at Scottish and American adults' use of present perfect in speaking with young children and the acquisition of the present perfect by the children. She concluded that "Scottish adults use the present perfect construction in their speech to children much more frequently than American adults do" and "Scottish children use the present perfect construction in their speech long before their American counterparts." '

http://separatedbyacommonlanguage.blogspot.com/2006/08/present-perfect.html