Thursday, October 29, 2009

I wanna a new drug; or veer you off your path"?

This is the headline for an article in Vancouver 24 hours on October 14, 2009. Beautiful isn't it. Even if the single-letter word a is removed there are still issues, but more on that later. First, another error:

See how the first question has the question mark inside the closing quotation mark? That's where it should be. The second question has the question mark outside the closing quotation mark; that's not where it should be.

Back to that headline. Who thinks that writing I wanna new drug is a correct slangy way of writing I want a new drug? Compare it with I wanna go to the game. Here wanna is in place of want to, not want a. I'm curious - is wanna a suitable substitute for both? And then what about the song "I Gotta Feeling" by Black Eyed Peas. I Got To Feeling?

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