Grammar Optional?

Recently, a fellow Diva posted about an unsatisfactory experience she had with an online writing course. They were asked to post a paragraph from their work on the class message board, then comment on each other's work. When she started posting constructive criticism, telling them both what she thought was good and could be improved, one of the other students proceeded to tell everyone to pay no attention to what she said, that R. didn't know what she was talking about. This other student was defended by the instructor who said they didn't need her help, that it was the creativity that was important, grammar and punctuation were optional

Grammar optional?!

Sorry, but grammar and punctuation are both integral parts of the writing process. I don't care whether you're writing an email or letter, posting on message boards or blogs, or doing "real" writing, if it's written and you're calling yourself a writer you owe it to yourself and potential readers to do the very best you can, to proofread what you've written, to correct grammar and punctuation and use words correctly. Only by consistently doing do you become better, until you reach a point where you don't have to consciously think about it, it's so ingrained.

Whether it is "only" a message board or email and not "professional" work, if you're that slack when it comes to writing a post or email, what are we to think of your work in general? Not to mention that writing and proofreading posts and emails is good practice, not just in the writing aspect, but technical as well. And then there is the fact that editors and agents have been known to lurk on boards. What kind of impression do you leave of your work, your attention to detail, if your online writing is habitually sloppy? I admit that I do make typos now and then, I'm not infallible, but there's a HUGE difference between the occasional typo and all-out laziness.

I've been turned off of online workshops where the instructors never capitalized the pronoun "I" or the first word of a sentence, where they could not correctly choose between there/their/they're or you/you're, or used words with completely different meanings as though they were interchangeable such as wonder/wander or want/won't, or cannot use the correct tense of a word. Argh!

The first rule for anyone wanting to be taken seriously as a writer is to learn the basic rules of grammar and syntax, and be rigorous in their use. Anyone can learn the basics, no matter what their level of education. All you need is a basic grammar school (and there's a reason it's often called grammar school!) English book, easily found at your local bookstore. Heck, you can even find them cheap at used book stores or online venues.

For anyone looking to improve their writing or editing skills, I recommend the following:

The Elements of Style -- Strunk & White
Self-Editing for Fiction Writers -- Renni Brown & David King
On Writing Well -- William Zinsser
The Everyday English Handbook -- Leonard J. Rosen