Which is the correct sentence?
“We’re going to talk about your problems.”
Or…
“We’re going to talk to your problems.”
Now, if you were my grammar student (I don’t have any grammar students)…
And if you wanted me to correct all your mistakes (I don’t correct my students’ mistakes)…
And you said, “Talk to a problem”…
I would say, “Whoooooo. Wait just a minute. We talk TO a person. But we talk ABOUT problems.”
Right?
Isn’t that what you learned in your dusty grammar book long ago?
Well, just this evening, I was watching a video.
An educated, successful American native speaker was talking.
He was even wearing a tie.
And he said, “We’re going to talk to your problems.”
And that’s not the first time I’ve heard that from a native speaker!
Is it a mistake?
Yes.
Until… a few million people start to say it that way.
Then they change the grammar books.
When I was a kid, my grammar book said, “Always use the masculine pronoun when talking to a group.”
So a teacher talking to a class of boys and girls would say, “Everyone take out his book.”
Now it’s, “Everyone take out their book.”
Times change.
Words change.
So don’t get too attached on your rules, because they may not be here tomorrow.
Very interesting. I would like to know if that progress of changes is obviously only in American world or it works in the conservative British world too. Who knows it ?
From what I’ve heard, UK slang is richer than American slang. So maybe UK English changes more…?