I know many people use it, but it really does sound informal. Should I avoid it anyway?
Case is. I have a pair of earings on the table and I want to refer to them, so I say:
- "Are you talking about those ones?"
- "Are you talking about those?"
Is the second case better than the first? Are there other ways to say it?
Best Answer
No, saying “these ones” or “those ones” is NOT grammatically incorrect, though many people believe the opposite to be true. Those particular phrases are often frowned upon (more so in US English than British English) but have been around for centuries in both formal and informal writing (government, linguistic, theatrical, etc. documents/ plays/ books). Though many might proclaim them to be incorrect, many linguists do not agree. The idea of those phrases being incorrect is actually relatively new from what I understand, only emerging within the last century or less.
In The Oxford History of Classical Reception in English Literature, for example, one chapter's author uses the phrase “these ones.”
To conclude, phrases such as “these ones” are NOT incorrect, but are largely stigmatized and disliked (which also does not make them incorrect, however much those people might wish that they were). They might be a bit redundant, but redundancy also does not make them incorrect.
This article from Grammarphobia covers this question with a vast assortment of historical and modern examples by scholars and other authors.