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stillnosheep
Joined: 01 Mar 2004
Posts: 2068
Location: eslcafe
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 Posted: Sat Apr 15, 2006 7:49 pm Post subject: |
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| Stephen Jones wrote: |
Finally lets look at the marvellous sentence I mentioned in my previous post.
| Quote: |
| Indeed it was Sheikh's comprehensive demolition of the false underpinnings of the Atassi attack upon the Gregor highlighting of the Jones mistaken (by his (Jones') own standards) usage that I was originally applauding. |
There indeed should be at least one comma there, but if we follow standard "American" rules, the only place a comma is obligatory is after 'Indeed'. And what a sorry place to put a comma it is! Like a refreshment stand 200 metres from the starting line in a Nevada desert marathon, we have the pause in the only place we don't need it. Not just a sorry comma but a sadistic one, as we stop to look out over the dry twenty-five kilometers of prose ahead of us and realize we will never make the end of the sentence before the vultures come and pick our bones.[/i] |
Thank you. I was rather proud of the sentence myself. Especially as I could find no place where a comma could reasonably be positioned except, indeed, after indeed.
But sadistic? Never. While I can deliver the sentence without need of pause, the opening and closing brackets allow plenty of rest opportunities for the more, ahem, respirationally challenged amongst us.
Finally let's take another look at the marvellous sentence that opens this post.
| Stephen Jones wrote: |
| Finally lets look at the marvellous sentence I mentioned in my previous post. |
Shouldn't there be an apostrophe in 'let's'? |
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Stephen Jones
Joined: 21 Feb 2003
Posts: 4124
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| Posted: Sat Apr 15, 2006 8:05 pm Post subject: |
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| Quote: |
| Shouldn't there be an apostrophe in 'let's'? |
Yes |
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Stephen Jones
Joined: 21 Feb 2003
Posts: 4124
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| Posted: Sat Apr 15, 2006 8:40 pm Post subject: |
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| Please give me some sample sentences in which commas cannot be explained syntactically but can be explained only because the speaker/reader feels the "need" to pause. |
Not clear where you are going here. We don't normally put pauses just because we feel like them; pauses in speech have the same effect punctuation marks do in writing, and indicate some kind of syntactic or semantic boundary.
If we wished to imitate a particular person's exact speech intonation, then we can use commas and other punctuation marks for this purpose. Taking the example from Thurber that Truss rightly claims is destroyed by the comma, there is no semantic difference between "my God what is that thing?" and my God, what is that thing?" and whilst here it is the absence of the comma that indicates the non-stop patter of the door-to-door salesman, we can add commas to indicate the slow dawning of the horror. [i]my God, what is, that, thing?".
Look at the punctuation of nineteenth-century novels and you will see more commas than you would now. Does this mean it would be read aloud with more pauses? Probably. |
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Atassi
Joined: 13 Sep 2004
Posts: 128
Location: 평택
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| Posted: Sat Apr 15, 2006 10:12 pm Post subject: |
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Henry Cowell wrote:
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| Basing comma usage on an aspect of SPEECH (i.e., pauses) is patently silly today. Commas are used in writing, and writing is not speech and is not meant to be read. |
I must disagree. Writing follows speech, and writing conventions have historically been based on the language as spoken. Basically, we didn't learn to speak after writing was established.
Stephen Jones just gave a wonderful intuitive explanation of the issue, and included much evidence to support his conclusions. He should be commended for being so knowledgable on the topic.
Now, based on what we've heard, let's focus on our learners shall we? I recognize the difficulties in instructing language learners on this.
Justin expressed fear that his students' "heads will explode" if we tell them something like "commas indicate pauses, but not all pauses indicate commas." Maybe confusing for language learners, but can this not be done?
Stephen, I think your input is valuable here.
Regards,
Atassi |
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stillnosheep
Joined: 01 Mar 2004
Posts: 2068
Location: eslcafe
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| Posted: Sat Apr 15, 2006 10:52 pm Post subject: |
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Atassi, this whole discussion is taking place on a plane way way over your head and neither your ridiculous attempts to patronise HC nor your quite shameless sucking up to SJ changes that one little bit.
| Henry Cowell wrote: |
Basing comma usage on an aspect of SPEECH (i.e., pauses) is patently silly today. Commas are used in writing, and writing is not speech and is not meant to be read. |
| You wrote: |
I must disagree. Writing follows speech, and writing conventions have historically been based on the language as spoken. |
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Atassi
Joined: 13 Sep 2004
Posts: 128
Location: 평택
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| Posted: Sat Apr 15, 2006 11:01 pm Post subject: |
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Some attitude you have. No wonder I get support mail now.
To answer you, what has happened historically continues to a large extent today.
Thanks for the kind comments  |
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Atassi
Joined: 13 Sep 2004
Posts: 128
Location: 평택
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| Posted: Sat Apr 15, 2006 11:39 pm Post subject: |
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Also, stillnosheep should know that I always try to be friendly and show respect to anyone I come across. I admit though that it's hard to do so when others show blatant disrespect for me, or for others around me.
This forum should be open to all who wish to participate. If one wishes to debate, it should be done respectfully so.
I look forward to the end of what embarrassingly has taken place here. To any others who frequent this forum: you are welcome to take part in a good discussion.
Warm regards to all,
Atassi |
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Henry_Cowell
Joined: 27 May 2005
Posts: 3352
Location: Berkeley
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| Posted: Sun Apr 16, 2006 7:36 am Post subject: |
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| Atassi wrote: |
| Writing follows speech... |
Wow...  You and Roger should get together. He thinks that writing and speaking are equivalent. Thus he prefers to teach writing rather than conversation. Same thing, really.
You and Stephen Jones have still not provided a single example in which a comma indicating a pause does not also indicate an important syntactic function of separating elements in a sentence.
English composition teachers regularly teach punctuation without regard to "pauses" in speech. They teach punctuation -- which is a writing element and not a speech element -- as part of grammar and syntax, which is where it belongs. Nothing you say here will change that. |
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Atassi
Joined: 13 Sep 2004
Posts: 128
Location: 평택
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| Posted: Sun Apr 16, 2006 8:55 am Post subject: |
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Henry, with all due respect, I was originally referring to the concept of omitting commas when no pause is necessary in a sentence. Since we are obviously talking about formal writing conventions, I never stated that all pauses need commas (although you insisted I did). The original sentence in question:
| Quote: |
| Aluminum' was the original name given to the element by Humphry Davy, who discovered it. |
Here, we have a comma in a place where not many people need to pause. I was attempting to state that this sentence as originally written was correct without the comma. I pointed this out because, in my opinion, this should not be corrected on our students' papers. I mean, we are teachers after all, so that's the mindset I came into this discussion with.
Now, Stephen mentioned another sentence:
| Quote: |
| I phoned my brother who lives in Chicago, and then emailed my other brother in Iraq. |
Now, I believe we might also write: "I phoned my brother, who lives in Chicago, and then emailed my other brother in Iraq."
This would also be correct. However, I believe the comma I just placed would be more useful if the sentence went: "I phoned my brother, who happens to live in Chicago, and then emailed my other brother in Iraq."
In this last sentence there is a definite need for the comma I placed, as now semantically a speaker will need to place a pause between "brother" and "who". You are right that the syntax also calls for the comma's placement (assuming you would think so). Let me know if I have erred here.
Now, if we were were to speak of writing for novels and the like, commas are more frequently then allowed in such writings. Stephen mentioned an example:
| Quote: |
| [i]my God, what is, that, thing?". |
This is an extreme example I agree, but it is acceptable in some types of writing. I was originally not referring to these scenarios, and I would not present anything like this to students except those at an advanced level.
To sum up, I think Stephen succinctly explained it with the following:
| Quote: |
| The use of the comma is based on the use of a pause in intonation. Nevertheless, there are varying conventions that mediate between the pause and the punctuation, and we cannot talk about a one-to-one relationship. |
I never meant to oversimplify the issue, but we have to think of simple ways to present it to our students. We need students to depend more on intuition, and less on rules. The challenge is in trying to bring our students' levels of intuition higher and higher. That's my goal anyway.
And regarding the talk of teaching writing instead of speaking, you know I never went there....the skills are different and both are highly necessary to teach. My point, my dear friend, is that the rules for writing originate from historical linguistic norms in speaking; and although speech tends to change faster than writing does, writing conventions do still evolve over time for different reasons. Comma usage is no exception. Do a grammar check in Microsoft Word; this may partially explain why you'll see commas being often omitted in writings these days. Most writers' minds speak as they write.
I will try to keep up with our lovely discussion, but understand if I'm delayed that I have some urgent research work to take care of now. I'll look forward to continuing the discussion later if everyone wants to. Although this has been a bit annoying lately, I have learned things myself reading what everyone had to say. Gotta go...regards |
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Atassi
Joined: 13 Sep 2004
Posts: 128
Location: 평택
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| Posted: Sun Apr 16, 2006 9:16 am Post subject: |
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Just a quick comment to all the onlookers: the moderator came in. Stillnosheep used a very inappropriate slur, and my response was edited as well to erase any history of it taking place. Either he was intending to call me a Democrat, or maybe he intended the a- word to mean something else.
Anyway, to give everyone the context, my previous posts were in response to sheep's nasty behavior here recently.
Atassi |
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stillnosheep
Joined: 01 Mar 2004
Posts: 2068
Location: eslcafe
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| Posted: Sun Apr 16, 2006 11:40 am Post subject: |
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| Atassi wrote: |
Now, Stephen mentioned another sentence:
| Quote: |
| I phoned my brother who lives in Chicago, and then emailed my other brother in Iraq. |
Now, I believe we might also write: "I phoned my brother, who lives in Chicago, and then emailed my other brother in Iraq."
This would also be correct. |
No, it wouldn't. That was precisely Stephen Jones' point. |
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stillnosheep
Joined: 01 Mar 2004
Posts: 2068
Location: eslcafe
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| Posted: Sun Apr 16, 2006 12:26 pm Post subject: |
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The MODs have not edited any of my posts in this thread. They stand as written by me. Please stop trying to portray yourself as a victim. It is undignified and serves only to disguise the fact that the last five pages of this thread have been an attempt by evervbody else to get you to understand the mistake in your attempted correction of Gregor that started this nonsense in the first place.
Let's recap the dispute and see what others have had to say:
| Atassi wrote: |
| Gregor wrote: |
First, I'm going to be so crass as to point out, to someone having done me a favor, that there should have been a comma after "Humphry Davy" |
A comma is not supposed to be where you wanted to place it. Change the phrase at the end and it may take a comma, but as it is it would actually be incorrect to place one there.
I just wanted to point that out, and forgive me if another variety of English differs. I use standard United Statesian English... |
| Henry Cowell wrote: |
| Actually, you [...] are wrong (and Gregor was correct), especially if you're citing "standard" U.S. English. A comma is required because the following clause is not restrictive (i.e., not essential to identifying Mr. Davy). |
| Atassi wrote: |
[U]sing descriptive grammar for American English I still stand by my original statement that a comment is not needed. And since it is not normal to place a comma there in that sentence, it would actually come across as seemingly incorrect to do so.
I would add that it's not normal in any writing, whether in texts, newspaper articles, or journals. The principle is that a comma is placed where a native speaker would normally pause, which would not happen in American English with that sentence. |
| Henry Cowell wrote: |
| This is quite extraordinarily wrong. Formal writing in the U.S. uses the very punctuation distinctions that I pointed out. Writing, grammar, and style manuals reinforce those distinctions. If you want to call these "prescriptive," that's fine. But please don't try to describe what is "normal" in all standard U.S. written forms. |
| Stephen Jones wrote: |
| [In the phrase Humphrey Davy, who discovered it. the comma is mandatory in both British and American English. Were it easier to edit posts in this forum, I would have changed it as soon as I noticed it. |
| Sheikh Inal Over wrote: |
According to Atassi we can pretty much stick a comma where we like ... i.e. depending on which word we want to stress ...
| Quote: |
The principle, is that a comma is placed where a native speaker would normally pause. |
| Quote: |
The principle is that a comma, is placed where a native speaker would normally pause. |
| Quote: |
The principle is that a comma is placed, where a native speaker would normally pause. |
Atassi did not mention anything about unmarked clauses, and as we were so modestly told that Atassi's writing is much admired, we would assume that that is what Atassi meant ...
.. what's more, 'Atassi's principle' would logically allow the comma in the first sentence, which Atassi insisted should not be present!
Quote: Aluminum was the original name given to the element by Humphry Davy, who discovered it.
That is, if we are allowed to utter the sentence in a non-Atassi form ... |
| Atassi wrote: |
| Your examples, frankly, sucked. |
| sns wrote: |
| Game Set Match: Sheikh Inal Over |
| Gregor wrote: |
| Is grammar and (proper writing) simply not taught in schools anymore?? There should be no question at all regarding the placement of the comma in the "offending" sentence. I also knew that the author of that sentence knew that perfectly well and it was likely a typo or oversight. |
| Henry Cowell wrote: |
sns,
It's useless. This guy[Atassi] has proven that he's incapable of grasping the nature of this issue. |
| Cdaniels wrote: |
Atassi wrote:
You're still intent on saying I said things I didn't say
Not true, HC and stillnosheep are following the logical consequences of your statements, and not taking them out of context, as you apparently like to insist. |
Just accept that you were wrong, and move on, instead of trying to pull the wool over everybody's eyes with cries of "Victim!" interspersed with demands that Sheikh, Gregor, HC and myself all vacate this board and/or thread due to insufficient evidence of intellect on our part.
You spent 4 pages trying to argue with Sheikh, Gregor, HC and myself over the conventions governing comma usage in general, in particular the correct punctuation of Aluminum was the original name given to the element by Humphry Davy, who discovered it. Every single other poster agreed that you were wrong according to your own "principle" [your word] asd well as according to the standard conventions governing the use of commas.
In quiting the original field of battle once every single other contributor to the debate had pointed out your error you accused other contributors of being 'rascist', 'nationalist', and lacking the intellectual ability to debate with you. On being called on that by other posters you now wish to assume an air of injured innocence and create divisions between other posters.
I repeat: Just accept that you were wrong, and move on; it will be be far less damaging for you in the long run.
Last edited by stillnosheep on Sun Apr 16, 2006 4:13 pm; edited 4 times in total |
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Sheikh Inal Ovar
Joined: 04 Dec 2005
Posts: 1208
Location: Melo Drama School
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| Posted: Sun Apr 16, 2006 1:54 pm Post subject: |
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Good to see things have moved along so far ... we seem to have at least three questions going on here:
1) Did Atassi make a boo-boo with his/her rule of thumb?
2) What are the rules of punctuation surrounding the use of the comma?
3) Who are the good guys and who are the bad?
In question 1, the crux of the matter is the rule of thumb introduced on page 4 ...
| Atassi wrote: |
| The principle is that a comma is placed where a native speaker would normally pause |
The questions to Atassi are:
In spoken English, is the stressing of a word in a clause normal ?
Is it normal for native speakers to pause after a stressed word?
These are Yes/No questions ... If his/her answer to both is 'Yes', then he/she has to admit that the examples of 'ridiculous' comma use .. which 'frankly sucked' ... are valid examples of how ridiculous the rule is - when it is expressed in the above words in a communication with fellow language teachers (not students) ...
A later variant of the rule appeared on page 4 .. and there are quite possibly other manifestations knocking around ... providing a whole hand of rules of thumbs and fingers:
| Atassi wrote: |
| if you would pause in speech, it normally requires a comma in writing |
Even if Atassi's answer to the above questions were 'No' ... I'm reliably informed by some American colleagues that they (and - I'm quietly confident - that most Brits) certainly would stop for a pause where the comma is placed in the sentence:
| Quote: |
| 'Aluminum' was the original name given to the element by Humphry Davy, who discovered it. |
If this is so .. does not (whichever) rule-of-thumb indicate that a comma can be placed there ... which goes against Atassi's earliest argument ...
Question 2, Stephen and Henry can thrash out ...
Question 3 .. is possibly the most interesting one .. as we witness a poster who wishes for the recognition of playing the 'gentleman' ... while enjoying the trappings of playing the 'cad' ... |
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Atassi
Joined: 13 Sep 2004
Posts: 128
Location: 평택
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| Posted: Sun Apr 16, 2006 4:22 pm Post subject: |
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Sheikh wrote:
| Quote: |
Even if Atassi's answer to the above questions were 'No' ... I'm reliably informed by some American colleagues that they (and - I'm quietly confident - that most Brits) certainly would stop for a pause where the comma is placed in the sentence:
Quote:
'Aluminum' was the original name given to the element by Humphry Davy, who discovered it.
If this is so .. does not (whichever) rule-of-thumb indicate that a comma can be placed there ... which goes against Atassi's earliest argument ...
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In this case my dear friend, the comma causes one to pause. Quite frankly, the pause is optional (but I thought you'd be able to figure that one out). Are you still mad at me? 
I spent enough time here. Just one last lie to address:
sheep said:
| Quote: |
| The MODs have not edited any of my posts in this thread. They stand as written by me. Please stop trying to portray yourself as a victim. It is undignified and serves only to disguise the fact that the last five pages of this thread have been an attempt by evervbody else to get you to understand the mistake in your attempted correction of Gregor that started this nonsense in the first place. |
LOL  sheep is senile now!!!
Anyway, it's really disgusting that you would use name-calling in the first place, and then even more disgusting that you would lie about doing so. I merely wished to let everyone know the reason for my previous posts.
Have a good day guys...don't have time today. |
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Atassi
Joined: 13 Sep 2004
Posts: 128
Location: 평택
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| Posted: Sun Apr 16, 2006 4:51 pm Post subject: |
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Yes I came back for a moment. It's despicable to use name-calling, and also despicable for sheep to choose quotes as he wishes. It seems he is missing the whole discussion (on purpose).
Stephen Jones on the previous page wrote:
| Quote: |
| To sum up in my opinion Atassi is basically right. The use of the comma is based on the use of a pause in intonation. Nevertheless, there are varying conventions that mediate between the pause and the punctuation, and we cannot talk about a one-to-one relationship. |
But sheep missed that obviously. He chose to quote Stephen and everyone else as he wished. Sheep can stand on two legs and this still would be over his head. Stop flooding the forum with your nonsense.
MOD EDIT: (Use the Report feature for complaints or PMs. Don't ask for Moderation in a post or thread.) |
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