Why do we teach prescriptive grammar?

[Scott.Sommers]

In some of the other threads, we've been discussing different aspects of prescriptive grammar (PG). One of the topics that keeps coming up, but never gets fully explored, is the rationale for teaching PG. Even though there are many legitimate linguistic reasons not to stress PG, I can only assune that explicit instruction in PG remains at the heart of much of our instruction in communicative English skills, and that is why detailed knowledge about PG remains important to teachers. Why is this? Is there something fundamentally important about PG that is somehow being missed in the discussion of SLA? Or is this a relic of older, less informed classroom technique that is difficult to get rid of? And if so, why?

[fluffyhamster]

I'm not entirely sure what "prescriptive grammar" is: I doubt if anyone teaches pure, "traditional" grammar, but neither could anyone hope (or want) to describe language in its every present, potential detail; so, perhaps we can assume that by "prescriptive", we just mean that we have hammered out a prescription of sorts that builds on the regularities identified by our grammarian predecessors, whilst also taking account of more recent or overlooked irregularity or creativity.

Of course, once we have decided what we want to teach, the prescription slowly becomes evermore prescriptive (perhaps principled, but flying in the face of reality) again, but obviously some stability from time to time is better than constant upheaval and doubt - who'd want to be writing a grammar every decade (i.e. more than once per generation)? Would there be any point (that is, any noticeable change?). In some areas, some changes may be observed, but generally things remain stable, and the last generation's ways are certainly not "wrong" (incomprehensible)...vocabulary is a different matter (David Crystal aparently gets a new dictionary, or wants a new edition, every five years!).

So, prescriptions provide a remedy for the "patient's" needs, and can be rattled off easily by the "doctor" - prescribe this to effect that "cure"; people improve, get better, especially if they believe in what they are being given, and everyone's happy. They are, in short, a panacea for a multitude of ills, providing generally comforting treatments for a wide range of problems.

Where these prescriptions prove less useful is when they are misprescribed, or too strong, or the problem too pressing. We all know about antibitiotics being prescribed for colds - they will have no effect; or of the effects of chemotherapy and radiation therapy for cancer, or the side effects of a whole host of drugs in relation to what they are supposed to treat; and finally, there are those matters in which medicine is powerless.

The analogy with grammar should be clear enough: often no one prescription will work or help totally; sometimes the prescription is "overkill"; and often, it is pathetically inadequate, as if minding our Ps and Qs were the whole story when it comes to communicating (rules are not only made to be broken, there are many instances where creativity of an order the grammars never envisaged is needed).

PG therefore paves the centre of the highway, but in entrusting to the route it has laid we shouldn't forget that walking on the sidewalk can often be as sure and reliable a way to go (minus the choking fumes of our sports car), or that we might sometimes need to get away from it all in another sense, that is, make a detour down an unfamiliar driveway to oversee the construction of our luxury custom-designed mansion in the countryside.

[Metamorfose]

I see some very passinate attacks on the 'wrong' use of language, 'natives commit a lot of mistakes and you can be better than them in English' is the stupid motto some teachers have here, if one marks in a test 'If I was you...' this poor student will get a beautiful red cross, if this same pupils marks 'She told me the president is in town.' again another cross will be the reward. People learn how to speak how to use the language but take for granted one of the most important aspect of any language, like us, it changes, it's not a sacred code with one can't blasphemy by accepting other codes, when one only relies on their Grammar books or what they were taught ten, twenty years ago and dismiss other usages of the language as 'wrong', they lose the essence of language, it's like us, ambiguous and imperfect, perfect within its system, but limited as we human beings are.

I recall one students who asked 'Is "we don't need no education" wrong?' I told him he should avoid it in a test but there are people who say so, even as a NNspeaker he should avoid it, I went on, unless he's been quite a time within the communite and is part of them. I think this is much more precise and human (we are teachers, aren't we?) than saying "No, it's wrong, the singer can't speak his own language."


On the other hand we need a guide, pupils need the sensation that not everything goes (and in fact not everything goes but I believe if one emphasise the 'descreptive' aspect of grammar too much, they may end up having students who think that "home I went" is correct English), I believe what you call prescreptive grammar is what RA Close call 'grammar as a fact', that solid core that can't be changed.

José

[fluffyhamster]

I believe what you call prescreptive grammar is what RA Close call 'grammar as a fact', that solid core that can't be changed.

José

I think truly prescriptive grammar is merely an opinion, an acquired taste, a positive moral imperative and decision for some, by which they believe empires can rise or fall/decline (enforcing a standard does help preserve the illusion of unity).

Grammar as fact, on the other hand, is (description that is) so basic and incontrovertible that only an madman would go deliberately against it, or an idiot inadvertently - it is the language, and it is not a matter of opinion or debate at all (or, at least it won't be in our generation).

[Metamorfose]

I think truly prescriptive grammar is merely an opinion, an acquired taste, a positive moral imperative and decision for some, by which they believe empires can rise or fall/decline (enforcing a standard does help preserve the illusion of unity).

Grammar as fact, on the other hand, is (description that is) so basic and incontrovertible that only an madman would go deliberately against it, or an idiot inadvertently - it is the language, and it is not a matter of opinion or debate at all (or, at least it won't be in our generation).

Good point of yours fluffyhamster, I'll fall on my sword in this. Indeed no educated native speaker of any language can use all the set of the prescriptive rule, it's a sacred code for some (I'll insist on that), it's always arbitrarily chosen, the dialect which is standard for others, some people here, for example, want to approximate the language people speak in Portugal and the one we speak here in Brazil through rules, by fearing the decline of the Portuguese language, some say that we should emulate the European version of our language because that is the correct one, but are there any scientific research that proves so?

José

[Scott.Sommers]

I ask this because I believe there are alternatives. There is a large and growing body of research on conversation analysis. I also work with people who believe that exercises derived from the concepts of learner autonomy offer interesting possibilities. I mention these not as my own prescriptions but as evidence that available alternatives are ignored.

To be honest, I often fall back on 'teaching grammar', particularly in conversation classes because I don't know any other way to think about some of things I believe students should learn. I also teach composition, where, ironically, I prescribe almost no grammar. I think that's the case because I have a much clearer idea of what students should be doing in a composition class without traditional exposure to grammar.

And by the way, Happy Lunar New Year!!

[woodcutter]

Everyone here, I believe, thinks they are teaching "descriptive grammar", I do not think that anyone would describe themselves as a prescriptive grammar teacher. However, in the discussions we have had before, I have pointed out that students are often faced with strict marking systems, where a thing is wrong or right, and there is no place for the "?" that we can often see in linguistics textbooks.

Therefore we are forced to give a solid set of rules to guide them as best we can. We can at least base these rules on current usage, rather than old wives tales, however.

[fluffyhamster]

Everyone here, I believe, thinks they are teaching "descriptive grammar", I do not think that anyone would describe themselves as a prescriptive grammar teacher. However, in the discussions we have had before, I have pointed out that students are often faced with strict marking systems, where a thing is wrong or right, and there is no place for the "?" that we can often see in linguistics textbooks.

Therefore we are forced to give a solid set of rules to guide them as best we can. We can at least base these rules on current usage, rather than old wives tales, however.

The grammar should be descriptive in the sense that it is the best we can generally find, but if there is a specific (albeit silly) need to learn actually prescriptive rules, then that should be what we teach instead. But let's not allow the general labels to confuse us or hold back our thinking: a corpus of exam questions would provide a "good" basis on which to offer an "excellent description" of prescription for those who need or care for it.





(That was an ironic use of the "Razz" emoticon, you see)

[Scott.Sommers]

The vast majority of what gets taught as grammar comes from books that explain the basic tenants. In effect, they are defining the principles. It is from these assumptions about the construction of the 'best grammar' that the discussions that originally attracted my attention are drawn from. Written English conforms to these rules for the most part because it has been made to do so. If you read material written before the standardization of written Modern English, it differs considerably from its current form. Spoken English, on the other hand, only vaguely conforms to these rules. But this has never stopped parents and elementary school teachers from correcting students according to these formulations.

[woodcutter]

And you yourself are able to perform code-switching operations and produce the standard English which allows an educated New Yorker to chat with an educated Geordie more easily than their blue collar friends can manage, because you were lucky enough to be brought up by traditional minded souls.

Standard oral english differs from the written (e.g "If I'd've seen him" is OK), but it is not anything goes.

[Stephen Jones]

grammar comes from books that explain the basic tenants.

I suppose it is true that the basic tenets are merely temporary inmates and will be substituted by others over the passage of time.

[Scott.Sommers]

Yes, they are only temporary inmates, but their sentence is very long. Thank you, Stephen, for pointing out the error of my ways.

[fluffyhamster]

And you yourself are able to perform code-switching operations and produce the standard English which allows an educated New Yorker to chat with an educated Geordie more easily than their blue collar friends can manage, because you were lucky enough to be brought up by traditional minded souls.

Standard oral english differs from the written (e.g "If I'd've seen him" is OK), but it is not anything goes.

Woody, you obviously believe in drills and painfully making every last scrap of syntax painfully obvious to English learners, but I think it is a stretch to say that "educated" native speaker-writers perfom as well as they sometimes do by adhering to explicit rules. Eloquence comes from having something to say and using whatever intelligence and passion (and obviously "raw" language knowledge, "facts") to shape things effectively (appropriately) according to the context. The fact that educated people have had exposure to data that may in itself have been formed in strict accordance to prescriptive rules is besides the point, and even the most rabid prescriptivist breaks their silly rules from time to time in hot pursuit of making a point they think is essential on top of and in addition to the rules they are trying to uphold and demonstrate (in everything they can't always painstakingly formulate).

That, I believe, is what linguistics and AL should be all about, uncovering the natural tendencies in spontaneous usage. Luckily for us, we have corpora now to help resolve any issues, and can ultimately bypass the intricacies of whatever descriptive framework we might be tempted to impose in the analysis by submitting ultimately just the example itself; and in the construction of a pedagogical grammar there is also no reason ultimately to use or refer to anything other than the actual forms (words and phrases) that are used.

Scott, have you seen John Sinclair's Trust the Text? I haven't had time to read it yet (he is not always the easiest of writers to follow) but there could be some very interesting stuff in it if Ronald Carter's introduction is anything to go by:

(Part I, 'Foundations', consists of two core chapters which outline major theoretical principles...of trusting and respecting the integrity of the complete text...) This is followed by a section of five chapters devoted mainly to work on written discourse structure. This part* is entitled 'The organization of text', and develops important further insights into the relationship between text-structure and dialogic interaction by examining a range of text types. 'Planes of discourse' and 'On the integration of linguistic description'**, first published in the 1980s, outline a framework for the analysis of all situated language. The framework derives from the work described above*** on interactive spoken discourse in the 1970s(***) but it is subtly extended here to embrace the organization of written text. In these chapters the importance of prospective and encapsulating structures is underlined as a plane of language which interacts with an autonomous plane of discourse management. Throughout the section the importance of integrating the analysis of spoken and written language is underlined.

*i.e. Part II.
**These are chapter titles.
***Carter refers earlier to the research of Sinclair and Coulthard that was published in 1975.

"Obviously" writing and speech differ, but if similar organizational units are operating and can be identified, (to me) the next logical step would be to see how closely the actual lexis in them matches, with a view to kind of laying a "transparency" of the written text over a bold appropriately spaced (and, if necessary, sequentially reorganized?) spoken "underlay" to see at and on which points the two converge (I believe, but cannot yet be sure, that speech would provide a "reasonable" basis for a learner's writing, and perhaps even their reading comprehension, understanding other's ways of organizing thoughts). It will be interesting for me to see if Sinclair's theories are of the sort relevance to me that I am hoping they might be.

[Scott.Sommers]

No, I haven't seen the book, but I agree that it looks interesting.

Woody makes the point that the language standardization I refer to as PG makes possible forms of communication that are difficult without it. I agree completely. I'd even go so far as to say that the development of the modern technology would not have been possible without this development. But as powerful and necessary as it was for this, I'm not convinced it's the best approach to adopt for language teaching -- either for natives or non-natives.

Fluffy raises an excellent point that corpus linguistics (and conversation analysis) now makes possible a solution to the problems raised by grammatical prescription. In fact, I think it points to one of the main issues of PG; what is PG supposed to be? I'm not the first to suggest that PG as a teaching method arose as a solution to the problems posed by teaching grammar at a time when technology did not permit a better understanding of the problem. Despite the development of more powerful methods, PG instruction has become institutionalized and extremely difficult to displace.

Fluffy's suggestions about a link between writing and speech are interesting and worth some thought. But the lack of understanding of this relationship highlights the continued problem for those of us who want to replace PG but lack a clear picture of how to do so.

[fluffyhamster]

Woody makes the point that the language standardization I refer to as PG makes possible forms of communication that are difficult without it. I agree completely. I'd even go so far as to say that the development of the modern technology would not have been possible without this development. But as powerful and necessary as it was for this, I'm not convinced it's the best approach to adopt for language teaching -- either for natives or non-natives.

Yes, but were you explicitly taught PG yourself?

Me, I was obviously taught to read (decoding the "sounds" of "speech" in "writing") at some point, and can write on a similar basis, but the way I am writing (well OK typing) this here right now is not the result of any explicit rule-learning and is proceeding simply on the basis of "seeing" how others expressed things that they wanted to say (and that I had wanted to read), and now having something I want myself to say (can lead to runaway blathering sentences sometimes, though ). I also think maturity and feeling that things ultimately matter comes into it too - which is why "creative" approaches to "teaching grammar" to schoolkids (and often maturer age-wise but not language-wise ESL students) might not work as well as was hoped (which leads to the PG brigade lighting up their toches and burning a few liberal types at the stake on top of their piles of silly "academic" books).

Rabid PG types don't seem to realize that the grammar is all around them, and that having good grammar is a result of coming to have good grammar. You can't rush it, and schoolkids without a clear direction in life probably arren't the people (more like pawns) we should be looking at to support whatever political agendas (and careers). If anything is at stake here, it should be the PG types, tied to the burning stake they themselves lit.

It's unfortunate that stupid people cannot string a thought let alone a sentence together, but you sometimes have to wonder if the "mistakes" they make are because of grammar instruction (instruction that will always go over their heads). They'd have decent "grammar" (express something meaningful) if they were more (capable of) taking an interest in something that was "well-expressed" ("instinctively", on the basis of past experience of examples), and went on themselves to "say" something about what they'd read, learnt, thought about some more, added to, rejected etc. Curing stupidity beyond a certain age becomes a personal rather than collective responsibility, but there is all that is needed in the collective to "make the leap" and speed oneself along (especially now with the internet and chat forums like this).

(You might be able to tell I recently started on Tomasello's The Cultural Origins of Human Recognition, the "ratchet effect" is a good way of describing the ongoing development of human culture (possible due to how human cognition/attention differs from apes...not that they maybe aren't slowly catching up! I'll tell you if he mentions Planet of the Apes at all ).