Quote:
"... when most speakers use a form that our grammar says is incorrect, there is at least a prima facie case that it is the grammar that is wrong, not the speakers."
Prof. R Huddleston.
Do you agree?
A prima facie case
Moderators: Dimitris, maneki neko2, Lorikeet, Enrico Palazzo, superpeach, cecil2, Mr. Kalgukshi2
-
JuanTwoThree
- Posts: 947
- Joined: Tue Sep 14, 2004 11:30 am
- Location: Spain
If correctness is decided by the majority then this is a democracy with a lot of people who are not enfranchised.
A head-count of English speakers would reveal a very high number of them using "I ain't done nothing" or similar. Perhaps not a majority but enough for it to be considered a valid variant if decisions were based on sheer numbers.
One question though is whether the users themselves would regard it as correct, if asked.
Even so, we tend to exclude English as it is spoken and not written, regional Englishes even within the "important" English-speaking countries, English of poorer people, English of ethnic groups and a long etcetera of other Englishes.
We often hear about AmE, CanE, AusE etc but rarely about Caribbean English. Indian English or other Englishes of people who also consider themselves Native Speakers.
The why should NNS speakers be automatically excluded? Is ownership defined by speaking the language from birth? And what does the distinction NS/NNS really mean?
When we are trying to be as PC as possible and use expressions like "non-standard" it still can be a code for "not used by the right people".
But then since most other decisions, declarations of war and the like, are made by literate well-off middle-class university-educated white people (men, rarely women) living in the most powerful economic and cultural region of the country, wouldn't it be utopian to expect language to be so very different?
A head-count of English speakers would reveal a very high number of them using "I ain't done nothing" or similar. Perhaps not a majority but enough for it to be considered a valid variant if decisions were based on sheer numbers.
One question though is whether the users themselves would regard it as correct, if asked.
Even so, we tend to exclude English as it is spoken and not written, regional Englishes even within the "important" English-speaking countries, English of poorer people, English of ethnic groups and a long etcetera of other Englishes.
We often hear about AmE, CanE, AusE etc but rarely about Caribbean English. Indian English or other Englishes of people who also consider themselves Native Speakers.
The why should NNS speakers be automatically excluded? Is ownership defined by speaking the language from birth? And what does the distinction NS/NNS really mean?
When we are trying to be as PC as possible and use expressions like "non-standard" it still can be a code for "not used by the right people".
But then since most other decisions, declarations of war and the like, are made by literate well-off middle-class university-educated white people (men, rarely women) living in the most powerful economic and cultural region of the country, wouldn't it be utopian to expect language to be so very different?
<A head-count of English speakers would reveal a very high number of them using "I ain't done nothing" or similar. Perhaps not a majority but enough for it to be considered a valid variant if decisions were based on sheer numbers. >
Yes, I know all that, Juan, but the quote specifically used the words "most speakers".
<The why should NNS speakers be automatically excluded? Is ownership defined by speaking the language from birth?>
Why not indeed?
<But then since most other decisions, declarations of war and the like, are made by literate well-off middle-class university-educated white people (men, rarely women) living in the most powerful economic and cultural region of the country, wouldn't it be utopian to expect language to be so very different?>
Would it?
Yes, I know all that, Juan, but the quote specifically used the words "most speakers".
<The why should NNS speakers be automatically excluded? Is ownership defined by speaking the language from birth?>
Why not indeed?
<But then since most other decisions, declarations of war and the like, are made by literate well-off middle-class university-educated white people (men, rarely women) living in the most powerful economic and cultural region of the country, wouldn't it be utopian to expect language to be so very different?>
Would it?
-
fluffyhamster
- Posts: 3031
- Joined: Tue Oct 26, 2004 6:57 pm
- Location: UK > China > Japan > UK again
JTT's expanded the scope of what we might mean by 'most speakers', whereas I was just going to imagine it applying to those within a reasonably well-defined community, at least geographically (I naturally tend to imagine such a majority as consisiting of people just like me, and I am sure that "we all" make plenty of "mistakes").
Grammar is never more than a jargony superimposition on the actual, consistently-used forms floating about in said community, and when it is a presriptive grammar, it becomes an imposition. That being said, I am still surprised at how many people seem to refuse to ever learn how to e.g. write an "appropriate" (i.e. begging) letter of application for a job (I banged on about this kind of thing on one of those threads on prescriptive grammar - probably the unsurprisingly named 'Why do we teach ~ ?' one! - a while back).
Academics or pedants are free to argue the point(s), however, in their feeble attempts to demonstrate that it it is still the speaker and not the grammar that is wrong in the(ir final) "analysis".
Grammar is never more than a jargony superimposition on the actual, consistently-used forms floating about in said community, and when it is a presriptive grammar, it becomes an imposition. That being said, I am still surprised at how many people seem to refuse to ever learn how to e.g. write an "appropriate" (i.e. begging) letter of application for a job (I banged on about this kind of thing on one of those threads on prescriptive grammar - probably the unsurprisingly named 'Why do we teach ~ ?' one! - a while back).
Academics or pedants are free to argue the point(s), however, in their feeble attempts to demonstrate that it it is still the speaker and not the grammar that is wrong in the(ir final) "analysis".
Last edited by fluffyhamster on Mon Nov 14, 2005 12:09 pm, edited 1 time in total.
-
fluffyhamster
- Posts: 3031
- Joined: Tue Oct 26, 2004 6:57 pm
- Location: UK > China > Japan > UK again
Which bad guys are we talking about exactly, though? Although even the more interesting of the best descriptive grammars can still end up putting me to sleep, I don't think anyone who cares to read them will find much to disagree with (there's a bit of something/someone for everone in them - that is, they include less standard grammar too), and for anyone teaching EFL (particularly non-native teachers), these kind of publications (especially if they are ever finally translated) must be a godsend (certainly more helpful than constantly returning to more prescriptive tomes in the hope of finding "answers" to whatever is or seems a problem at that particular moment in time).metal56 wrote:Their freedom to do so does seem to reach very far and have a massive influence though.Academics or pedants are free to argue the point(s), however, in their feeble attempts to demonstrate that it it is still the speaker and not the grammar that is wrong in the(ir final) "analysis".
Last edited by fluffyhamster on Mon Nov 14, 2005 12:20 pm, edited 1 time in total.
-
fluffyhamster
- Posts: 3031
- Joined: Tue Oct 26, 2004 6:57 pm
- Location: UK > China > Japan > UK again
-
JuanTwoThree
- Posts: 947
- Joined: Tue Sep 14, 2004 11:30 am
- Location: Spain
Is there any form used world-wide by "most people" that "our grammar says is incorrect"?
I used the example of "I ain't" with a double negative to show that it would come a respectable second to the standard form if we sampled every single "English Speaker", whatever that means, but that if the group sampled was "the right people" and not "everybody" it would be in the books if a similar minority of "the right people" used it.
I assumed though did not make clear that within this "Every Single English Speaker" group there there would obviously be dialects and sociolects where the standard form was massively outvoted by "most people" in that 'lect.
I used the example of "I ain't" with a double negative to show that it would come a respectable second to the standard form if we sampled every single "English Speaker", whatever that means, but that if the group sampled was "the right people" and not "everybody" it would be in the books if a similar minority of "the right people" used it.
I assumed though did not make clear that within this "Every Single English Speaker" group there there would obviously be dialects and sociolects where the standard form was massively outvoted by "most people" in that 'lect.