drum or drumming club?

jotham · Post by **jotham** » Mon May 07, 2007 7:18 am

In the textbook, a writer mentions various clubs at a school: cooking club, chess club, piano club, etc. She wanted to include a percussion club, but didn't know whether to call it the drum club or drumming club. (Percussion is too difficult or strange a word to teach in this textbook.)
I have reservations about drum club because it doesn't seem to encompass the rich variety of instruments in a percussion club, like xylophones, triangles, etc. Or perhaps it could seem like a club for collecting different kinds of drums or rare drums. (Though piano club has no such connotation.) And besides, we usually play the drums and not the drum; but the drums club is obviously awkward.
For these reasons, drumming club seems a little bit more accurate because drumming techniques incorporate an array of drum instruments. But drumming club doesn't parallel with guitar club or piano club — keyboarding club would be the synonymous term for drumming club.) But then again, drumming club appears to parallel cooking club.)
If I just go on my ears, drum club sounds better than drumming club, but I hate to rely on that in the absence of evidence.
Doing a Google search, drum club comes up much more often, but most of them refer to a music duo, throwing a wrench into the results. Any suggestions?

metal56 · Post by **metal56** » Mon May 07, 2007 9:24 am

Forget about trying to find parallels: go with "drumming club".

lolwhites · Post by **lolwhites** » Mon May 07, 2007 10:23 pm

Drumming club sounds to me like a group of people getting together regularly to make some noise ("Hey guys, that was a great drumming session we had this week!"). Drum club sounds more like a group of people getting together regularly to compare and talk about drums ("And next week our guest speaker will give a presentation on the talking drums of Africa.").

jotham · Post by **jotham** » Tue May 08, 2007 1:15 am

Forget about trying to find parallels: go with "drumming club".

Are you saying that because it sounds better in your ears or because of the reasoning stated above?
Thanks for the input. I'll try to militate for drumming club in the absence of contrary opinions.

jedimasterbooboo · Post by **jedimasterbooboo** » Tue May 08, 2007 6:43 am

You mentioned there are other instruments in the club besides drums. Drum club is wrong. Drumming club does not accurately describe what's happening either and leaves out the other wonderful intruments listed.

Why is percussion considered strange or difficult? I would teach that to Kinder (any) students from any country. Is it any more difficult than umbrella?

I'm also not clear as to what's going on, are you writing a book?

jotham · Post by **jotham** » Tue May 08, 2007 8:23 am

I'm an editor of English-teaching textbooks for a prominent private company in Taiwan. Yes, I agree percussion is the perfect word to convey the exact meaning, and I just added those other instruments on assumption — there's no indication that this fictional club includes them and no mandate that they should. Certain parameters regarding vocabulary and grammar have to be observed in these textbooks for government approval. The government has a 2,000 word list of prominent English words, and there is some leeway for introducing other words, but the number of vocabulary is limited. Amidst these parameters and restrictions, many of the Taiwanese staff might feel that percussion just isn't important enough to fight for.
I suppose percussion might be appropriate for high-school level students in English-speaking countries: don't you think fourth graders might be more likely to join a drumming club than a percussion club? I'm not sure really. Perhaps it's like asking if fourth graders would join an ornithology club or a bird-watching club.

metal56 · Post by **metal56** » Tue May 08, 2007 11:28 am

I suppose percussion might be appropriate for high-school level students in English-speaking countries: don't you think fourth graders might be more likely to join a drumming club than a percussion club?

I think they might. "Drumming club" sounds more user-friendly to me.

jotham · Post by **jotham** » Fri May 11, 2007 2:09 am

I just had another thought about this when considering the student's point of view. Earlier, I had mentioned that keyboarding skills is synonymous with drumming skills. This inconsistency might give rise to a possible minor stumbling block where students internalize and then apply or transfer a wrong grammar rule: they may incorrectly extrapolate that if one engages in drumming, why not fluting, guitaring, or pianoing? (Trumpeting is a different animal.) Maybe I think too much. Still, drumming refers to a specific concept: it isn't a common term they're likely to use in any other venue.
Maybe we should just get rid of this drumming club. I hate to disrespect the poor drummers, who are defined in one joke as people who hang around "musicians."

metal56 · Post by **metal56** » Fri May 11, 2007 5:13 am

Maybe I think too much.

Eureka!

Now you can being worrying about our students. This summer we are putting up a notice which will read:

Are you normaly bored in your vacation? Play, football, tennis, hockey, and pool this vacation with Cova Sports Club. Cova offer discount prices to all our students. Apart from the above, they offer yoga, gymnastics, and aerobics. All at a discount to students here...".

How many of our students will sign up to "play yoga, play aerobics, etc.?