From: roger@phoenix.Princeton.EDU (Roger Lustig)
Subject: Re: Use of 'I' and 'me'
Originator: news@nimaster
Organization: Princeton University
Date: Fri, 21 Aug 1992 21:41:07 GMT

In article <pjh.714404539@nessi> pjh@eng.cam.ac.uk (Philippa Hogben) writes:
>roger@phoenix.Princeton.EDU (Roger Lustig) writes:

>>In article <pjh.714307570@nessi> pjh@eng.cam.ac.uk (Philippa Hogben) writes:
>>>roger@phoenix.Princeton.EDU (Roger Lustig) writes:
>>>>In article <pjh.714232717@nessi> pjh@eng.cam.ac.uk (Philippa Hogben) writes:
>>>>>roger@phoenix.Princeton.EDU (Roger Lustig) writes:

>I seem to have opened rather a can of worms with this one. I did not
>intend to cause any offence to Shakespeare ["supernatural being of
>your choice" rest his bones] or to anybody else. The point I was
>trying to make was regarding the apparent implicit assumption that
>"Shakespeare _must_ be a good writer - his plays have survived -
>*therefore* anything he writes _must_ be correct/grammatical etc."
>From what you say, he does appear to have been a "good" writer -
>depending on your individual definition of the word "good" of course.

Actually, it's not my definition, but a consensus one; on top of that,
there's the observations that linguists have made about his writing wrt
the language of his time.  He had his quirks, mind you; in the
page-and-a-half that the OED devotes to "less," there's one meaning
that's noted as "Chiefly Shakespearean." 

But, no, that "apparent implicit assumption" was not one made either by
me or by Dictionary Murray and all the lexicographers before and since.

>I wasn't really trying to say that he _wasn't_ a good writer, just
>that the fact that he has survived doesn't automatically make him so.

Heavens, no!  

>In fact, sometimes it appears that people feel he is somebody they
>_ought_ to read and like (because he is one of the "greats") but they
>don't necessarily.

Fools.  I've been to two plays this summer, and saw a third on TV
recently.  *Lord,* he's good.  Even when the plot holds little real
attraction (as in Richard III, to my taste) the things people say and
the way they say them are electrifying.

>It also appears that I did misinterpret your remarks on our definition
>of grammar being what has survived to us from the past. I confess I am
>not totally sure of the various distinctions between "grammar",
>"style" and various other terms that come up. I know what _I_ mean by
>those that I use.......

OK: part of my library musings today.  _Saying What You Mean_ by Robert
CLaiborne, New York: Norton, 1986 starts with a quick and simple
discussion of the terms in question, and continues its long Introduction
with many useful insights on the sort of discussion we have here.  Very
thoughtful, and well-read; and he also surveys what others, incl.
Fowler, Follett, Bernstein, etc. have done.  The bulk of the book is one
more usage guide,but it's far more common-sensical and actual-usage
oriented than many.



>>>>Now let's look at Shakespeare's audience again.  It consisted mainly of
>>>>the nobility and citizenry of London -- not the common, uneducated
>>>>rabble.  

>>>I think there was quite a lot of the "common, uneducated rabble" in
>>>his audience, actually. (At least, according to the various people I
>>>have heard talking about it.)

>>I doubt it.  I doubt that very many peasants ever saw a Shakespeare play.  
>>Tradesmen and craftsmen, perhaps; but those were not the rabble.  I
>>expect thatthe literacy rate among his audience was many, many times
>>that of the general populace.

>As I said (or implied) I was passing on information I had been told
>elsewhere. If you can't believe what you are told as "true" until
>better information turns up then what are you to do.

Without a trace of rancor, let me say:  you could look it up.

>>>You said above that that his knowledge was
>>>intuitive. How many expressions in English are counter intuitive?

>>Depends on whose intuition you poll.  Besides, what's your point?  I
>>meant "intuitive" in the sense of "not having been learned from a book,"
>>which is easy to prove, as the first English grammar was written some
>>time after his death.  Nor do we know of a school that taught it.
>>You're using a different meaning of "(counter-)intuitive."  

>I interpreted your use of "intuitive" as "that which is known
>instinctively and doesn't have to be learnt" (learnt in any way, not
>necessarily from a book).

Well, that would rule out language, wouldn't it?


>>In the strict sense of grammar as the structure of the language, no,
>>native speakers do *not* make mistakes of grammar.  They may say things
>>at variance with formal usage, or may speak a dialect with rules quite
>>different from that of the upper class, but people speak grammatically.

>>>People are _taught_ grammar (or not as the case
>>>may be in this country) they do not know it "instinctively". 

>>Stuff and nonsense.  Are you telling me that no illiterate ever spoke
>>well?  You learn grammar by learning to speak, and very few people learn
>>to read first.  

>You have just agreed with me. People _learn_ grammar as they learn to
>speak. I did not say they were taught it from books. (The comment "or
>not as the case may be" was a comment on the fact that British schools
>used to teach "Grammar" so that everybody (most people?) used to know
>what the various parts of speach were and how to use them. 

Not even "most people."  Ever read Churchill's _My Early Years: A Roving
Commission_?  He describes the situation by which he was considered too
stupid to learn Latin at Harrow, and was taught the structure of the
English sentence instead.  It was just thething for him, he said, but he
sure made it sound as though it was an exceptional thing.

Now, school grammar taught one the parts of speech, but it was rarely
where one learned how to use them.

>The fact
>that they no longer do makes it difficult when one wants to use an
>unfamiliar construction and not know how to. 

I find that hard to believe.  People have always had trouble with
unfamiliar constructions.  Seeing and hearingthem used is how one learns
to use them, though; knowing the parts of speech, the moods, etc.,
doesn't help much.  As for the parts of speech themselves, they don't
really do much for one's knowledge of English as opposed to other
languages; we have so many words that change their meaning only slightly
as they slip across one or even two part-of-speech boundaries (e.g.,
"before") that the whole 8-part model isn't even used all that much by
linguists.

>O.K. so it may not
>necessarily "matter" whether we do get it "correct" but some of us
>like to 

That wouldn't be a problem if

a) you folks didn't feel the needto tell the rest of us about it, and 

b) you had some readily available standard of "correctness" that you
could explain.

>and regret the fact that we don't know the structure of our
>language well enough. 

Well enough for *what*?  You write perfectly well.  I'm sure you speak
well, too.  I must warn you, though: if you actually study the structure
of your language, you will realize how problematic the idea of "Getting
it correct" really is.

>Also, there are times when it gives a bad
>impression to use colloquiallisms instead of "propper" English.)

Absolutely.  No question about it.  

>>You learn the structure of your mother tongue by
>>learning to speak it, period.  Nobody has to tell you what a verb is
>>before you can use one!

>No, but you learn (gradually) that certain classes of words mean
>things that are done and that there usually has to be something doing
>the thing. They may not know this explicitly but they certainly know
>it implicitly. Even a simple sentence as "me want cake" shows some
>knowledge of grammar. The "want" shows what it being done and the
>child knows that something has to want (me) and something has to be
>wanted (cake).

No.  The child knows that   

a) it wants cake

b) one form of demanding it seems to work better than another.  I know
of no evidence that there's any conscious awareness of grammatical
function; on the unconscious level, or the level at which speech is
formulated, there are obviously rules for formulation, but these do not
correspond necessarily to grammar as we abstract it from the
observation of language, any more than one "knows" which muscles to more
in which order so as to walk.  That's just not connected to any kind of
thought process.

>>In fact, take a hundred good writers and speakers, and ask them the
>>definition of "adverb."  Most of them will get it wrong, I bet.

>Most of them will know that they can use words such as quickly, slowly
>etc. to show _how_ things can be done.

To be sure.  Now, what do they gain by knowing that these words are
(usually) adverbs?  (For the record, not all adverbs show "how" things
are done.  Some modify adjectives, for instance, others indicate time,
as in "He had been there many times before.")

>>>Listen to
>>>a child learning to talk - it will make several grammatical mistakes
>>>which will (sometimes) be corrected and added to its knowledge of what
>>>is correct and what isn't. What happens when the "correcter" doesn't
>>>know what is correct? The child learns an incorrect usage. So of

>>Au contraire!  After a certain age, people do NOT speak baby-talk. 

>Before a certain age they do particularly when the are starting to
>learn to speak. This is not really relevant.

It's relevant because the "correcting" process doesn't affect the dhange
away from baby-talk.

>>They
>>learn by listening to what other people say, and by finding out what
>>communicates well and what doesn't.  Very little of a child's language
>>knowledge comes from correction; long years of observation and
>>experiment have demonstrated this.  Correction (when done kindly)
>>doesn't hurt, but it has very little effect.  There is a huge literature
>>on the subject; I suggest you read a little of it.

>My point was that they learn from those around them. Some of what they
>learn may be from people explicitly telling them what to say, though I
>agree that a lot of it is just from listening to what goes on aroungd
>them.

That's more like it.

>>>course native speakers make grammatical errors (in my experience, they
>>>are sometimes worse at it than people who learn the language as a
>>>foreign language).

>>What errors *are* those?  Are they errors of grammar?  Or are they
>>errors of style?   

>You tell me. I'm not sure I understand the distinction.

Grammar is the structure of the language.  It involves the placement of
words with relation to one another, the inflection of words (e.g.,
declension, conjugation), and so on.  In any language, there are
variations across dialect; these are called "errors" when used
inappropriately, i.e., across dialects.

>>Are they perhaps variants of dialect?  

>Not what I was thinking of.

But perhaps it's a good thing to think of street English and Pub English
and offiece English and so on as dialects!  They have different
properties, and different proprieties.

Roger

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