From: roger@crux.Princeton.EDU (Roger Lustig)
Newsgroups: alt.usage.english
Subject: Re: "Grammar" & "Usage" -- it's almost over...
Date: 27 Aug 92 16:48:29 GMT
Organization: Princeton University
Originator: news@nimaster

In article <1992Aug26.185548.3762@desire.wright.edu> thayes@desire.wright.edu writes:
>This post has gone from around 100 lines to over 445 lines in *less than*
>one week.  I can't think of a rationale for it to continue, as the main points
>have only become entrenched, not especially altered.  So here is a summary of
>my reactions to Roger's positions and a summary of my own.  This irenic
>offering is made to appease those who are bored with this post; no surrender is
>implied.

>1.  I have put forth the idea that there is a core of English grammar and usage
>that serves as a prototypical English -- I do *NOT* mean "Standard English" [tm]
>as Roger imputes to me.  I can provide very good and well-validated 
>research that demonstrates this for categories of all sorts of things 
>(e.g., the category "bird" is best represented by the member "robin").  
>I don't see how dialects as members of the category "English" are 
>different from robins and ostriches, by analogy.

Easy.  Robins and ostriches don't exist by convention.

Language is nothing *but* convention; it is a (partial) agreement
among some number of people on how to communicate.  Languages can
change in a trice if enough of the speakers choose to agree on a 
new way of communicating; birds do not change by agreement.

(Of course, the definition of "bird-ness" can change too, likewise
by agreement; which could very well mean that next year's prototype
is indeed the ostrich.  Don't confuse the abstraction of bird-ness
with birds.)

As for the core of things that all versions of English have in 
common, well, there are very few actual items that one can point to.
And these things do not add up to anything like the specs for one
or another dialect.

>I have no doubt that other people have advocated the same "English as category"
>debate.  I have no knowledge of these debates, as I am not a professional
>linguist.  But from my field of expertise I think it's pretty reasonable.

It's dangerous because of the nature of the thing under discussion: a
set of conventions.

>2.  Thus the point of a.u.e. seems to me to be discussions over the attributes
>of members, or the validity of members, of the category "English."

To some extent.  However, most of these discussions cannot be resolved
by reference to the common core; the issues tend to be at a less
deep-structural level.

>3.  I think writing is a type of dialect, and has its own usage that is largely
>different from speech. 

*Occasionally* different would be more like it.  

> Roger's suggestions that one can write verbatim, then
>edit it, etc., supports my point, as one sees that verbal dialects don't format
>well in writing, and typically vice-versa.

True enough, but there's a path from one to the other.  Eventually one 
abandons the process of running back and forth aclong the path (or 
bridge); but the comparison is a good way of getting started, i.e., of 
applying what one *does* know (how to talk) to what one needs to learn.

>  This is because verbal
>communication is different from written communication, a point Bonita made.

Finding out *how* they're different is something that the transcription/
editing process can do.

>Southerners write English that is understandable to the British, and Roger's
>assertion that they write in the dialect comes from verbiage, I think, and not
>as much in usage/grammar.

Quite right.  But their written style is developed by abstraction from
their spoken style.

>4.  Roger has expert envy. (oops, the devil made me do that!)

Naah.  But I do like to hear the arguments of those who have studied the 
matter.  I'm not one of those people who actually *rejects* an argument
about language just because it was made by a linguist...

>5.  I never said that people who cannot write well are stupid.  Writing well is
>a skill, much as race car driving is a higher level of skill than driving down
>the street.  But at the same time I think it's the case that people who are 
>unfortunately less intelligent are less likely to write adequately.  For

Indeed; certainly in our culture, we define intelligence to a great extent
as the ability to make abstractions.  Writing is an abstraction of 
language as generally practiced, i.e., speech.  (Think of how much of
your language use actually involves writing or even reading.  Think of 
how much the average person throughout history has read or written.)

>the majority, I would say that poor writing may be *either* a sign of poor
>writing ability or inadequate understanding of what is to be communicated. 

No problem there.  Sorting the two out is tough, though.

>Sometimes both causes are present.  Inadequate writing ability can be
>ameliorated, I think, by understanding and practicing -- re-learning may not be
>far off -- the fundamentals *of writing*.  

And I advocate (based on experience and observation) an approach that
starts with what the student already knows: how to talk.

>Inadequate comprehension requires another tool kit.

Yet both problems often have fear and lack of confidence at or close to
their root.

>OK Roger, have at it, make it short, and let's move on.

I think we're pretty close to agreeing here.

Roger
Newsgroups: alt.usage.english