Cato's Grammar Grumble

[mc ukrneal]

Me am sorry, but this is nonsensic. Incorrectical English is thus with a reason, being exackly that had been broken the rules.

And yet William Faulkner wrote: "The crest, the trees, the roof of the house stand against the sky.  The cow nuzzles at me, moaning.  Then the dead, hot, pale air breathes on my face again.  He could fix it all right, if he just would.  And he dont even know it.  He could do everything for me if he just knowed it.  The cow breathes upon my hips and back, her breath warm, sweet, stertorous, moaning.  The sky lies flat down the slope, upon the secret clumps.  Beyond the hill sheet-lightning stains upward and fades.  The dead air shapes the dead earth in the dead darkness, further away than seeing shapes the dead earth."

or this: "From a little after two oclock until almost sundown of the long still hot weary dead September afternoon they sat in what Miss Coldfield still called the office because her father had called it that -- a dim hot airless room with the blinds all closed and fastened for forty-three summers because when she was a girl someone had believed that light and moving air carried heat and that dark was always cooler, and which (as the sun shone fuller and fuller on that side of the house) became latticed with yellow slashes filled with dust motes which Quentin thought of as being of the dead old dried paint itself blown inward from the scaling blinds as wind might have blown them. "

Faulkner broked the rules with style!

[North Star]

And yet William Faulkner wrote:

Faulkner broked the rules with style!

Faulkner & other similar literary artists don't really have anything to do with the discussion, though. It all started with Sean ridiculing those who speak English as their nth language (Sean not being fluent in any second language, to put it kindly) for not caring 'enough' about punctuation, and when we politely pointed out some of his own errors in the material he uses to teach English as a second language, he's been defending himself by claiming that the rules are just wrong.

Hi Cato et al, can I run this past you, possibly not for the first time- why is it that non-westerners take substandard English to be fine and don't understand at all when the English speaking world shakes heads in mirth at them?

My basic argument is that many non-Western societies and languages don't prioritize articulation, differentiation and discrete expression as do Western languages and their modern societies. India is a great example- it's a fantastic culture but one for holistic thinking not straight thinking.

It's not that other languages are less than English, indeed they could easily be superior, and I'm most interested in Sanskrit for example. But English has to be learnt as English- it can be used in other ways that it's not designed for, but not as well. It fulfils specific functions of discrimination and precision and to ignore this becomes laughable- because these characteristics are part of its basic structure.

I don't know how to explain the ridiculously cavalier attitudes to English that non-Western learners show, other than that they're bringing in presuppositions from their own experience of what a language is. Western learners of English as a second language do not take a low level of understanding, or any garbage they write, to be just fine or a dialect as good as Australian or American English.

In each of my three jobs in S.Korea and China the local staff could not believe that their second-rate English was second-rate, and justified crazy mistakes as a legitimate local dialect of English.

Moreover here's a ppt presentation I put together for Chinese English-teaching staff on common mistakes. It was a well-attended event but with some strained and indignant faces and nothing further encouraged, and some of the subsequent responses unfortunately being

'Frankly I don't think the mistakes you outlined were mistakes.'

In fact I got very angry and was called to a disciplinary meeting...

https://app.box.com/s/hp4vj2jd7ixt229x7gs75byu9yx81uzz

[Sean]

This is not a problem, as indicated below several times...

Good English is not mere rule-following English, it's gaining an understanding of what works, what has balance and sense, and with these things occasionally transgressing whatever rulebook.

English has no academy that approves its formations and words, unlike some languages.

Whatever the criteria instead are for good English, and they're very distinct and non-relative, they're not the equivalent of tilting your compass to the north star and following it blindly.

This tremendous subtlety catches foreign learners out royally however, and they usually don't suspect it exists at all.

Having Koreans and Chinese with a sheet of their English and laughing at you with eye-popping incredulity when you tell them that it's covered in mistakes is a test of patience far beyond anything on GMG, I can assure you.

Got it?

Oh no, maybe that wasn't a sentence though, so I shouldn't say it....

[Ken B]

So let me summarize. English is not treated with the respect it deserves, and egregious misuse abounds. So let's teach foreigners to use "them" as a subject, because William Faulkner's semi-literate first person narrator did.

It all started with Sean ridiculing those who speak English as their nth language ... for not caring 'enough' about punctuation, and when we politely pointed out some of his own errors in the material he uses to teach English as a second language, he's been defending himself by claiming that the rules are just wrong.

Bingo.

[Sean]

I need to set more time aside for my American literature.

[Florestan]

Faulkner & other similar literary artists don't really have anything to do with the discussion, though. It all started with Sean ridiculing those who speak English as their nth language (Sean not being fluent in any second language, to put it kindly) for not caring 'enough' about punctuation, and when we politely pointed out some of his own errors in the material he uses to teach English as a second language, he's been defending himself by claiming that the rules are just wrong.

Exackly. 

[Ken B]

IMe need to set more time aside for my American literature.

FTFY.

[mc ukrneal]

Exackly. 

Faulkner & other similar literary artists don't really have anything to do with the discussion, though. It all started with Sean ridiculing those who speak English as their nth language (Sean not being fluent in any second language, to put it kindly) for not caring 'enough' about punctuation, and when we politely pointed out some of his own errors in the material he uses to teach English as a second language, he's been defending himself by claiming that the rules are just wrong.

I was teasing with the Faulkner thing. I guess it fell flat...

[Cato]

I was teasing with the Faulkner thing. I guess it fell flat...

  By no means! 

The ontology of Faulkner's fawlty grammer is the phylogeny of his grampa! 

[Christo]

and when we politely pointed out some of his own errors in the material he uses to teach English as a second language, he's been defending himself by claiming that the rules are just wrong.

But they are! Sean is just trying to help ours! 

[Karl Henning]

And yet William Faulkner wrote: "The crest, the trees, the roof of the house stand against the sky.  The cow nuzzles at me, moaning.  Then the dead, hot, pale air breathes on my face again.  He could fix it all right, if he just would.  And he dont even know it.  He could do everything for me if he just knowed it.  The cow breathes upon my hips and back, her breath warm, sweet, stertorous, moaning.  The sky lies flat down the slope, upon the secret clumps.  Beyond the hill sheet-lightning stains upward and fades.  The dead air shapes the dead earth in the dead darkness, further away than seeing shapes the dead earth."

or this: "From a little after two oclock until almost sundown of the long still hot weary dead September afternoon they sat in what Miss Coldfield still called the office because her father had called it that -- a dim hot airless room with the blinds all closed and fastened for forty-three summers because when she was a girl someone had believed that light and moving air carried heat and that dark was always cooler, and which (as the sun shone fuller and fuller on that side of the house) became latticed with yellow slashes filled with dust motes which Quentin thought of as being of the dead old dried paint itself blown inward from the scaling blinds as wind might have blown them. "

Faulkner broked the rules with style!

Dialect.

Wish we might excuse Sean on that account!  But, no, he's just being lazy 

[Karl Henning]

The ontology of Faulkner's fawlty grammer is the phylogeny of his grampa! 

In a nutshell! 

[Sean]

I've mentioned these files of mine before, but I've since enlarged them.

Expressions, though could do with a good proofread-

https://app.box.com/s/b1jli8pvw8zf3mzjylv0ijb18ms4xn7t

Vocabulary-

https://app.box.com/s/pqs7dpf0h9zmanlg9njti8bcywqqsold

[Sean]

This should read something like Coconut breaking stand (don't think I've posted this before.)

[jochanaan]

So, I've been noticing as I listen to NPR that often (usually for younger reporters) when a reporter is being interviewed, they begin their answers with "So, ..." 

Is this the educated man's "like"?

Is it correct?

As far as I can determine, it's a common speech tic.  And, like many speech tics, it is not "right" or "wrong" until it gets annoyingly repetitive.

[Karl Henning]

Not a true Grumble, just enjoying a typo . . . Breaking the land-speed record for returning to the office:

I am currently out of the office without access to email and will return on Monday, Mach 23.

[kishnevi]

This too is not a true grumble, but certainly it is Cato territory.
http://wonkette.com/575109/vermont-proposes-official-latin-motto-wingnuts-tell-vermont-to-go-back-to-mexico#

[Karl Henning]

Yes!  I saw that!

[Ken B]

This too is not a true grumble, but certainly it is Cato territory.
http://wonkette.com/575109/vermont-proposes-official-latin-motto-wingnuts-tell-vermont-to-go-back-to-mexico#

Hilarious. The irony is I think she -- Wonkette has a history of obtuseness -- missed the irony in "Hell No! This is America, not Latin America. When in Rome do as the Romans do!"

[North Star]

Yes!  I saw that!

+1

Hilarious. The irony is I think she -- Wonkette has a history of obtuseness -- missed the irony in “Hell No! This is America, not Latin America. When in Rome do as the Romans do!”

Hah! Of course, that might have been unintentional. . .