Mulroy begins his essay with “The study of grammar helps us to understand the great literature of the past and to speak and write eloquently” (79). Romantic, with the belief that grammarians have gotten a raw deal by being labeled as stereotypical old fogeys, Mulroy contends that “the most important benefit of the prevalence of good grammar is that it contributes to the preservation and spread of standard languages” (79). His profound statement, earlier echoed, is backed up by the notion that historical language, at least in Europe, was quilt-like, where different unintelligible dialects hampered progress. As a result, there were economic, social and cultural factors that required “uniting large numbers of people together by a common tongue…to create standard national languages” (80).
But Mulroy explains that this was not going to be an easy task, given the unbridled spirit of the English, so eventually capitalism gave forth her fruit in the context of dictionaries and grammar books that became vogue in the 18th and 19th centuries. He later goes on to praise people like Samuel Johnson and Bishop Lowth, saying they “…contributed significantly to the creation of modern standard English…” (81).
On the other hand, Mulroy feels that Pinker, although a brilliant writer and linguist, in not so many words “pisses” on the achievments of these men as well as zealot mavens who trumpet the benefits of good grammar. So, like a careful surgeon, Mulroy slices away Pinker’s arguments, as if they were gangrene to the “grammar” body.
First, Mulroy lumps the NCTE and Julius Hook (an all-star in the English world) with Pinker’s faulty research skills, stating that Hook and Pinker both “…refrain from citing specific passages in Lowth’s grammar [book]” (82). Later, Mulroy praises this same Lowth by saying, “With some updating, it [Lowth’s book] could be used to give college students a needed overview of English grammar” (83).
Obviously, Mulroy is heralding the intrinsic application this book yields. But, Mulroy isn’t done carving yet. Next he carves away the cancerous definite article, as seen in Pinker’s eyes. Then he removes the tumor of infinitives that has plagued, in Pinker’s lens, modern English. With all these hypothetical foibles laid at Pinker’s feet, Mulroy does stitch up his contentions nicely saying, “My problem with Pinker’s influential presentation is one of emphasis, not principle” (85).
Toward the end of his essay Mulroy defends grammar instruction suggesting that grammar is intrinsic, increases vocabulary and “…greatly increases the number and complexity of the thoughts that one can actually express” (86-87). He also says that people have risen from poverty thanks to grammar.
Friday, September 19, 2008
Tuesday, September 16, 2008
Grammar Puss: Pinker's Such a Stinker?
In Grammar Puss, by Steve Pinker, the essay finally annihilates all those hypersensitive grammarians that are more concerned with exposing the weaknesses of others than improving language as a whole. The essay begins with the science of language and ends with the real purpose of improving language is "the clarity and style of written prose" (10). But the most interesting part was "Good writers go through anywhere from two to twenty drafts before releasing a paper" (11). As a person that is notorious in avoiding revisions, Pinker reminds the reader that the brain was not engineered to express complex trains of thought on paper. This is why writing is so difficult and explains why revisions are so prudent. The gist of his essay was to explain why "many prescriptive rules are just plain dumb..." (10) and that people should employ the standard english used in their dialect or what Foster would call discourse community. So, while Pinker does feel that tradition and rules are antiquated, he does feel that we must learn how to communicate with what is vogue in language communities.
Thursday, September 11, 2008
Interview with McMahon, Chair of ECU English Dept.
Morning Dr. McMahon,
Thank you again for taking the time to answer my questions, I have taken the liberty to paraphrase your answers. If there are any irregularities, let me know. After your approval, I will be submitting this on a blog at tommyhammons@blogspot.com
What can grammar do for success, image and confidence?
How do you define grammar, connotatively?
Are you worried, psychologically, how your peers see you concerning grammar? Explain
Besides taking a grammar course, what’s the best way to exercise your grammar “chops?”
What are your concerns about Prescriptivists and Descriptivists?
What is your position on “literal meaning falling into disfavor in academia?”
Do you think this phenomenon is something to be worried about?
Do you think there is a connection between this trend and the declining interest in grammar instruction?
1a I believe that these three are interrelated, and that they have an important relation to a sound image.
2a. In the broadest sense, grammar is the structure of ideas and how they relate to one another.
3a. Yes! Though I am in a leadership position in the department, I feel that I have more to learn from my colleagues than they do from me with respect to many things, particularly grammar. I think this stems from the fact that I did not receive strong grammar training in high school.
4a. I think reading more books is the best way. Quite simply, if you read examples of good writing, you unconsciously begin to emulate them. Unfortunately, I think the proliferation of visual media is reducing the amount of time people spend reading and therefore reducing their opportunity to acquire strong grammar skills in this manner.
5a. Perhaps because I am a philosopher, I am more concerned with content. In short, I am concerned first with what people say, and secondarily with how they say it. However, I feel there is a false dichotomy between content and form because there is an inherent connection between the two. You cannot have one without the other; communication requires both content and structure. Simply put, if the structure of your expression is not sufficiently sound from a mechanical perspective, then it cannot convey content effectively.
6a. Disfavor, no. When we ask students to engage in analysis we are trying to get them to use their literal understanding of texts to anchor an interpretation. I do think that the movement away from formalist analyses and toward more reader response interpretation can result in a reduced emphasis on literal meaning. Mostly though, I think it is factors external to academia, factors in our culture, that have encouraged a decline in interest in literal meaning.
7a. Yes.
8a. Yes. In general, I think college instructors are more concerned with content, rather than structure, presumably because we assume that secondary educators have focused much of their attention on technical proficiency in their students’ writing. Of course, I assume that I need to help my students develop their grammar skills if they arrive here without a strong foundation in that area. Ultimately, I emphasize BOTH content and form because I feel that both are important and because I also have a duty to prepare students for the fact that in the real world, employers expect one not only to have good ideas, but also to be able to articulate those ideas in clear, correct prose.
Thank you again for taking the time to answer my questions, I have taken the liberty to paraphrase your answers. If there are any irregularities, let me know. After your approval, I will be submitting this on a blog at tommyhammons@blogspot.com
What can grammar do for success, image and confidence?
How do you define grammar, connotatively?
Are you worried, psychologically, how your peers see you concerning grammar? Explain
Besides taking a grammar course, what’s the best way to exercise your grammar “chops?”
What are your concerns about Prescriptivists and Descriptivists?
What is your position on “literal meaning falling into disfavor in academia?”
Do you think this phenomenon is something to be worried about?
Do you think there is a connection between this trend and the declining interest in grammar instruction?
1a I believe that these three are interrelated, and that they have an important relation to a sound image.
2a. In the broadest sense, grammar is the structure of ideas and how they relate to one another.
3a. Yes! Though I am in a leadership position in the department, I feel that I have more to learn from my colleagues than they do from me with respect to many things, particularly grammar. I think this stems from the fact that I did not receive strong grammar training in high school.
4a. I think reading more books is the best way. Quite simply, if you read examples of good writing, you unconsciously begin to emulate them. Unfortunately, I think the proliferation of visual media is reducing the amount of time people spend reading and therefore reducing their opportunity to acquire strong grammar skills in this manner.
5a. Perhaps because I am a philosopher, I am more concerned with content. In short, I am concerned first with what people say, and secondarily with how they say it. However, I feel there is a false dichotomy between content and form because there is an inherent connection between the two. You cannot have one without the other; communication requires both content and structure. Simply put, if the structure of your expression is not sufficiently sound from a mechanical perspective, then it cannot convey content effectively.
6a. Disfavor, no. When we ask students to engage in analysis we are trying to get them to use their literal understanding of texts to anchor an interpretation. I do think that the movement away from formalist analyses and toward more reader response interpretation can result in a reduced emphasis on literal meaning. Mostly though, I think it is factors external to academia, factors in our culture, that have encouraged a decline in interest in literal meaning.
7a. Yes.
8a. Yes. In general, I think college instructors are more concerned with content, rather than structure, presumably because we assume that secondary educators have focused much of their attention on technical proficiency in their students’ writing. Of course, I assume that I need to help my students develop their grammar skills if they arrive here without a strong foundation in that area. Ultimately, I emphasize BOTH content and form because I feel that both are important and because I also have a duty to prepare students for the fact that in the real world, employers expect one not only to have good ideas, but also to be able to articulate those ideas in clear, correct prose.
Tuesday, September 9, 2008
Ethos and Error
This essay was a mouthful. The whole theme was errors in the workplace. If we don't see grammar as important, then surely we will appreciate it since our mortgage depends on it. BEsides the methodology approach, which was quite extensive. I liked the fact that Beason said the business people saw image as the main problem with faulty writing and he he broke it down into five categories. It reminded me of Snow White. There's sleepy and dopey and "hasty," "careless," etc. the thing that jumped out at me was thinking problems vs. knowledge problems. It seems people see you as having "faulty thinking abilities..." (52). They do not think you can reason. That's huge! One mistake in a letter can label you for the rest of your tenure ant a job.
PBS: Foster Steals the Show!
Hey guys this is a fictitious play about a PBS scout trying to get a new show on the air. The executives have pitching the idea about a show dedicated to the study and origins of language and they are particularly interested in the decline of grammar in America and how that affects the U.S. on a global scale. Tommy Hammons, the PBS scout, is sent to the office of David Foster to try and let him know he was not selected for the show, but Foster’s incessant defense of his paper, “Tense Present,” persuades Tommy to give him another shot.
Setting: A full, bright office with hanging plants near the windows. A sign on the wall that says “To err is human and grammar will make you divine.” The desk is scattered with students’ papers and there is a paper-weight that has Foster’s family inside of it. The camera pans over to Tommy looking the office over as David Foster comes in wearing a Turtle-neck sweater with a pair of corduroy pants and hushpuppies. He’s also wearing a pair of wire-rim glasses that he never got rid of from the sixties and he’s smoking a pipe.
Foster: Well, good day Tommy
Tommy: Hi Dr. Foster
Foster: Uh, I believe we had a meeting today about my paper, Tense Present.
Tommy: Yes. Well, that’s what I need to talk to you about.
Foster: About? Why, what’s wrong?
Tommy: Dr. Foster, PBS just isn’t ready for a show that is based on your paper.
Foster: Are you kidding me? Language is everything and everywhere; it’s what let’s us have anything to do with one another; it’s what separates us from the animals; Genesis 11:7-10 and so on. (Page 41 classmates)
Tommy: Yes, I know. I read the paper…bu-
Foster: Did you? Do you remember how I said that “…good writing is only as good as the principles on which it’s based” (43).
Tommy: Uh-huh. But what does that mean, exactly.
Foster: Well, “America is in the midst of a protracted Crisis of Authority in matters of language” (43).
Tommy: That sounds familiar?
Foster: It should be. It’s in my paper. Shall I continue?
Tommy nods his head in abeyance
Foster: You see there are two camps. The Descriptivists and the Prescriptivists. The Prescriptivists are like the Republicans. They’re conservative, while the Descriptivists are more “liberal” like the Democrats.
Tommy: Okaaay
Foster: The Descriptivists view writing as self-exploratory and expressive while the Prescriptivists look for systematic grammar, usage, semantics, rhetoric, etc (45).
Tommy: Yes, I know all that. But, what’s the big deal between these two camps? Why are they always fighting?
Foster: The Desciptivists believe that traditional English is conceived and carried on by WASPS.
Tommy: Right. Basically, old white guys who believe they know all and are all.
Foster: Right. But we got to have some form of unity or all hell will break out. Take for instance this Scientific Method philosophy that the Descriptivists have on language. They have these five rules, right. The first one says Language changes constantly.
Tommy: Well, it does.
Foster: Yeah. But, how much and how fast? (45).
Tommy: Look, can you just summarize everything you want to tell me. I’m getting very tired and I still got to read this paper by Larry Beason called “Ethos and error: How business People React to Errors”
Foster: Okay. In a nut-shell, you cannot have grammar without content and vice-versa. How can a person appreciate a significant thought without wading through all the syntax errors? Descriptivists believe some of these rules are arbitrary or even inconsequential (48). But, it’s not just what we say but how we want that other person to respond (50).
I’ll be the first one to admit that sometimes it’s better to speak with different dialects. Depending on where you are at socially or regionally, it’s far superior than SWE. I have students that have great, wonderful intellects and they are geniuses in their own discourse community, but in the academic world they are struggling. Would I not be doing a disservice to them and myself f I ignored their errors? Listen up! Because this is the meat of my argument. “Neither camp appears ever to have considered whether maybe the way prescriptive SWE was traditionally taught had something to do with it’s inutility” (53).
Tommy: You mean pedagogy.
Foster: Exactly! And, students are not going to give a damn about grammar unless you can show them the importance of it. Why, look at the capitalistic exploits of PCE. The politicians and corporations are only using terms like “economically disadvantaged,” because it sounds better than poor. It’s a form of censorship, designed to serve the status quo (55). Then you have AE. These poor saps are more concerned with insecurities and intellectual resumes than they are with really exposing the truth. In fact, AE’s “real purpose is concealment and its real motivation fear” (56).
Tommy: Okay. Cool. That helps a lot. I’ll talk with the “brass” and we’ll let you know.
Setting: A full, bright office with hanging plants near the windows. A sign on the wall that says “To err is human and grammar will make you divine.” The desk is scattered with students’ papers and there is a paper-weight that has Foster’s family inside of it. The camera pans over to Tommy looking the office over as David Foster comes in wearing a Turtle-neck sweater with a pair of corduroy pants and hushpuppies. He’s also wearing a pair of wire-rim glasses that he never got rid of from the sixties and he’s smoking a pipe.
Foster: Well, good day Tommy
Tommy: Hi Dr. Foster
Foster: Uh, I believe we had a meeting today about my paper, Tense Present.
Tommy: Yes. Well, that’s what I need to talk to you about.
Foster: About? Why, what’s wrong?
Tommy: Dr. Foster, PBS just isn’t ready for a show that is based on your paper.
Foster: Are you kidding me? Language is everything and everywhere; it’s what let’s us have anything to do with one another; it’s what separates us from the animals; Genesis 11:7-10 and so on. (Page 41 classmates)
Tommy: Yes, I know. I read the paper…bu-
Foster: Did you? Do you remember how I said that “…good writing is only as good as the principles on which it’s based” (43).
Tommy: Uh-huh. But what does that mean, exactly.
Foster: Well, “America is in the midst of a protracted Crisis of Authority in matters of language” (43).
Tommy: That sounds familiar?
Foster: It should be. It’s in my paper. Shall I continue?
Tommy nods his head in abeyance
Foster: You see there are two camps. The Descriptivists and the Prescriptivists. The Prescriptivists are like the Republicans. They’re conservative, while the Descriptivists are more “liberal” like the Democrats.
Tommy: Okaaay
Foster: The Descriptivists view writing as self-exploratory and expressive while the Prescriptivists look for systematic grammar, usage, semantics, rhetoric, etc (45).
Tommy: Yes, I know all that. But, what’s the big deal between these two camps? Why are they always fighting?
Foster: The Desciptivists believe that traditional English is conceived and carried on by WASPS.
Tommy: Right. Basically, old white guys who believe they know all and are all.
Foster: Right. But we got to have some form of unity or all hell will break out. Take for instance this Scientific Method philosophy that the Descriptivists have on language. They have these five rules, right. The first one says Language changes constantly.
Tommy: Well, it does.
Foster: Yeah. But, how much and how fast? (45).
Tommy: Look, can you just summarize everything you want to tell me. I’m getting very tired and I still got to read this paper by Larry Beason called “Ethos and error: How business People React to Errors”
Foster: Okay. In a nut-shell, you cannot have grammar without content and vice-versa. How can a person appreciate a significant thought without wading through all the syntax errors? Descriptivists believe some of these rules are arbitrary or even inconsequential (48). But, it’s not just what we say but how we want that other person to respond (50).
I’ll be the first one to admit that sometimes it’s better to speak with different dialects. Depending on where you are at socially or regionally, it’s far superior than SWE. I have students that have great, wonderful intellects and they are geniuses in their own discourse community, but in the academic world they are struggling. Would I not be doing a disservice to them and myself f I ignored their errors? Listen up! Because this is the meat of my argument. “Neither camp appears ever to have considered whether maybe the way prescriptive SWE was traditionally taught had something to do with it’s inutility” (53).
Tommy: You mean pedagogy.
Foster: Exactly! And, students are not going to give a damn about grammar unless you can show them the importance of it. Why, look at the capitalistic exploits of PCE. The politicians and corporations are only using terms like “economically disadvantaged,” because it sounds better than poor. It’s a form of censorship, designed to serve the status quo (55). Then you have AE. These poor saps are more concerned with insecurities and intellectual resumes than they are with really exposing the truth. In fact, AE’s “real purpose is concealment and its real motivation fear” (56).
Tommy: Okay. Cool. That helps a lot. I’ll talk with the “brass” and we’ll let you know.
Monday, September 8, 2008
Foster: The First BLog
Tense Present
In the Essay, Tense Present, David Foster runs the whole gamut of Grammar. He attacks Descriptivists with sentences like “This is so stupid it practically drools” (47). Ouch! Frie (the person he talks about) has to be hurting right about now. I’m sure in the academia world this would be considered a TKO, total knock out! Really, I have never seen an academic paper ridicule another paper like that. It’s Krazy! But, Foster just doesn’t stop with the insults. He goes on to attack another Descriptivist, Steven Pinker who says “When a scientist considers all the high-tech mental machinery needed to order words into everyday sentences, prescriptive rules are, at best, inconsequential decorations” (48). This statement outrages Foster who goes into this defense using misplaced modifiers, confusing clauses, and questioning “who” exactly is offended by inconsequential decorations. That was fine! He should have stopped there! But…No, he doesn’t. He goes into this terrible analogy about pants and the acceptance of gender associated with pants. Lord, I felt like I was at a warehouse listening to a guy tell me why the Snickers was better than the Milky Way; the argument was trite when he decided to use the analogy of pants. Please, gimme a break! While Foster “hits” the Descriptivists hard, he also does not fail to swing at the Prescriptivists either, just not as hard. All in all, Foster appeals to readers by trying to speak with an honest tone that seems genuine even when it does not. His candid, refreshing rhetoric gives him a unique style and separates his essay from other essays with clear distinction.
In the Essay, Tense Present, David Foster runs the whole gamut of Grammar. He attacks Descriptivists with sentences like “This is so stupid it practically drools” (47). Ouch! Frie (the person he talks about) has to be hurting right about now. I’m sure in the academia world this would be considered a TKO, total knock out! Really, I have never seen an academic paper ridicule another paper like that. It’s Krazy! But, Foster just doesn’t stop with the insults. He goes on to attack another Descriptivist, Steven Pinker who says “When a scientist considers all the high-tech mental machinery needed to order words into everyday sentences, prescriptive rules are, at best, inconsequential decorations” (48). This statement outrages Foster who goes into this defense using misplaced modifiers, confusing clauses, and questioning “who” exactly is offended by inconsequential decorations. That was fine! He should have stopped there! But…No, he doesn’t. He goes into this terrible analogy about pants and the acceptance of gender associated with pants. Lord, I felt like I was at a warehouse listening to a guy tell me why the Snickers was better than the Milky Way; the argument was trite when he decided to use the analogy of pants. Please, gimme a break! While Foster “hits” the Descriptivists hard, he also does not fail to swing at the Prescriptivists either, just not as hard. All in all, Foster appeals to readers by trying to speak with an honest tone that seems genuine even when it does not. His candid, refreshing rhetoric gives him a unique style and separates his essay from other essays with clear distinction.
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