Like it or not, the education system you describe above is creating grammar snobs.
Like it or not, it’s clear you don’t have a clue what you’re talking regarding with our educational systems. They have many problems. Creating grammar snobs generally isn’t one of them.
As an editor from the U.S., this wins the thread in my book. Bloody right it isn't!
I feel like the energy of this thread really depends on not reading very well to misunderstand each other. As LC, mt, and others have said, one loses class in the U.S.A by writing and speaking without using certain grammatical rules. Of course it's classist. As an editor, one of my jobs--though really not the main one, despite what pop culture thinks--is to ensure that those who pay me produce books to a certain standard of grammar. I want my children to be able to use that same standard. To that extent, heck yeah there's a right and a wrong. If you violate my grammatical norms too often, I will find it painful. That doesn't mean the rules are logical or that they don't keep people down. My husband has heard one of the top scholars in his field say something like 'It's not the same but I know prejudice is real. Every time I open my mouth, people assume I'm stupid.' And they do because he has a very thick southern accent. I swear that's the only reason we don't "y'all" more in this country. It's a very useful word but whenever I use it,* people tell me I shouldn't, basically because it has the wrong class.
*Not a southerner and no accent to match but I lived there for about 7 years
I can only say that my impression is that in post-grad academic work in the US, consistency of style in writing seems to be Highly Valued.
You're right - it is highly valued. It's highly valued in the UK too, but it seems that students are trusted to pick this up on their own, rather than having to be formally taught it.
(For reference, applied science degrees also feature essays, dissertations in the final year, written projects and reports, with full references. I've written a thesis and several academic papers. No formal course in Academic English. Daughter graduated in zoology last year. No formal course in Academic English. It just doesn't seem to be a thing.)
Again, I can’t speak from personal experience—perhaps someone like @ECraigR can say more—but my impression is that Academic English isn’t taught as a class as such here. It’s taught through reference to style guides that are supposed to be used by all students and by feedback on writing.
Again, I can’t speak from personal experience—perhaps someone like @ECraigR can say more—but my impression is that Academic English isn’t taught as a class as such here. It’s taught through reference to style guides that are supposed to be used by all students and by feedback on writing.
But maybe my impression is wrong.
Yes, that’s what I was trying to say. @Ohher could probably say more than I could about how it’s taught, being a professor and all.
Again, I can’t speak from personal experience—perhaps someone like @ECraigR can say more—but my impression is that Academic English isn’t taught as a class as such here. It’s taught through reference to style guides that are supposed to be used by all students and by feedback on writing.
But maybe my impression is wrong.
Yes, that’s what I was trying to say. @Ohher could probably say more than I could about how it’s taught, being a professor and all.
I'm not aware of any academic institutions offering courses titled "Academic English," but academic English is what's generally taught in freshman composition, which (in the US, anyway--I don't know about elsewhere) is a basic writing course required of nearly every first-year college student in nearly every college.
What's seldom pointed out in these courses is that we're teaching students how to write in styles that meet academic standards. At the college where I teach, second-language speakers are routinely offered a course called "Academic Writing" which "prepare students for English composition and other academic writing at the college level." According to our college catalog, this "includes introduction to patterns of essay organization such as the comparison and contrast, cause and effect, and process analysis. Grammar and complex sentence structures will be reviewed as needed." Many try to skip this course (it costs money but doesn't meet graduation requirements) to their sorrow, when they struggle and fail in English comp.
Parenthetically, it occurs to me to wonder what would happen if we did a computer analysis of Doc Tor's posts. How many instances would we find of "me and so-and-so" constructions? I can't, off the top of my head, recall any. Of course, I wasn't looking for them, either.
It is covered in the U.S. at various pre-college levels. (All quotes below are from the Common Core State Standards, which are used in about half the country and are cribbed off of importantly in other states.
From Grade 2:
Compare formal and informal uses of English
From Grade 4:
Differentiate between contexts that call for formal English (e.g., presenting ideas) and situations where informal discourse is appropriate (e.g., small-group discussion).
From Grade 6:
Adapt speech to a variety of contexts and communicative tasks, demonstrating command of formal English when indicated or appropriate.
I will stop there but there are relevant high school standards too.
I did an English degree in England. That was all we studied. In the opening lecture one of the professors exhorted us to "write well," and that was all the instruction we had.
Getting back to "correct English" I was worried yesterday when I read in the AV, 1 Cor 8.9, "this liberty of your's". I don't think it's a misprint, as I checked another copy, but surely that's wrong?
It appears that the UK universities I'm familiar with expect their undergraduates to acquaint themselves with the the style required for reports and essays. They seem to cope fine.
It strikes me that this isn't so much grammar pedantry as teaching pedantry. Is this where I have to admit no one 'taught' me how to write a novel? I realise that people pay good money to get a degree/masters in creative writing, but why not just spend three years writing and reading instead?
I did an English degree in England. That was all we studied. In the opening lecture one of the professors exhorted us to "write well," and that was all the instruction we had.
Getting back to "correct English" I was worried yesterday when I read in the AV, 1 Cor 8.9, "this liberty of your's". I don't think it's a misprint, as I checked another copy, but surely that's wrong?
It appears that the UK universities I'm familiar with expect their undergraduates to acquaint themselves with the the style required for reports and essays. They seem to cope fine.
It strikes me that this isn't so much grammar pedantry as teaching pedantry. Is this where I have to admit no one 'taught' me how to write a novel? I realise that people pay good money to get a degree/masters in creative writing, but why not just spend three years writing and reading instead?
I am deeply prejudiced against the idea that "creative writing" is something that can be taught. (It is a prejudice, as I have no problem with music students being taught the different forms of music, but I feel very deeply you should get on and write if you want to. That, and the fact that any novel I've read which begins by thanking the author's creative writing teacher has been dreadful.)
I'm not aware of any academic institutions offering courses titled "Academic English," but academic English is what's generally taught in freshman composition, which (in the US, anyway--I don't know about elsewhere) is a basic writing course required of nearly every first-year college student in nearly every college.
Ah yes, both my kids had it freshman year. I don’t recall taking it 40 years ago when I was a freshman. I don’t know whether that’s because it wasn't generally required then, whether it wasn’t a requirement for music majors or whether I’ve just forgotten taking it.
But I was, long the lines of what @Gwai said, taught what I think was similar material in junior high and high school college-prep classes.
.Getting back to "correct English" I was worried yesterday when I read in the AV, 1 Cor 8.9, "this liberty of your's". I don't think it's a misprint, as I checked another copy, but surely that's wrong?
In the AV I first turned to it’s "this liberty of yours" (Collins, Cleartype) and in the nearest Cambridge University Press edition, but as you have shown it in the nearest Oxford University Press copy (tsk, tsk Oxford!).
It's not orthography at all. It's a punctuation error.
Nice try, but according to Wikipedia, An orthography is a set of conventions for writing a language. It includes norms of spelling, hyphenation, capitalization, word breaks, emphasis, and punctuation
For many of us who went through the English state education system in the 70s and early 80s, there were few/no formal grammar lessons.
I learned grammar in Latin and French, but not really in English. Our English teachers would correct grammar in our writing - anybody writing "Me and John went to the cinema" would be on the receiving end of a lot of red pen - but we were never actually sat down and told how the language worked.
It's not orthography at all. It's a punctuation error.
Nice try, but according to Wikipedia, An orthography is a set of conventions for writing a language. It includes norms of spelling, hyphenation, capitalization, word breaks, emphasis, and punctuation
Yet another argument against using Wikis as source material in research papers for freshman comp.
Certain schools of academic theory, ones where translations of Derrida and Foucault are taken as models, are notorious for having appalling style. I don't think anyone has ever set out to teach it, so it must be picked up by imitation.
I've never even been able to do a convincing parody of it.
Getting back to "correct English" I was worried yesterday when I read in the AV, 1 Cor 8.9, "this liberty of your's". I don't think it's a misprint, as I checked another copy, but surely that's wrong?
It's so wrong that after I noticed I had written it on a Christmas card, I tore up the whole card and started over. I was writing to a friend who is a retired English teacher and I just knew it would jump out at him. Which is why, although I agree with the gifted Doc Tor that the creative part in Creative Writing probably can't be taught, without basic good grammar the reader will be thrown out of the story when glaring mistakes pop up.
It's not orthography at all. It's a punctuation error.
Nice try, but according to Wikipedia, An orthography is a set of conventions for writing a language. It includes norms of spelling, hyphenation, capitalization, word breaks, emphasis, and punctuation
Yet another argument against using Wikis as source material in research papers for freshman comp.
At the risk of looking like I'm getting the ruler out and insisting it's at least this long, my Collins English Dictionary, roughly the weight of a whale's, defines it as "a writing system" which would include such things as punctuation, and alternatively a spelling system.
My Ransom House dictionary (1500+ pages) offers as its first definition "the art of spelling words according to accepted usage." #2 is "the part of grammar that treats of letters and spelling." #3 is "a method of spelling." #4 is "a system of symbols for spelling."
For many of us who went through the English state education system in the 70s and early 80s, there were few/no formal grammar lessons.
I learned grammar in Latin and French, but not really in English. Our English teachers would correct grammar in our writing - anybody writing "Me and John went to the cinema" would be on the receiving end of a lot of red pen - but we were never actually sat down and told how the language worked.
Red pen and other tea cheeky* corrections ARE a form of teaching. Even in the U.S., they are the most common method of teaching standard English out there, once past middle school.
* teacherly. I’m leaving the auto-correct for your hooting pleasure.
For many of us who went through the English state education system in the 70s and early 80s, there were few/no formal grammar lessons.
I learned grammar in Latin and French, but not really in English. Our English teachers would correct grammar in our writing - anybody writing "Me and John went to the cinema" would be on the receiving end of a lot of red pen - but we were never actually sat down and told how the language worked.
Red pen and other tea cheeky* corrections ARE a form of teaching. Even in the U.S., they are the most common method of teaching standard English out there, once past middle school.
* teacherly. I’m leaving the auto-correct for your hooting pleasure.
I'm not sure teachers in Britain are allowed to use red pens any more. But this may be a tabloid myth.
Yes, it does. But for whatever reason, “gift” as a verb appears to have been rarely used in the US until very recently (at least in my experience and the experience of others I’ve heard comment on it), when all of a sudden such usage could be seen or heard all over the place. So under those circumstances, it not only sounds like a new usage, but it sounds a lot like business-speak or something akin to it. Despite the long-precedent of “gift” as a verb elsewhere, here it sounds like the verbing Calvin liked.
This. And thx for the cartoon. I knew some of the lines, but had forgotten where they came from.
The UK had the most ridiculously sloppy, slapdash, haphazard approach to teaching English for about 20 years, during the 1970s and 1980s. I only know any grammar because of learning foreign languages, and I'm a natural linguist. This is not something we should be proud of - we have survived this process, rather than profited from it. It's a bug, and one that has been fixed - rather overfixed possibly, but that is a separate question - by the introduction and overloading of the National Curriculum, but I would defintiely say that we are survivors of this abuse of our native language, not profiters. Net, anyway - learning not to be afraid of using language creatively is also useful, but less useful than learning what the bits are and how they fit together in an organised fashion, rather than just testing combinations and learning which work.
At the risk of looking like I'm getting the ruler out and insisting it's at least this long, my Collins English Dictionary, roughly the weight of a whale's, defines it as "a writing system" which would include such things as punctuation, and alternatively a spelling system.
Goodness, I didn't know whales are equipped with such large dictionaries!
I'm not sure teachers in Britain are allowed to use red pens any more. But this may be a tabloid myth.
Mrs C taught in an Inner London primary school 15 or so years ago, and they were asked to use colours other than red to correct work (because red was deemed aggressive). IIRC, Mrs C generally marked in green or purple. I don't know whether this was prevalent, or just a local initiative.
(Yes, LC, red ink is indeed a form of teaching - but if all you get is correction without formal instruction, then what you get is the haphazard affair that Thunderbunk mentions. It leads to the vague sense that several people have reported of knowing that a particular construction sounds right, bot not being able to explain why.)
I'm not sure teachers in Britain are allowed to use red pens any more. But this may be a tabloid myth.
Mrs C taught in an Inner London primary school 15 or so years ago, and they were asked to use colours other than red to correct work (because red was deemed aggressive). IIRC, Mrs C generally marked in green or purple. I don't know whether this was prevalent, or just a local initiative.
(Yes, LC, red ink is indeed a form of teaching - but if all you get is correction without formal instruction, then what you get is the haphazard affair that Thunderbunk mentions. It leads to the vague sense that several people have reported of knowing that a particular construction sounds right, bot not being able to explain why.)
I completely agree. I didn't say it was GOOD teaching. In fact, I suspect truly good grammar teaching would have to approach English in the same mindset as we approach foreign language teaching--instead of the current half-didactic, half "oh just say what SOUNDS right" crap we have now--which severely disadvantages the non-voracious reader and the people born into variant English discourse communities. How the hell can anything just "sound right" when you've hardly been exposed to it?
PS We were told to mark in pencil, under the thory that this would psychologically suggest Changes Could Be Made, rather than looking like blood spatter.
I use a combination of green pen and/or inserting comment balloons on downloaded submissions. I seldom make corrections, though. Instead, I ask questions: is this what you intended to say? What does this sentence mean? Are you sure of this word's meaning? This statement seems to contradict what you said above; which point of view are you supporting?
From what I've heard from UK Shipmates, I gather green is the ink color traditional used for nasty/weird letters to newspaper editors. Not sure if that's the color the writer uses, or the color used to print it in the paper.
"Whom" is probably doomed. It may not vanish in my lifetime (I'm getting on to short-timer-hood) but I doubt it'll be around in 50 years. "The woman to whom I offered my seat refused it" sounds incredibly stilted to me. My discourse community would probably opt for "The woman I offered my seat to refused it." If I were writing fiction and wanted the "whom" version in dialogue, it would be because I was developing a fussy, pedantic, unsympathetic character.
The title of this thread does seem to keep changing.
The current one seems rather misogynistic to me, particularly given that most of us (incorrectly) accused of being "pedants" are female, while those who want to make up their own rules as they go along have Y chromosomes. There's a great deal in the new title to unpack. Would it be correct to advise our antagonists to oink off for being dickheads?
"Whom" is probably doomed. It may not vanish in my lifetime (I'm getting on to short-timer-hood) but I doubt it'll be around in 50 years. "The woman to whom I offered my seat refused it" sounds incredibly stilted to me. My discourse community would probably opt for "The woman I offered my seat to refused it." If I were writing fiction and wanted the "whom" version in dialogue, it would be because I was developing a fussy, pedantic, unsympathetic character.
Strangely to me starting a sentence with "whom" sounds odd, so I'd say "Who are you writing to?" but "You wrote to whom?"
I noticed the following in a newsletter from the Chief Executive of a British train company:
Myself and my colleagues travel on those trains every day and we’re very conscious of that and are passionate about making this service the best it can be.
Comments
You're right - it is highly valued. It's highly valued in the UK too, but it seems that students are trusted to pick this up on their own, rather than having to be formally taught it.
(For reference, applied science degrees also feature essays, dissertations in the final year, written projects and reports, with full references. I've written a thesis and several academic papers. No formal course in Academic English. Daughter graduated in zoology last year. No formal course in Academic English. It just doesn't seem to be a thing.)
But maybe my impression is wrong.
Yes, that’s what I was trying to say. @Ohher could probably say more than I could about how it’s taught, being a professor and all.
I'm not aware of any academic institutions offering courses titled "Academic English," but academic English is what's generally taught in freshman composition, which (in the US, anyway--I don't know about elsewhere) is a basic writing course required of nearly every first-year college student in nearly every college.
What's seldom pointed out in these courses is that we're teaching students how to write in styles that meet academic standards. At the college where I teach, second-language speakers are routinely offered a course called "Academic Writing" which "prepare students for English composition and other academic writing at the college level." According to our college catalog, this "includes introduction to patterns of essay organization such as the comparison and contrast, cause and effect, and process analysis. Grammar and complex sentence structures will be reviewed as needed." Many try to skip this course (it costs money but doesn't meet graduation requirements) to their sorrow, when they struggle and fail in English comp.
Parenthetically, it occurs to me to wonder what would happen if we did a computer analysis of Doc Tor's posts. How many instances would we find of "me and so-and-so" constructions? I can't, off the top of my head, recall any. Of course, I wasn't looking for them, either.
From Grade 2:
From Grade 4:
From Grade 6:
I will stop there but there are relevant high school standards too.
Getting back to "correct English" I was worried yesterday when I read in the AV, 1 Cor 8.9, "this liberty of your's". I don't think it's a misprint, as I checked another copy, but surely that's wrong?
It strikes me that this isn't so much grammar pedantry as teaching pedantry. Is this where I have to admit no one 'taught' me how to write a novel? I realise that people pay good money to get a degree/masters in creative writing, but why not just spend three years writing and reading instead?
Certainly ain't standard orthography, no.
I am deeply prejudiced against the idea that "creative writing" is something that can be taught. (It is a prejudice, as I have no problem with music students being taught the different forms of music, but I feel very deeply you should get on and write if you want to. That, and the fact that any novel I've read which begins by thanking the author's creative writing teacher has been dreadful.)
But I was, long the lines of what @Gwai said, taught what I think was similar material in junior high and high school college-prep classes.
Nice try, but according to Wikipedia, An orthography is a set of conventions for writing a language. It includes norms of spelling, hyphenation, capitalization, word breaks, emphasis, and punctuation
I learned grammar in Latin and French, but not really in English. Our English teachers would correct grammar in our writing - anybody writing "Me and John went to the cinema" would be on the receiving end of a lot of red pen - but we were never actually sat down and told how the language worked.
Yet another argument against using Wikis as source material in research papers for freshman comp.
I've never even been able to do a convincing parody of it.
The title of this thread does seem to keep changing.
I mean unrestive.
At the risk of looking like I'm getting the ruler out and insisting it's at least this long, my Collins English Dictionary, roughly the weight of a whale's, defines it as "a writing system" which would include such things as punctuation, and alternatively a spelling system.
Pond difference?
Red pen and other tea cheeky* corrections ARE a form of teaching. Even in the U.S., they are the most common method of teaching standard English out there, once past middle school.
* teacherly. I’m leaving the auto-correct for your hooting pleasure.
"I did it."
"Me and the wife".
I'm not sure teachers in Britain are allowed to use red pens any more. But this may be a tabloid myth.
This. And thx for the cartoon.
Goodness, I didn't know whales are equipped with such large dictionaries!
Mrs C taught in an Inner London primary school 15 or so years ago, and they were asked to use colours other than red to correct work (because red was deemed aggressive). IIRC, Mrs C generally marked in green or purple. I don't know whether this was prevalent, or just a local initiative.
(Yes, LC, red ink is indeed a form of teaching - but if all you get is correction without formal instruction, then what you get is the haphazard affair that Thunderbunk mentions. It leads to the vague sense that several people have reported of knowing that a particular construction sounds right, bot not being able to explain why.)
I completely agree. I didn't say it was GOOD teaching. In fact, I suspect truly good grammar teaching would have to approach English in the same mindset as we approach foreign language teaching--instead of the current half-didactic, half "oh just say what SOUNDS right" crap we have now--which severely disadvantages the non-voracious reader and the people born into variant English discourse communities. How the hell can anything just "sound right" when you've hardly been exposed to it?
PS We were told to mark in pencil, under the thory that this would psychologically suggest Changes Could Be Made, rather than looking like blood spatter.
From what I've heard from UK Shipmates, I gather green is the ink color traditional used for nasty/weird letters to newspaper editors. Not sure if that's the color the writer uses, or the color used to print it in the paper.
To, for, by, with and from - in other words the dative and ablative as well as the accusative/objective.
Properly said whilst wearing a wife-beater?
Strangely to me starting a sentence with "whom" sounds odd, so I'd say "Who are you writing to?" but "You wrote to whom?"
Yeah, probably the same.
But I'd obsess in guilt about it afterwards.