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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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I got a fine public dusting on Melanie and Mike’s excellent site last week, for daring to take issue with Curmudgeon’s Corner. In the light of the comments (mostly prescriptivist) of many newcomers here over the last week (and because the swine didn’t print my reply this week!  ) I thought I would reproduce it here to see if the basic argument gets any takers. The Curmudgeon Corner original piece: "Coal prices are forecasting at a record high…” by Michael Tent http://www.takeourword.com/TOW113/page4.htmlMy reply, along the lines of “I would rather be bludgeoned than curmudgeoned to death”: & Mike and Melanie’s dis:“logic is flawed…clear communication is paramount” http://www.takeourword.com/TOW114/page4.html#curMy unprinted reply: My critique of Malcolm’s view was based neither on the specific term he was examining, nor on whether a usage occurs in Shakespeare. The argument I evidently failed to communicate clearly was this: 1 Language is a constantly evolving stream – meaning is invested by users, not defined by curmudgeons. There is no right and wrong in absolute terms. What counts most to the majority of users (as you rightly summarised) is clarity of meaning. 2 What also matters is the context of speech community – I suggest radio’s more colloquial forms fit the pretence of one-to-one communication, whereas if the same phrase was offered in printed form it might not be appropriate. It is often observed that we use different grammar and vocabulary when, say, talking to a plumber or writing to a bank manager. 3 My analogy about flying into airports was to point to similar migration of meaning (and elision) between the components of a sentence – a curmudgeon might have once insisted upon “being conveyed by flight in an aeroplane to disembark at the airport”. 4 I see no possible real confusion of meaning in either ‘flying into an airport’ or ‘coal prices are forecasting’. To grope for a completely artificial interpretation of what this non-standard grammar might be taken to mean misses the point: we apply exterior context to define likely meaning. For example, if someone remarks to you “My car’s telling me it’s time for a service”, no one but a lunatic (or a curmudgeon!) would think of remarking on the car’s sudden ability to speak and diagnose your religious requirements. 5 Pointing to the Shakespearean usage of ‘casted’ to contradict Malcolm’s assertion this form is not used was an irony you missed. Here was a practical example of language evolution. You are of course right to say we never intentionally select words that convey completely superseded meaning – yet if the curmudgeons and language police were to have their way, this is the cul-de-sac to which our language would be consigned, since the traffic moves on either with or without you. The truth is that most curmudgeons are actually just defending a socially prestigious language variety against what they feel as a threat from the unwashed masses – pure snobbery. If Malcolm had simply said that usage sounded a bit ugly to him, I would be happy to agree; euphony is often the most reliable guide we have to good communication. There are more important battles to be fought than such artificial quarrels as this: after all, of the many thousands of auditors how many took a wrong or confused meaning from the broadcast?” This week Eminem did print a sort of acknowledgment that there is an alternative view of language that doesn’t rely on Curmudgeons telling us to get in line: http://www.takeourword.com/page4.htmlSo over to you, if anyone’s interested. Is language best described essentially by rules (“you must do this”), or is it more accurately understood by (largely non-judgmental) descriptions of how people are actually using it?
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Joined: Mar 2000
Posts: 11,613
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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Posts: 11,613 |
Well now, Auntie, I see that in your ways of wile and guile, you have posed your question in such a way as to try and have us think that any answer must be either one
or the other! But we won't fall for that, no sir!
'Tis a blend of both, and others here are much more able than I to explain how.
With love from your curmudgeonly neice
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Joined: Feb 2001
Posts: 85
journeyman
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journeyman
Joined: Feb 2001
Posts: 85 |
Jackie's right. It can only fall somewhere between. On the one hand, you don't want the language descending to the point "See Jane Run. Run Jane Run." The reason we have such a vast collection of words, is because each word was felt to be necessary, to describe or explain something perfectly. To eliminate most of those words is to eliminate understanding.
On the other hand, ever word in history started with someone feeling it should exist, and when you come down to it, even an expert opinion is still a subjective opinion. That expert may be following what others have said before, but he has still decided for himself if it was right or wrong. And as it has been argued to great length in other places, what is right and wrong is always changing. To hold on to a version of english (or any language) that existed 50 years ago, or 100 years ago, or even 500 years ago is still holding on to some mutation of an earlier version. Which no doubt, at the time, people would have been complaining about how nobody speaks properly any more, and that language was being destroyed.
To sum it up, being a curmudgeon is more about not wanting to change, than preserving what's "right". And to be its opposite is just plain lazy and unclear. It's got to be somewhere in between.
Ali
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Joined: Nov 2000
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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"See Jane Run. Run Jane Run."
Funny, I always thought it was Spot who did all the running ...
Anyway I agree with Ali's general direction. The use of language is like any other art form; beauty is in the eye of the beholder. There is absolutely no "science" of language use (and linguistics, which interests us all, is likewise not a real science)[ducking for cover emoticon]. There are a few general rules which almost everyone follows, but even they're not sacrosanct since our fallible but extremely accomplished pattern-matching mechanisms can even deal with exceptions to them. And like any other art form, lots of people like to try out new techniques and media ...
This makes for great material for curmudgeons to rail against, but it doesn't make their whinging any more valid! And I whinge with the best of 'em if it suits me.
The idiot also known as Capfka ...
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old hand
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old hand
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(and linguistics, which interests us all, is likewise not a real science)
From what I understood of linguistics, it is descriptive, not prescriptive. At least my book says that over and over again. So it doesn't side with the curmudgeons, anyway. And from what I read, there are in fact a few rules which seem to be common among all languages. (Book at home, me at school - no examples forthcoming.)
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old hand
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old hand
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but even (the rules are) not sacrosanct since our fallible but extremely accomplished pattern-matching mechanisms can even deal with exceptions to them.
Do you mean on the speaker's or on the listener's side?
and do you mean true exceptions or ad hoc violations of the rules?
And what is the criterion for failure of the pattern-matching?
And what else but a science can answer these questions?
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Posts: 10,542
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Apr 2000
Posts: 10,542 |
CK>not a real science
maybe not, but it is the study of language to which all kinds of science and pseudo-science (and nescience!) is applied; e.g., analysis, anthropology, geography, philosophy, psychology, cartography, cacology, carpology, campanology... whoa.
-ron obvious
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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Aaaah, at last! [smug-and-satisfied smile emoticon]
The idiot also known as Capfka ...
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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wseiber railed Do you mean on the speaker's or on the listener's side?
and do you mean true exceptions or ad hoc violations of the rules?
And what is the criterion for failure of the pattern-matching?
And what else but a science can answer these questions?
In order: 1. Either. 2. Either or. 3. Misperceptions. 4. Nothing. But none of your questions are only artifacts of linguistics, they are issues related to the way our brains interpret sensory information. All of your questions would be just as valid if we were talking about vision (or visionistics?), or our sense of smell (odouristics?), or our sense of touch, yadda, yadda. Linguistics can call itself a science all it wants, but in my view it remains nothing but a post-hoc study of what was and is. Where science can materially affect the way our computers will operate in the future, it won't make the slightest bit of difference to the way we speak or write. There are no "defining moments" out there in linguistics which would make some ancient Greek run down the street without so much as a bath towel, yelling some unintelligible word until the cops grab him up for indecent exposure and inclement discovery. It may be a simple failure of my imagination, but I really can't conceive of something that a student of linguistics might discover that will change the way we look at or use language into the future. As far as language is concerned there is only archaeology, I'm afraid. But that's interesting enough for me! 
The idiot also known as Capfka ...
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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That explains my early fascination with archaeology (or is this the "chicken and the egg" conundrum?).
I'm with CapK. Similarly, even if a specific music theory is used as a composition tool, it is 'often' quite meaningless to the overall aural perception of most listeners. Given the possible combinations of 88 notes that "westerners" have been stuck on (ducking for cover emoticon), this 'failure' of music theory to provide 'science' is the same 'failure' across the arts.
However, I still enjoy both...
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