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Joined: Dec 2002
Posts: 87
journeyman
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journeyman
Joined: Dec 2002
Posts: 87 |
I'm glad for my Latin instruction for the structural analysis it taught me; to me it's a bit like playing a musical instrument: you learn how to play and then learn to improvise. Some musicians learn in other ways, I suppose, self-taught or whatever, and possibly writers could learn content before form. I still think most of the best writers and musicians have the craft down before the artistry.
I'm trying to leave myself some wiggle-room here because I'm convinced that having something to say makes good writing, too. I still like capitalization and punctuation and spelling and correct tense and number, though. It depends on the format, too; business letter more formal but a novel just about anything can be done far as I'm concerned.
What sane person could live in this world and not be crazy? -Ursula K. Le Guin, author (1929- )
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Joined: Jan 2002
Posts: 1,526
veteran
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veteran
Joined: Jan 2002
Posts: 1,526 |
I never understood English grammar until I took HS latin. I made good grades - I just didn't get it. After latin, though, I realized, for example, the difference between phrases and clauses. I understood that while grammar rules are somewhat arbitrary, that it was good to agree on some things (so as not to have the romans sneaking up on their own rears).
I think some of the criticisms are off base. Of course the author of this article believes that content is important. Of course he believes that one needs both form and content to communicate. If there is no content, what is the use of communicating? But it's like Mrs Schlinker told us - she didn't care what we had to say, but only that we said it well.
What essayist has done is taken something like sentence tree parsing and gone to the next level with it. He has abstracted the problem of communication in the same way that a class in HS algebra abstracts the problems of mathematics.
You learn the forms and develop some comprehension of the underlying mechanisms in class and later, when you have to solve real problems, you're on surer footing. You don't have to think about how to set up a set of equations in 3 variables or 5 or even 10. You have the basics down and not only that, you are sufficiently comfortable that you can skip steps, combine methodologies, perhaps even develop new ones. You can use your toolbox of methods and formulae with the same creativity that some guitar players use with the fixed set of chords they have learnt.
The only criticism that I might level against this approach is that it might be too abstract for some students. But I don't think every course needs to be geared for the success of the lowest common denominator.
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Posts: 2,379
Pooh-Bah
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Pooh-Bah
Joined: Mar 2001
Posts: 2,379 |
To make sentence of Fish's list, remove commas:
Coffee should book garbage quickly.
The questions who is Coffee and why he should book garbage at all, let alone quickly, are disallowed by the first rule of Fish's language game.
But, while the article is interesting and seemingly controversial, I take it tsuwm is making another point -- if just formally.
"Incidentally," congratulations on your daughter's graduation!
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Joined: Sep 2000
Posts: 4,757
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Sep 2000
Posts: 4,757 |
> Of course the author of this article believes that content is important.
If that is indeed true it cannot be adduced from what he has actually written here. The central thrust of his argument occurs in the second paragraph where he suggests most current US compositional classes major on content without study of formal structure. This ’theory’, he asserts, is wrong: “Content is a lure and a delusion, and it should be banished from the classroom. Form is the way.”
Well, actually he is factually wrong.
We all learn language by doing it.
Understanding the formality or the methodology comes WAY later.
It is perfectly possible to run a good class in composition without going into the analysis of form he is so self-frottingly ecstatic about. This is not to say that what he is doing is not valuable, because I would agree that it is, but it is not the only technique, and it is plain wrong to suggest it has some inherent primacy over other ways of study. Methods of study that are more accessible to the large majority may also not necessarily be ‘appealing to the lowest common denominator'.
Above all, I simply laugh at the fact he implies that what he is doing is about ‘composition’. It is actually about dissecting composition. This stands (to use his favourite word) in the same relationship to composition as dissecting a frog in biology does to understanding the meaning of life. It may be a very useful discipline of study, and it may indeed save many average people from expressing themselves with inexactitude or lack of clarity. But there is absolutely no evidence to suggest this kind of pedagogy has ever stimulated creative composition.
Congraduelations, Mikelsdottir!
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Joined: Mar 2001
Posts: 2,379
Pooh-Bah
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Pooh-Bah
Joined: Mar 2001
Posts: 2,379 |
>>The central thrust of his argument occurs in the second paragraph where he suggests most current US compositional classes major on content without study of formal structure. This ’theory’, he asserts, is wrong: “Content is a lure and a delusion, and it should be banished from the classroom. Form is the way.”<<
I'm not sure about that. I think his point is that without an understanding of form, "content" -- thought -- is not likely to evolve. His reference to 'big ideas' is facetious; this is evidenced later in the piece when he describes 'big ideas' as "usually some recycled set of pros and cons about abortion, assisted suicide, affirmative action, welfare reform, the death penalty, free speech and so forth." Not to formulate ideas. But he also says that the reason his classes 'don't involve content,' is because "once ideas or themes are allowed in, the focus is shifted from the forms that make the organization of content possible to this or that piece of content." He is suggesting that once pre-digested glop is introduced, the kids stop thinking about anything at all. He is also suggesting that thinking involves making connections. True, he might have said this better, and his failure argues against him, but what he seems to be trying to point out is that the majority of American students cannot formulate clear content, because the majority of American students are trained to write -- that is, to think -- unrigorously. I'm afraid he's right.
You are probably mostly right, when you say that language is learned in the doing. And in that case, the fault my lie in the content: a lot of it is mush. A more demanding curriculum would probably force attention to the formal structures in which its content is 'embedded.'
His polemic should be taken with a grain of salt. It sounds as though his Freshman course is essentially remediary. He is attempting, by means of an assault of abstraction, to teach his students what they should, indeed, have learned in the course of the thoughtful use of language. But the thoughtful use of language may be a thing in short supply in the US classroom.
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Joined: Sep 2000
Posts: 2,788
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Sep 2000
Posts: 2,788 |
Professor Kingsfield: You come in here with a skull full of mush and you leave thinking like a lawyer.
The Paper Chase (1973)
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Joined: Jun 2002
Posts: 1,624
Pooh-Bah
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Pooh-Bah
Joined: Jun 2002
Posts: 1,624 |
It's quite clear that few of you have actually tried to teach English composition. I think Fish's approach is extreme, but it is quite valid. The arguments above about him not valuing content are, however, not. What he said wa that in his class what was important was syntactical structure. He probably felt that he didn't need to add that being able to construct a sentence correctly is a futile skill if you have nothing worthwhile to say.
I have taught remedial English to both children and adults. It is not an easy task. For most on this board, writing is almost as natural as breathing, but for a significant percentage of people it is not. They can "hear" a sentence in their heads. They can express it orally, in good form. They can even read someone else's prose in a logical fashion. But they simply cannot get it down on paper themselves in good English. I could give you examples (and I will if anyone is really interested). I believe that some people are "wired" to be able to write fluently and others are not. I have taught people who are very, very intelligent but who cannot, for the life of them, express their ideas in writing. At first I thought they were just being mentally lazy, but, given the desperation of some of my students and their willingness to spend time and effort to do something about it, I realised that I was wrong.
A knowledge of the general rules of grammar is absolutely essential to such people, because it gives them a framework within which to work while constructing written sentences. While they are learning those rules, the context or concepts are strictly secondary.
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Joined: Sep 2000
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Sep 2000
Posts: 2,788 |
Capfka has spoken/written well.
I once attempted to teach a class in rhetorical strategies as they relate to the argumentation of ethics (and moral theology). It was a great failure. The students all had college educations and many of them had post-graduate degrees. My attempts to persuade them to look at the "how" of argumentation, apart from the content, were quite unsuccessful. Most of them simply could not separate the content from the method. To my increasing frustration, I gave them all sorts of models and language for talking about the "how" but, even at the end of the course, most of them were unable to think about and talk about methods without slopping over into discussion of content.
I think this has something to do with what Capfka is saying here.
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Joined: Sep 2000
Posts: 4,757
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Sep 2000
Posts: 4,757 |
> What he said wa that in his class what was important was syntactical structure. He probably felt that he didn't need to add that being able to construct a sentence correctly is a futile skill if you have nothing worthwhile to say.
Nonsense. What he actually says is clear and emphatic:
Content is a lure and a delusion, and it should be banished from the classroom. Form is the way.
He doesn’t say “my classroom” but “the classroom” in general.
Your assertion of what he may or may not think has no grounding in what he actually wrote. You may be right – but if so, he has let his claims run away with his mouth, which is not a great advert for his passion for the “clean English sentences” which he implies will automatically render thought equally pure and clean. I think insel’s got it right – it’s the faculties of analysis which are falling short: basically, he’s tackling an effect, and not, as he fondly believes, a primary cause.
Of course, the study of any discipline in a structured and analytical framework will improve cognitive faculties. I agree with you that his approach has validity, as I said above – just not the exclusive validity he claims for it.
He notes that “once ideas or themes are allowed in, the focus is shifted from the forms that make the organization of content possible to this or that piece of content, usually some recycled set of pros and cons about abortion, assisted suicide, affirmative action, welfare reform, the death penalty, free speech and so forth. At that moment, the task of understanding and mastering linguistic forms will have been replaced by the dubious pleasure of reproducing the well-worn and terminally dull arguments one hears or sees on every radio and TV talk show.” One can understand his frustration at having to drag his mighty intellect down to the level of his mere students, but he misses a point clear to many other teachers: a variety of teaching styles is required in order to reach all pupils. One of the keys to this is to build on their existing foundations of knowledge in order to gain their motivation: many students will respond more effectively to a lesson of grammar, for example, if it is embedded in getting them to communicate more effectively on a subject they care about. His students are apparently not like this – I will take that on trust despite the evidence in most classrooms to the contrary, but I do not accept that his techniques will work universally. Many dull pedants have been turned out by these pedagogic methods in previous years; knowledge of clear structures does not a writer make.
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Posts: 2,379
Pooh-Bah
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Pooh-Bah
Joined: Mar 2001
Posts: 2,379 |
>>[My] assertion of what he may or may not think has no grounding in what he actually [posted].
. . . and yet, I can't help but think -- and damn it all, I may be wrong -- that tsuwm was actually targeting certain tendenciencies on this board and how they may sometimes veer away from its original and continuing purpose. Given Fish's perhaps hyperbolic description of the content of 'content' as well as the fact that his examples by allusion are the *rehash of, yes, important issues, I take it the lead post in this thread was a mild, and humorous, critique. Let him who knows speak or remain silent.
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