My most recent blog entry has become a most interesting discussion on punctuation, grammar, usage and abusage. Heather Etchevers mentioned Lynne Truss’ book Eats Shoots and Leaves: The Zero Tolerance Approach to Punctuation (note lack of hyphen between Zero and Tolerance.)
This book taught me a great deal I didn’t know (but should have done) about basic English grammar. The blame for that deficiency – which is almost a disability (and I use words for a living) – I lay entirely at the doors of those trendy leftist so-called educationalists of the 1960s who were so fixated with relativism and class war that they scrapped the teaching of grammar as elitist and so effectively sacrificed the education of an entire nation for two generations or more: the same crapulous specimens, proud bearers of third-class degrees in social policy from Shitsville Polycrapnic, who marked me down in my 11-plus for saying that dinner was a meal consumed at dinner-time, rather than lunchtime, a solecism that marked me out as middle-class (and therefore wicked).
Now that’s fighting talk – and its essential rightness is demonstrated by the fact that Eats Shoots and Leaves was a bestseller. People discovered that they lacked something, and were, had they known it, prepared to rebel against the putrid attempt at social engineering perpetrated by the Left, a dumbing-down whose purpose was to render the population inarticulate and therefore powerless. The fact that people are more interested in game shows and reality TV, and are so uninterested in science, politics and the process of democracy and how their lives are ruled (and if anyone says disinterested I shall make a tape of them being impaled on red-hot skewers, and give the kittens a break) is a direct result of that dumbing-down: as is the gradual slide in status of teachers, until they are seen more as targets for schoolyard missiles than the figures of authority and respect that they once were.
Boris Johnson elsewhere said that the Left, having realized that socialism as a system of government is a failure, has lately taken revenge with Political Correctness, another way to control how we think by the words we use (the scientific basis of such an assumption is debatable, but that’s another subject).
And now, a story. When I was at school my ambitions were to do science, and also to write. When the time came for my A-levels, though, a timetable clash meant that I couldn’t study both English and Chemistry. I opted for Chemistry, reasoning that English was just books, so I could save it for Later Life, when I didn’t need a laboratory.
Later Life duly arrived and at the age of 33 I signed up for Adult Education to do my A-level in Eng. Lit. It was a two-year course, and initially the class was about twenty strong, being made mostly of those people whom education had failed. These people – the people that Adult Ed was meant to serve – dropped out, because they had never been taught the discipline of study. I was just one of three people who stayed the course, learning about Keats and Jane Austen, Shakespeare and Virginia Woolf, Hardy and Dickens and many other wonderful things. The lessons I learned in this A-level course I could apply directly to my job, and the joy of literature—and the ability to articulate and rationalize a literary criticism – has not left me since. I still didn’t learn any grammar, though.
(Thinks) I wonder how many people I’ve offended this time?
My favourite part of Eats, Shoots and Leaves is the page in which the subeditors solemnly add commas and then the proofreaders take them out (or vice versa): the pages never get passed. An illustration of the subjective element even of a grammatical basic such as the comma.
PS Are those Aussies asleep, finally, do you think? It is awfully quiet round here tonight. Maybe they are out hunting
orcsorry, Shark—Jenny and Malcolm are watching one of their 20-minute slots of TTT as I type (LOTR movie 2).We never sleep. We are always watching.
Back in the Good Old days, when our department was in the city centre (on the site where the Finnish declaration of independence was signed), I used to have
lunchdinner with linguists. Onelunchdinner time the conversation turned to commas, and who was a “heavy punctuater”. I now use that whenever I’m caught making a grammatical mistake – “oh yes, you’re just a light punctuater”.I didn’t learn much grammar at school, either. No reason to make a class issue out of it (mostly because I went to a progressive but excellent public school – not “public” as in English public schools) [1] who presumably don’t serve “dinner” at mid-day or “tea” in the evenings to people who name these meals thus).
I took woodworking = “shop” and typesetting classes with people who were making these fields their future professions, as well as all other academic subjects, right up to age 17. All paid for by my city. My little half-brother and half-sister had full (and effective) French-immersion classes through primary school in their public system in a nearby town. You get the best and worst in the American public schools, but you rarely get much grammar in English class. I think more could be provided, but early on. My kids learned grammar in the French system between ages 6 and 10 and there is touch-up in the couple of years following.
(This does not mean the American education provided depth along with width in public school. But I got some depth in college and the rest in graduate school, and find those appropriate times.)
I learned to punctuate by being an inveterate reader and learning by example. [pride] It’s also where I absorbed a fair bit of vocabulary: I can get up to 50 on FreeRice. [/pride] Have fun!
[1] that’s not me; if the link’s parenthesis is erased, the link itself’s abrogated. ;-) to Maxime.
Ack. I meant Maxine. Too bad we can’t go back and erase/edit old comments we authored.
My kids learned grammar in the French system between ages 6 and 10.
Exactly. The only grammar I have ever learned (and I do mean only) was while studying foreign languages – French, German and especially Latin. Latin is now all but extinct in the UK state sector – a casualty of perceived elitism – and modern languages are, I believe, no longer compulsory. The languages in the ascendant are those spoken by immigrant communities. The effects of all this will be to make educational achivement still harder while corralling immigrant communities in their own ghettoes. It’s no wonder that social mobility in the current Labour administration is the lowest of any government in living memory – and yet the leaders of this so-called socialist party all went to posh schools. Govern the proles, it seems, but for goodness’ sake, let’s not have them getting a piece of the action. Language is important, folks.
Thanks, Heather! I’m getting quite into this striking out, now, though I am a bit scared of the colours and fonts used by the eternally awake. The scope for wasting time is paternostable.
I agree, Heather, that the type of school seems irrelevant to one’s grammatical ancestry—it may be more of an age thing? But calling woodwork “shop” is definitely American. In England, “woodwork” was called “woodwork” when I was young and girls weren’t allowed to do it. Now they are, and it is called “resistant materials”. Similarly, when I was young, girls had to do “cookery” (occasinally called “domestic science”) and boys were not allowed to. Now they all have to do it and it is called “food tec” (short for “food technology”).
Sadly, owing to political correctness of the variety alluded to by Henry in his post, “food tec” does not consist of doing much actual cooking and bringing home of said victuals on the bus for hungry parents to consume for tea. Owing to elf and
legolassafety rules of the variety HG identifies, the students have to spend most of their time instead creating leaflets about “elfy eating” (including government targets for fruit & veg, as well as instructions to eat more starch—Mr Atkins must have refused sponsorship of the programme) and “elfy kitchens” (identifying all kinds of ghastly illnesses and accidents that might occur if you cut a piece of bread, leave the iron on or spill dogfood on the floor).I’ll tell you my age if you and Henry both reveal yours – and then we’ll see if grammar training is truly generationally framed.
Resistant materials?! Now I see why the Brits complain about PC language. “Cookery”, when I was in school, involved making what we call “pudding” and perhaps you might call “blanc-mange” but also sewing, and had been known under the catch-all term of “home economics” since the 1950s, at least. As PC-ish as “home ec” sounds.
I must admit complete bafflement as to what elfs have to do with kitchens. Brownies, yes… besides, the curriculum does sound just like what my eight-year old does in her Brownies troupe.
And don’t even get me started on Atkins’ proscriptions. Grrr. I am a prime example of this woman’s approach and she’s quite right that the French (I hang around with) talk all the time about what they like to eat, without quite the same epidemic of obesity that is found in the US and England.
@Heather: I’m 46 this month. But I am too much of a gentleman to ask a lady’s age, so I shall assume that you (and Maxine) are 21 (each), whatever you might claim to the contrary.
But I’m a feminist, so I don’t mind saying I’m 37. (I yam what I yam.) You can stay a gentleman, since you didn’t ask.
This allows Maxine to decide whether or not we all count as part of the same generation, without going into specifics. Nonetheless, she’ll have a hard time selling me that ancient argument about the decline in mores of today’s youth.
Just figured out how to put it in my profile, too. Clearly, I’m no gentleman – hope I didn’t annoy either of you with that gauntlet.
I agree with everything you say, Henry, except this: ”...attempt at social engineering perpetrated by the Left, a dumbing-down whose purpose was to render the population inarticulate and therefore powerless.”
I thought the purpose of the Left was ‘Power to the People’. The People’s powerlessness is an unintended consequence of Left policies; the result of throwing the baby out with the bathwater – a clichéd saying that nevertheless seems to apply precisely to so many well-intentioned social changes. (What’s that cliché in latin? It would then be acceptable in educated company.}
Heather: “elfy” is how Cockneys pronounce “healthy”.
Right on, Graham! Problem being that it’s so easy for the Right (or whoever is opposing the Left) to beat them over the heads with that bathtub as a consequence. “The people don’t deserve baths! They like being grimy! they’re too stupid to know they’re clean anyhow! give them more seasons of Lost, then they won’t even move from the sofa!”
Here’s some NN’ing: Graham, I’m a long-time amateur clarinetist. Where can I find a copy of Useful Clarinet Solos to give it a whirl?
@Heather – don’t mind at all. I’m grovellingly grateful for any comments I can get. Like all Vogons, deep down, I really want to be loved.
The purpose of the Left should have been power to the people, but the mistake of the Left is that of some scientists whom I shall not name who assume that there is a historical direction to the world, an inexorable progress, by which human nature can be improved by equality of opportunity. Whereas equality of opportunity is something for which we should all strive (and which the present government in the UK has thrown into reverse), I think that the very idea of linear progress, whether in history or science or economics or any other sphere, is simply bunk. See my essay examining the concept as it applies to evolution – a misreading that has bedevilled social interpretations of darwinism to this day.
On the subject of clarinets – my daughter needs a new alto sax teacher. It might come down to my buying a tenor sax and us learning together. What with the price of lessons, I think I could break even in less than six months..
Quite. But which people?
I can feel one of those Golden-Retriever Moments coming on again …
When the money is big enough, differences between Left and Right tend to disappear. Thus you could have Tony Blair and George Bush becoming BFFs and going off for an extended lark in Mesopotamia.
The only distinctions that matter are those voiced so eloquently by Judge Smails in Caddyshack – “The world needs ditch diggers, too.”
Awww, isn’t she cute?
@Bob – thanks. That has the same effect as loosening the bolts in my neck.
@Jeff – you’re completely right. When the Iraq war started I had the distinct feeling that we’d entered some weird alternate Universe almost without knowing it.
“Thank you, Your Holiness. Awesome speech.” – GWB
Totally.
Anyone believing that evolution has a direction must, by definition, it seems to me, believe in a supernatural director. In which case you don’t need evolution as an explanation for the natural world. The same goes for belief in laws of historical development. But maybe, Henry, those points are in your essay – which I’ll read.
Heather: For Useful Clarinet Solos call Spartan Press, my distributor, 01528 544770. Jack Brymer recorded the pieces on the optional cassette.
Henry: You could try New Alto Sax and New Tenor Sax solos. The pieces are the same in both books, and the parts have been arranged so that both saxes play in unison or octaves, i.e. you and daughter could play the pieces together. There are backing CDs with the series.
@Graham: I can see what you’re driving at. A potted synopsis of my essay is this. Darwin’s natural selection has no inherent direction or purpose. But the way in which people interpret evolution these days (and by that I mean people who aren’t evolutionary biologists) is coloured by Haeckel, Darwin’s number one fan in Germany, who fused natural selection with old-fashioned Naturphilosophie to create a monster. Naturphilosophie was full of all sorts of cosmic strivings, so I guess one could read that as invocation of a supernatural directive force.
... and thanks for those hot
sexsax tips!