Ironic Prescriptivism
This essay by Barton Swain in the New Criterion nails it. The piece poses as a review of Oxford’s recent release of the Fowler’s First Edition, but actually brilliantly defends a mild – I would call it ironic – prescriptivism in a way that overcomes the stunting categories of the prescriptivist-descriptivist debate.
…modern linguists are almost by definition incapable of understanding the function of a book like Fowler’s Dictionary. They take the view that “prescriptivism” is an unfortunate byproduct of eighteenth-century anxieties about class, and that a work like Fowler’s perpetuates those anxieties. There is truth in that view of things, just as there is truth in all oversimplifications…
Languages mutate, definitions evolve, grammatical conventions are just conventions, and there’s nothing anybody can do to stop the change.
True enough. But it doesn’t follow that these things are obsolete or irrelevant. Restaurants, free trade, and bifocal eyeglasses were all inventions of the eighteenth century, too. And, as with the prescriptive temperament in language, it doesn’t much matter what you think about them: they are part of the civilization we live in, and they will continue to be so. When linguists like Crystal deride “prescriptivism,” they think they’re deriding the stubborn allegiance to outmoded doctrines, and speak as if, with proper instruction in “sound principles” and a little prodding, these allegiances may be put to rest.
In fact, “prescriptivism” isn’t an “ism” at all. It’s an inevitable outgrowth of a civilized commercial society. A society such as ours in which high levels of social and economic mobility coexist with high levels of literacy will be one in which people advance by means of language, among other things.
I call this an ironic prescriptivism because Swain concedes all the things the descriptivists have been saying on a theoretical level: that the conventions of ‘proper’ English aren’t more logically well grounded or inherently mellifluous than other ways of speaking, and that our ideas about properness are in fact historically and culturally contingent and tied up with class prejudices, etc. But he advocates prescriptivist instruction on the basis of its cultural function, rather its logical or theoretical foundation. It calls to mind Richard Rorty’s ironist, the moralist who can’t give an adequate foundationalist account of his morality but acts empathetically anyways (I draw the parallel without necessarily endorsing Rorty).
I vaguely remember the Ebonics debates of the 90s. All the things the leftists were saying – that the belief in the inherent superiority of standard English wasn’t grounded in a sound understanding of language, and reflected class, racial, and other in-group prejudices, and that Ebonics was complex and had its own unique expressive capabilities – were true. But people still have a desire to show respect for others and communicate effectively by living up to shared standards and expectations (and it is to everyone’s own benefit to be able to meet the expectations of the affluent and educated classes). Sometimes these expectations are arbitrary – like table manners – but humans naturally long to meet them anyways. When we abandon language instruction, we’re depriving others of the ability to fulfill that desire. We flatter our own vanity about our enlightened language theory while harming those who desire to make their way through the real world.
- Comment (23)
- · Quote
- · UnfollowFollow (1)
- Pages:
- 1
- 2
- Pages:
- 1
- 2
Comments :
May '10
Re: Ironic Prescriptivism
My experience with linguists (I married one) tells me that a few acknowledgements by the prescriptivists would ease the defensiveness of the descriptivists:
1) All dialects, including Black English Vernacular (as it used to be called), are equally logical (or illogical) and are entirely rule-governed.
2) The acquisition of a dialect is 100% dependent upon environment and is 0% dependent upon intelligence.
3) Those who have the lucky fortune of speaking Standard English (or thereabouts) as their native dialect are at a societal advantage, since it is very, very difficult to re-learn linguistic rules, be they phonetic or syntactic or whatever.
Once these basic points are conceded, then linguists are generally willing to "live in the real world" and acknowledge that speaking and writing Standard English are important skills if one is to improve his lot in society. (But they won't grant that this fact is "fair"--nor should they.)
Oct '10
Re: Ironic Prescriptivism
"...and that Ebonics was complex and had its own unique expressive capabilities – were true."
I don't doubt this, but I would question any implication that Ebonics is as effective for, say, communicating complex ideas . Do educated black philosophers or scientists conversant in both Ebonics and Proper English bemoan the fact that they're forced to use P.E. instead of Ebonics. Could the insistence on P.E. be based on its objective efficacy and not just historical and cultural forces? Just the imbalance in the size of the respective vocabularies would seem to be an overwhelming factor. I suppose you could argue that if Ebonics were commonly used in science, it would expand as necessary, but...
Not being a linguist, perhaps I'm missing some important point, but it seems you concede too much in the spirit of Political correctness.
May '10
Re: Ironic Prescriptivism
Scott, I don't necessarily think all languages and dialects "equally logical (or illogical) and are entirely rule-governed." Languages like Ebonics or Spanish where the double negative is the standard way to express the negative have a hard time expressing true double negatives. There's also a book called Twice As Less (which is Ebonics for "half as much") documenting how the basic arithmetical abilities of students depended on their grammatical construction of numbers.
Nov '10
Re: Ironic Prescriptivism
A clear-cut argument for prescriptivism, without appeal to cultural function, can be made under the following conditions: if a reasonably logical standard has already been laid down by one or more recognized authorities such as Fowler and Gowers, and usage subsquently departs from it for some illogical reason (e.g., "prevaricate" evolves to mean "procrastinate" merely because it sounds similar), then there should be presumption in favour of the prior standard. The drift away from it risks spawning confusion, and has no compensating linguistic advantages.
May '10
Re: Ironic Prescriptivism
Severely Ltd.:
Just the imbalance in the size of the respective vocabularies would seem to be an overwhelming factor.
You're confusing "language" with "dialect". Both Standard English and Black English Vernacular are dialects of the English language and as such can draw from the entire English lexicon. Whether a particular BEV speaker is educated enough to draw extensively from that lexicon is another matter, but there is nothing inherent in BEV which prevents it from producing "I be effervescent."
An educated black with a Buckley-esque vocabulary who spoke both SE and BEV fluently would find it just as easy to represent complex thoughts in either dialect. He would be a fool not to use SE, however, because that is likely the dialect of his audience and his peers.
May '10
Re: Ironic Prescriptivism
Hey, Mark.
Logically speaking, "twice as less" is every bit as valid as "half as much," just as "twice as small" is as logical as "half as big." The book you cite concurs. Instead it argues that "nonstandard English [BEV, for example] can lead to misunderstanding or misrepresenting in the classroom" due to the fact that academia uses mathematical terms and expressions which are in fact Standard English terms and expressions, with which nonstandard speakers might not be familiar. Evidently prior to this book academia assumed math to be a subject immune to these communication barriers, but there is nothing "less mathematical", per se, about nonstandard dialects.
Put it this way: If math professors everywhere spoke and wrote in BEV, it would be you and I with the disadvantage: "Oh I see Mr. Washington. When you say twice as less, you mean half as much. Now I get it!"
May '10
Re: Ironic Prescriptivism
First, it's Black English and Chicano, not Spanish, that have the standard double negative (Think Cheech and Chong: "Badges? We don't need no stinking badges!").
Second, you must understand that even though we call this a double negative, it technically isn't. Rather, in Cheech's sentence the "no" is a substitute for "any." So to create a true double negative, Cheech (or Tyrone) would simply say "We don't not need no badges."--which is the equivalent of Standard English's "We don't not need any badges." It's counterintuitive, I know, but it's all entirely rule governed and any thought can be produced, some way, some how.
Third, it's true that all languages and dialects have vagueries or inefficiencies in this or that instance. Nothing new there, and English is no exception. (Does "undoable" mean "not capable of being done" or "capable of being undone"? Hmmmmm.)
May '10
Re: Ironic Prescriptivism
The main complaint linguists have about prescriptivists is that they are intellectually lazy. They hardly ever take the two minutes it would require to investigate the record and discover whether their "rule" has any historical basis whatsoever. 99% of the time, if they checked, they would find that serious writers from Jane Austin to Melville never observed their chimerical rules.
May '10
Re: Ironic Prescriptivism
Thought of an interesting example for that third point in #7, Mark:
"Disrespect" as a verb (as in "He disrespected me") is inching its way toward acceptance in Standard English because of its common usage and its efficiency. It had previously only been a noun. The verb was introduced to English via Black English--originally it was simply "to dis," then later "to disrespect." And all the while Tyrone was thinking, "You mean Scott and Mark don't have a word for this? What idiots!"
May '10
Re: Ironic Prescriptivism
Well said, Scott.
The rationality of a particular word or dialect in a given situation always boils down to efficiency, though that efficiency can be literal or social.
It doesn't matter what a word originally meant or means in a different social environment. The purpose of language is communication. Someone who uses a flurry of words and expressions that his intended audience, whomever they are, are unlikely to understand is a fool.
On the other hand, though most people know multiple dialects and adapt their dialects to specific situations, complete adaptation would be considered disingenuine. Christopher Hitchens would sound like an idiot and a fraud if he tried to speak Ebonics to residents of Compton or Harlem. Wise adaptation in this scenario would mostly entail refraining from vocabulary and subjects not common in those areas.
While Scott's correct that inner city dialects could adopt and adapt the larger vocabulary of Standard English, BEV has a smaller vocabulary in practice. A resident of Harlem would seem arrogant to his fellows if he used many words they didn't understand. Gangsta rappers sometimes use big words as a way of asserting stature.
May '10
Re: Ironic Prescriptivism
More than vocabulary and grammar, it's body language and other social cues that make it difficult to bridge dialects.
Poor people tend to speak loudly and directly, gesture more, and are more open with their emotions. Rich people are more reserved and guarded in every respect. The result is that poor people come across to rich people as rude and aggressive while rich people strike poor people as arrogant and secretive.
You don't really understand a dialect until you understand the relevant social habits and expectations.
Matthew Shaffer:
But people still have a desire to show respect for others and communicate effectively by living up to shared standards and expectations.... When we abandon language instruction, we’re depriving others of the ability to fulfill that desire. We flatter our own vanity about our enlightened language theory while harming those who desire to make their way through the real world. ·
Agreed.
The key to teaching Standard English to speakers of other dialects is making it clear that they are augmenting, rather than replacing, their native dialects.
May '10
Re: Ironic Prescriptivism
Aaron Miller:
While Scott's correct that inner city dialects could adopt and adapt the larger vocabulary of Standard English, BEV has a smaller vocabulary in practice. A resident of Harlem would seem arrogant to his fellows if he used many words they didn't understand.
...just as I would sound pretentious if I used big words around the people I work with, most of whom speak Standard English but do not have huge vocabularies. Having knowledge of a vast array of hundred-dollar words is simply the product of exposure and education, not the system of rules which govern one's dialect.
May '10
Re: Ironic Prescriptivism
Aaron Miller:
The key to teaching Standard English to speakers of other dialects is making it clear that they are augmenting, rather than replacing, their native dialects. · Feb 20 at 8:15am
Hmmm, not sure about that, because for a BEV speaker to rise in society he must actually replace, rather than augment, his dialect. He can't mix 'n' match.
The best a teacher can do, I guess, is a frank acknowledgement of the task ahead and an empathetic "Hey, man, I feel for you. It isn't fair that my dialect is considered standard and yours isn't. But it's reality nonetheless. Now let's get to work."
Nov '10
Re: Ironic Prescriptivism
What Swain is ignoring is that even if one concedes the necessity of a standard dialect (which I, as an amateur linguist, do) historically speaking many of the elements of "proper" grammar very much were imposed on English artificially by an elite class under the mistaken belief that Latin was inherently superior. The result is that a lot of common "errors" (sentence ending prepositions, for example) are actually naturally occurring features of Germanic languages (a family which includes English) which were declared inferior due to a belief that if you can't do it in Latin you shouldn't do it in English.
He also ignores that even the standard dialect is constantly evolving, and prescriptivists have frozen the rules to reflect a standard which is at least a hundred years old.
Prescriptivists forget that language is a democratic institution. When the majority of native speakers do it "wrong" in the same way, then it's time for the rules to change. That doesn't mean there should be no standard, simply that the standard should be determined by how people speak instead of the reverse.
May '10
Re: Ironic Prescriptivism
Scott Reusser
First, it's Black English and Chicano, not Spanish, that have the standard double negative (Think Cheech and Chong: "Badges? We don't need no stinking badges!").
...
Third, it's true that all languages and dialects have vagueries or inefficiencies in this or that instance. Nothing new there, and English is no exception. (Does "undoable" mean "not capable of being done" or "capable of being undone"? Hmmmmm.) · Feb 20 at 12:34am
Spanish does have a standard double negative--No tengo nada is the standard way to say either "I do not have anything" or "I have nothing", but it is literally "I do not have nothing". I merely said it makes it difficult to express a true double negative, not impossible.
And I completely agree that languages each have their own disadvantages and inadequacies, which I believe reinforces my original point. In English, for example, it is hard to distinguish in the past tense between actions which were necessary under the circumstances, and actions which were not necessary but must have taken place in order to be consistent with present facts. Consider the sentence, "He had to have lied."
May '10
Re: Ironic Prescriptivism
(cont)
And I also don't mean to imply there is no value in Ebonics as a dialect nor that its speakers haven't made a significant contribution to Standard English, like the example you gave. I just think you were being a bit to politically correct to state flatly that all languages and dialects are equally logical and rule-governed. Especially when logical and rule-governed might conflict with each other.
May '10
Re: Ironic Prescriptivism
Your Spanish example is cool. Thanks.
"Rule-governed" simply means that there are learnable rules, not randomness, which govern dialects, which is most definitely the case--otherwise impersonations would be impossible. Any logic (or lack of) is irrelevant, as with Standard English's conjugation of "to be" (I am, you are, he is, they are). The point is only that these are rules, not "random mistakes", such that in Tyrone's mind "I be" is a rule, too, not a mistake. (But it violates a Standard English rule, so he's got a problem.)
And trust me political correctness did not influence my comments. In fact, revulsion at PC is the reason I can't bear to say "Ebonics", which is a silly word created simply because the PC crowd was offended by the term "Black English." Screw them.
One can be anti-PC and still wish to clear up misconceptions about dialects. The misconceptions are pervasive, even if subconscious, and are the reason Haley Barbour, for example, can never be president.
May '10
Re: Ironic Prescriptivism
Scott Reusser
Aaron Miller:
The key to teaching Standard English to speakers of other dialects is making it clear that they are augmenting, rather than replacing, their native dialects.
Hmmm, not sure about that, because for a BEV speaker to rise in society he must actually replace, rather than augment, his dialect. He can't mix 'n' match.
I worded that poorly. What I meant is that poor people can learn to speak Standard English in public situations while continuing to use their native dialects at home and with friends. It's good to teach kids that life ain't fair, but they should understand that Standard English isn't necessary or even optimal in all scenarios.
It's like wearing a tie at work and a T-shirt at home. Kids are likely to be less resistant to learning a new dialect if they understand that you're not trying to erase the one they've always known.
Agreed.
May '10
Re: Ironic Prescriptivism
Fair enough. Thanks for the gentle rebuke. Maybe I'm splitting hairs, but I'd much more eagerly agree with the statement "every language is ruled-governed and has its own logic and illogic" than "all languages are rule governed and equally logical or illogical."
May '10
Re: Ironic Prescriptivism
Then we're in agreement because that's what I meant. Thanks and adios.
Aaron Miller
What I meant is that poor people can learn to speak Standard English in public situations while continuing to use their native dialects at home and with friends.
I'm ambivalent on that one. Thomas Sowell, I bet, would recommend undoing one's Black English and never looking back, and pragmatically he might very well be right. I would tend to agree with him, I guess, even while acknowledging the unfairness.