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If I Were the King of Grammar…
What a great topic for this month’s group writing. The first thing I thought to write on was, “If I were a rich man…” Unfortunately, my wife told me it had already been done.
I had to think of something else. I have general handyman skills, but I’ve never done fine carpentry work. I would love to have those sorts of skills. “If I were a carpenter…” And then my wife said that had also been done before.
Well, then I thought, I’ve always wanted to dance. But…
Well, it seems like there are a whole lot of people out there writing songs in the subjunctive mood. Now, of course, everyone on Ricochet knows about the subjunctive mood, as well as the English language’s other moods: indicative, interrogative, imperative, injunctive, optative, and potential.
I have a confession to make: I never learned about moods in an English grammar class. When I was going to school, it seems like we never finished getting through the textbooks. Maybe my peers were just more disruptive than most, and it meant we went through the information more slowly than planned. Or maybe the plan was bad and no class was getting through the whole thing. Of course, it wasn’t just grammar books that were never finished. I never had a history class that got to or past World War II. And I’m not that old. Before the first day I had darkened the door of a school building, we had had more than twenty years of history since WWII. Well, it wasn’t like I was going to read the rest of the school books in my spare time over the summer, either. I had too much to do over the summer. I was a kid. I had to whine about being bored. Do you know how much time that takes? You don’t have enough time to do that if you’re reading a grammar book.
No, the first time I heard of the subjunctive mood, it wasn’t spelled that way. It was «le subjonctif». I learned about moods in high school French class. It left me wondering what else I didn’t know about English grammar. How come nobody had ever told me about this stuff before? It really put me into a mood that was more grumpy than subjunctive. There I was, Wile E. Coyote, Super-Genius High-School Student, and I had never heard of grammar moods before. I do declare!
If I were Grammar King, I would ensure everyone knew all the beautiful grammar things we have in our languages. Languages are complex emergent creations. Nobody sat down one day and said, “Dudes, what we really need is a subjunctive mood in our grammar.” No, it emerged out of the practice of peoples’ trying to communicate long ago. And this is a tool in the toolbox of our language. We have subtle ways of indicating moods through word choices. I would have everyone know such facets of the beautiful gem that is our grammar.
How about you, my Ricochet friends? Was there anything in school that you seemed to miss learning when you should have? Perhaps something you stumbled across later?
Published in Group Writing
Yes, like ‘schadenfreude’ ‘sehnsucht,’ and ‘lagom’ (that last one should have an umlaut over the ‘o’).
So Kent, are you stating “I wish you had not told me”?? or “I wish you would not have told me” about Bartholomew’s pet peeve?
Hey, I didn’t name it. I didn’t even know what it was called (I had to look it up). But I know how to use it.
I expect not. Syntax changes slowly, but it does change. You have to figure that it changes because people have found a different way of expressing a function or can get along without it. “If I was” is equivalent to “were I” for saying “I’m not.” As is Vin Scully subjunctive: “that ball’s hit a little harder, this game’s over and I’m sitting in my lounger at home, shoes off, eating a sandwich made from Farmer John ham.” For some reason we all understand this construction.
The genitive case in German is an example of having more grammar than you have any use for. That way of indicating possessives was going out of the language when 18th grammarians decreed it should stay. Consequently it’s used only in writing.
I suppose Newspeak would be a different critter, but then, that’s the whole point of Newspeak. “The limits of my language mean the limits of my world,” as Wittgenstein said (Die Grenzen meiner Sprache bedeuten die Grenzen meiner Welt). I suppose also that Idiocracy could have it right. Every day that passes suggests that, but I’ll keep faith that we’re not really getting stupider.
CarolJoy, I didn’t know I was going to have to take a pop quiz. I would have studied harder.
You’re thinking of Kelso from That ’70s Show.
But it roars like a lion.
Pronation.com would make a good web site.
It would be leaving a left turn, I think.
Actually, I hate to say it but the ungrammatical use of periods bothers me a bit — every time.
Sure, syntax changes, and I know that a language is an organic, evolving thing. But this is a case where a useful distinction is being lost. “If I had done it” and “if I would have done it” mean two different things, and if that distinction blurs, you have lost precision. Language is a tool, arguably the single most important tool we humans have ever invented, and when a tool loses its edge it becomes less useful.
Some words are gooder when you’re trying to communicate and sh*t but it seems kinda fascist to tax sin because like who is to say what is a sin. So the whole sin tax thing seems totally bogus.
F’sure. Amirite?
And what’s up with these English folks? They say “I should like to go into town” instead of “I would like to go into town.” Whenever I read this, I get confused and my buzz is harshed. Which is correct?
@arahant
As an aspiring grammar king, how do you feel about the theme for the month being “If I was….”
That means you possibly actually were.
You will note that it is not the way I titled the article.
in Milwaukee. Then proceeded to go into the hotel and deliver his speech before he went to the hospital.
TR was a bad-ass
Growing up in Wisconsin we heard a lot about fighting bob Lafollete
We heard far too much of him next door, too.
I always wondered who were all those people who were fighting Bob LaFollete.
Americans.
The beginning of that speech:
Technically, I suppose. Not in the sense you mean. I almost got held back in the second grade.
I’d say 90% of what I can articulate are things I’ve learned in the last five years. The other things I know would require reference books. I’ve been telling myself for years that I should look at them.
I think it’s referenced here (warning for language):
Oh, how I hate rap.
Yeah, that was what Winston was referring to.
I hope those musicians got 3x scale. That was rancid.
Whicka-What?
It’s a rhetorical trick, Sam’l. Say nice things about the audience. 😉
Even looking things up on Wikipedia is better than nothing in most cases.