The English language isn’t suffering at all, although grammar mavens are suffering. But they’re always suffering and they seem to like it that way.
I thought the show was pretty weak. If the point of the thing is to showcase different dialects, why not let speakers of the dialects talk instead of the narrator all the time? The guy needed to shut up.
This whole issue, of regionalist use and level of discourse, bothers me immensely.
Language is a tool for communication – whatever communicates effectively, and expresses conceptual ideas in a manner that can be understood by the hearers, readers, is effective use of language.
The problem lies in the dichotomy between prescriptive and descriptive grammar. “Me go depress submit button now” is poor English on anyone’s standards – it doesn’t match how any English speaker would express that concept. But “I’m gonna hit submit now” is quite acceptable colloquial usage.
The problem is that we are brought up speaking colloquial English, and, in general, not familiar with formal English until we enter school. Thus, we have to be taught what usages are acceptable in formal English and how they differ from what’s acceptable in colloquial. “It is I” at the door of a boys’ treefort is equally incorrrect as “It’s me” in ultra-formal usage.
Both descriptivist and prescriptivist paradigms are partly accurate and partly flawed – it depends on precisely what is being taught and studied. To describe how English is used in, for example, instant messaging or at a bar in Pascagoula, MS, is entirely appropriate, and the results will not be what conforms to Mr. Precise Speech’s Guide to Excruciatingly Correct English.
But the fact is that there is a common consensus that “Then he goes, like, can you ship me 20 widgets by tomorrow?” is not proper business English, and however much “irregardless” works to convey meaning in colloquial speech, it’s improper formal English.
I try to be precisionist in my word usage in posts here, because it is so very easy for an important shade of meaning to be lost through a near-but-not-precise synonym. But I don’t try to write formal English; the SDMB is a medium corresponding most closely to speech between intelligent people. And so I express myself online in the manner that I would in oral discourse, if my tongue worked as well as my fingers. :o [And I can see that quoted out of context, so don’t, huh! :D]
Helping what case?
Do you feel the same way about the apostrophe? That words like don’t and couldn’t should never appear in good English? When someone asks you the time, do you respond with a phrase including “of the clock” and “post meridian”?
Mr., Mrs., fax, tux, Re:, vs. were not the downfall of English. What makes l8r and ppl different?
The apostrophe and abbreviation are part of the English language. I also abbreviate things like gov’t in writing notes, but never in a report.
Some slang and abbreviations catch on more than others - generally as a rule in language, if it helps simplify or clarify communication, it gets introduced. Mr. and Mrs. are obvious abbreviations of title. Fax is a simplification of technical terms, and tux is abbreviation slang that caught on, as there is no confusion between “tux” and other, similar words. If you care to argue the case that “l8r” is a simplification or improvement on “later” (despite the fact that it uses a non-alphabetic character), the floor is yours, and you can follow up with how “ppl” enhances clarity in communication.
It involves two fewer keystrokes. Duh. “ppl” has three fewer than “people.” Anybody who has ever used a cellphone to punch out a text message will tell you this saves time and effort.
… yes, which goes back to where I said, “text messaging isn’t helping the case, either”
And for the record, typing “l8r” is about equally difficult as typing “later” - perhaps harder for some people who use home keys and certainly for trained typists.
Neither clarifies or enhances the language.
If enhancing clarity is your criterion, then walrus is right, you should object to writing 3:00 PM in a formal or official document. Three of the clock post meridian would be preferable, as the former is simply a time/space-saving neoformation.
Which is why I write “at 1500 hours”, which I guess doesn’t make much sense taken literally, but that’s what it means.
[quote]
Eve: It’s interesting to me how many people frequently upper-case “Black” but lower-case “white.”
The number probably corresponds to those who use Webster’s and who wish to refer to those who have light skin tones as opposed to referring to a member of a conservative or reactionary political group.
I would assume that the New York Times currently prefers to use African-American. Whatever people choose to use, as long as it is not deliberately hurtful or misleading, is fine with me.
[QUOTE=Zoe]
What does this have to do with the odd and inconsistent practice of capitalizing “Black” as an ethnic designation while not capitalizing “white” when used in the same sense? (The reference to “a conservative or reactionary political group” is totally lost on me.)
There’s never been a committee on official English with any force of law, so we have to take the language as it is, not as someone would like it to be. The fundamental issue is whether Person A can understand Person B. I don’t see much of a problem among the various dialects of American English, but there is an obvious problem when people cannot or will not speak English in any form at all in the United States. To those people I must say simply: We cannot understand what you are saying. Whether you’re trying to make some kind of political or cultural point by not speaking English, regardless of how valid that point may be, and whether you care or not, we cannot understand what you are saying.
Let’s face it. Spoken languages (no matter what language we are talking about) are merely sounds that are symbols of ideas. I say dog and you get a general idea of what I am talking about. I can say German sheppard but even that is a general idea.
The more elaborate the language the more specific the symbols become so that the speaker and the listener come closer to the same images and thoughts. English today has become more utilitarian than it used to be. 19th Century speakers were more metephorical and elaborate, while today we try to be susinct because we can usually back ideas with concrete visuals or sounds.
We seem to speak more like manuals and text books these days, even throwing around acronyms to shorten sentences. The business model of the economy of words seems to have crept into everyday language.
I’m not 100% sure if slang is more or less colourful but even it seems to be based on brevity rather than metephor.
Somewhat related, I notice that “human” in sci-fi and fantasy books is almost always lowercase when talking about the species but Wookie, Klingon, and other alien names are always capitalized.
I wonder if there’s some sort of correlation?