I was on a plane once when the pilot announced, “We’ll be landing momentarily.” The seemingly stuffy gentleman next to me shook his head and said under his breath, “Then we won’t have time to get off the plane, now, will we?”
I don’t have a single point; I have a complicated position: namely, that “correct” usage in a particular sphere of use is indeed determined by the users, but not by each user equally. Certain persons are recognized as having more knowledge of the language and are looked up to as arbiters both of correctness and taste. Do we really disagree?
Fine, but unanimity is not required for them to be so recognized. Or is it? What’s your actual position, anyway?
You’ll get no disagreement from me if you say that there is no one “proper” English that all must use or be deemed ignoramus. There are many different spheres of use.
Crimson herring! Equivocation of arbiters of correctness and taste in English with those holding political and financial power!
Cuz you say so? They do hold exert control insofar as people allow them to do so–and many do!
Hah! Bush is daily castigated on his use of English, which goes to prove that politcal power is NOT the same thing as power over the language.
My point is that they don’t have any real authority, and that you’ve not shown any sense in which they do.
Many people allow them to hold linguistic power–and many don’t! Newsflash!
As for power over the language, that’s a far cry from social control. I don’t think you’re very clear on what your point is.
If your point is the very limited point that in certain genres of speech, certain forms are preferred, and in certain of those genres, English teachers and prescriptivist grammarians are respected as experts, I’ll agree with you, and we can shake hands and end the debate.
If your point is anything broader than this, I’d like you to restate it, because I think we’re getting bogged down in irrelevancies and diversions.
Daniel
I guess we just shook hands. 
[QUOTE=Futile Gesture]
It is still a false dichotomy. The lack of one true keeper does not create a bloc of voters.
Some dictionaries are written to be prescriptive. That was the intent of the authors. I suppose you could read a cookbook as a detective novel if you want to but it would be no less a cookbook.
If you are saying that standard English in the UK is different from standard English in the U.S. then I agree with you.
Does one need to be a student to have this right? What happened to “everybody gets a vote”?
Let’s say you and I are conversing in one of these dialects, perhaps street slang, where the understood meaning of the word “rack” is “automobile” (I’m just making this up.) Then I use “rack” to mean “police.” Am I correct? Am I still speaking street slang? Have I just invented a new language? If words can mean what anyone says they mean how can you have any standards at all?
This illustrates why “correct” is a bad word for this context: as you show, it’s difficult to use “correct” to communicate a coherent concept when referring to language use.
Is the “rack=cops” correct? Wrong question. Does it communicate effectively? Probably not. Nor, in the same context, would “gendarme” communicate the concept effectively, despite the fact that you’d probably consider it to be “correct.”
Daniel
This, I think, is the essence of this debate. The prescriptivist grammarians would hold that “correct” is a valid concept when applied to language. Whether they would look to the past or to current common usage to define it is irrelevant. That’s worth keeping in mind, because a large part of what I’m seeing debated here is a question of “which source is correct”. The people debating that are missing the point entirely.
Daniel, if you will permit me to clarify your point as I understand it: the concept of “correctness”, as we understand it, does not have any substantial or useful meaning where language as a whole is being discussed. Among certain groups of speakers, “rack” may be understood to mean automobile, and among others, it may mean “police”. Both of these groups can be said to be speaking English, and both are engaging in flawless communication, thus, which can be said to be “correct”? Neither, and the question is meaningless. There is no correctness in language, merely effective communication.
Furthermore, upon using a word in such a way that your meaning is unclear to your audience, you are not incorrect, you are inefficient. You will have to spend additional time clarifying your meaning via words that are mutually understood, at which point an understanding of your intent will be reached. From that point on, you can use the original word, and the audience will understand you perfectly. Have you taught them the “correct” usage of the word? No, you’ve taught them what you mean when you say it, and that’s as good as you’re going to get. Universal standards simply do not exist, and why should they? Certainly, it grates on the educated ear to hear a price quoted as “fifty-six cent”, but is any meaning lost in the process? The French have gotten by for hundreds of years without different pronunciations for the singular and plural. Intent is easily clarified through context, and if it isn’t, you’d need to find another way to phrase it anyway if you want to get the message across.
Usage of individual words follows the same guideline: know your audience, know what they understand certain words to mean, and use those words in that manner. If you do that, you will have achieved effective communication. If that is not the goal of language, and if it is instead some sort of “correctness”, then language is a stupid tool indeed. After all, so many of us have been using it all of these years for a secondary, unintended purpose.
Left Hand of Dorkness has said all of this, but it was more of an implicit undertone to his words, rather than a blatantly stated theme. I felt that it might expedite things a bit if I were to come out and say it. Hopefully, it’ll help to elucidate the driving point of the discussion. 
–Ian
[QUOTE=Left Hand of Dorkness]
[
My guess is that I they would learn how to communicate with folks today by doing it. I would teach them what I believe to be standard English. They would learn a variant of that at school, hanging out, on a sports team, etc. If they spoke that variant at home I would not correct them but I would point out that such speech is appropriate only within the context of the street, or the playground, or the gym, or whatever.
This is where you and I disagree, I think. In a previous discussion I suggested that what I call standard English is the default position for speakers of English, and you replied “only in formal business speech.” (Correct me if I am wrong.) How about diplomacy, textbooks, legislature, literary criticism, the curriculum for English as a second language? Non-native speakers are not taught rap, or hillbilly, or valley girl; they are taught standard English. To use a musical analogy, consider in classical music (or jazz for that matter) the concept of “variations on a theme.” The notes, rythmn, timing all may be diffrent ftom the original, but there is respect paid and reference made to the original. The original is the source, or the standard. The variations are not wrong, or invalid, or less proper, but they are dependent on the source for meaning. Not to say that they cannot stand alone as independent works, but their meaning is more clearly communicated to someone familiar with the original piece.
I believe that if I were to able to speak to someone who spoke standard English 300 years ago, we would be able to understand each other. Perhaps not perfectly, but communication would be possible. I believe that Mark Twain and I could carry on a conversation fairly effortlessly. I doubt that would be true for someone who grew up speaking today’s street slang, and who had never been exposed to standard English.
Look at those kids studying for the spelling bee. They learn to break down words by figuring out the etymology and then reconstructing it to discern the meaning. Without a strong foundation in standard English this would be impossible.
I think it comes down to this. Someone (like the OP) swoops in and and declares “such a and such a word does not mean what you think it does!” to which people rightly reply " how do you know?" In this case, and perhaps in most cases, it is silly to make such an assertion. Of course if the speaker and audience agree on the meaning of a word then that word is correct, and no other meanings for that word can claim superiority. The problem, in my mind, comes from this idea that standard English is just one of many ways of talking, with no more provenance or currency than any other way of talking. The danger here is that people will not learn how to speak it at all, or worse, come to have disdain for it. In our culture today black children are scorned if they sound “too white.” Such an attitude is culturally and intellectualy constricting, as well as divisive.
To sum it up, I think I agree with you on these points:
Words change and languages evolve.
Context is crucial to understanding.
What works in one context might not work in another, but no context can claim superiority over another.
We disagree here:
What I call standard English is the source for all the variants of English. Yes it too changes over time, but these changes should not be allowed to happen willy-nilly. In other words, there is an appeal to tradition and authority, although it is open to debate exactly what that authority might be.
It is a bad thing when words like " infer" and “imply”, or “reticent” and “reluctant” are used interchangeably, for nuance and meaning are lost with nothing having been gained.
In closing, yes I would teach my child that “awesome” is used to express pleasue, but I would also tell him (I’m going to have to be cloned to have a kid at this point) that “awesome” used to be a much more powerful word, and that nothing has stepped in to fill the breach.
Roland, I think that’s an excellent statement of what I’ve been trying to say; thank you!
There’s only two obvious points I’ll add:
- If you use a word in a way that many other people use the word, your communication is going to be more efficient, more effective, than if you use a word in a novel way.
- If you’re working within a certain “genre” (in quotes because it’s not exactly what the word means), it behooves you to follow that genre’s rules. Among recent immigrants to the US who speak rudimentary English, this means one thing; among military brass, this means another thing; among literature professors, this means yet a third style of speech and writing.
I state these two points because I believe that people often misunderstand them and derive a false system of linguistic value based on these rules. Certainly it’s in the interests of some members of academia to promote this false value system, inasmuch as it gives them marginal power that they wouldn’t otherwise have; nevertheless, the system is false.
Daniel
**Daniel and Ian ** I was using “correct” because thatwas the word Futile Getsure used. But I am suspicious of the concept that there is “no correctness in language.”
Do you not correct a child when he is learning to speak. Do you not correct a student who is learning the language? And Ian, your reference to the French was interesting, inasmuch as it is my understanding that they are extremely protective against changes and corruptions to the language, to the extent of attempting to control it through legislature.
trandallt
I’ll agree with your statement insofar as it largely jives with what I’ve said above. As you predicted Daniel would do, though, I’m going to get all nitpicky and disagree on the “standard English” issue.
You see, “standard English” does not exist. Even among prescriptivist grammarians and English teachers, there is debate as to which usage of a given word can be said to be more “correct”. The whole thing becomes bogged down in a battle of etymology versus common usage (as I mentioned above), and that road leads nowhere useful whatsoever, nor are the results of any debate along those lines particularly compelling. What one is left with at the end of the bickering is an opinion; an opinion based on sound logic, to be sure, but even the soundest logic requires initial assumptions to operate. Because it is in those assumptions that the disagreement originates (in this case, the source of “correctness”), no logical argument can be said to be universally sound.
Even if “Standard English” were a useful concept, which I would argue that it is not, there would be no method of enforcement whatsoever. Far be it from me to hold a Practicality-over-Ideology stance, but the fact remains that the impossible is just that. Yes, foreign students are taught a rather common variant of English, but the reason for this is that that particular variant is the most commonly understood among Americans. This has nothing to do with whether or not it’s “correct”. If a foreign student, upon learning this variety of English and entering the United States, happened to find himself in a small town in the deep south (say, Alma, Arkansas, where my grandmother lives), he would doubtless have some slight trouble being understood, and would have one hell of a time comprehending others. In this case, having learned so-called “Standard English” would serve the student no purpose at all.
You are correct that there is a general subsect of English that is most commonly understood, but the key word there is “general”. If you’re going to apply and enforce a concept of “correctness” upon the language, then we’re going to have to agree upon a single source or an ultimate arbiter for every situation. Even if that were possible – and it’s not – I ask again, why bother?
Finally, I reiterate: the purpose of language is effective communication. Nothing more, and nothing less. There is no “correct” English because correctness does not apply. That is why “Standard English” is impossible.
Vaguely? I’ve never heard it used in any other context. I certainly don’t know how it came to be used this way, but it seems to be ubiquitous. Ruined? Depends on your perspective I guess.
I’ve experienced no misunderstanding regarding this usage of “livid”. The obvious conclusion is that everyone I know uses it the same (apparently incorrect) way.
I respectfully disagree. It has nothing to do with caring or not caring about language. I pride myself on knowing the correct usage of words. The fact remains – I have never heard “livid” used except to mean “extreme, red-faced-style anger”. As a consequence, that’s how I’ve used the word.
This thread is the first time I ever heard that this usage is inaccurate. And my friends and family are all college educated. (Not that a college degree is any guarantee of proper English, but it probably is a good predictor.)
My point is that language is learned primarily by hearing people talk. I’m a perfect example – what would lead me to question the usage of “livid”? Nothing. (Except a Straight Dope thread, of course.)
Now of course, I write all this and just now look up “livid” in my Funk and Wagnalls. Its first definition is “having the skin abnormally discolored, as a) flushed, purplish from intense emotion.”
So, now I’m confused. How is the common usage of “livid” incorrect?
Oh, and my reference to the French, since you felt compelled to point it out, was not in reference to changes in language or the resistance thereof. It was intended as an example of a way in which context can be relied upon, even in “standard” language, to achieve effective communication.
Because you mention it, it’s also worth noting that the governmental department that manages the French language is fighting a losing battle. Not only are certain English words gaining in popularity, depite the Societé’s insistance that they are “incorrect” (computaire in place of the original French ordinateur, for instance), but they have shown remarkable unwillingness to accept that this is so. They continue to attempt to enforce arcane usages and deliver much-ignored edicts pertaining to proper grammar, and receive little regard from the general populace in terms of altering how they actually speak. And yet, somehow, the French language marches on.
Algernon, I looked “livid” up last night, too, and discovered that it was derived from a Latin word meaning “black and blue.” One of its definitions refers to ashen, but the more common definition refers to being flushed.
Although I assign little weight to a word’s etymology when figuring out how I can best use it to communicate, it is interesting how often the etymology of a word is in confluence with how the word tends to be used.
trandallt, I agree with you on standard English in some ways: there is a bulk of the language which is used the same by almost all English speakers, and someone who knows that bulk will communicate more effectively. I disagree that this bulk comprises business speech, however. I ain’t saying y’all can’t communicate damn near perfectly with folks using fancypants speech, mind, but I am saying most folks could understand this totally nonstandard sentence. Mark Twain wouldn’t have had any problem with it, either.
Business speech is not especially inclusive: part of its function seems to be acting as a tool of exclusion, inasmuch as someone who includes the word “ain’t” on a resume cover letter ain’t likely to get the job.
It’s valuable to know Business English if you want a professional job, but that’s all. It’s not an especially superior version of the language, and it’s not a lingua franca, to use a phrase with an especially distracting etymology.
Daniel
[QUOTE=Roland Orzabal]
trandallt
Actually I don’t think you are being nitpicky at all. I think it’s really the bone of contention here.
I don’t know why etymology and common usage cannot co-exist. I understand that words change. Etymology is a tool for undeerstanding language. And I am not saying that the “source” is correct, rather that it is the source and the default position when meaning is unclear. Also that learning commonly accepted English makes it easier to understand the other variants. I don’t think learning “rap” makes it partcularly easy to understand “hilbilly.”
Surely this last sentence is hyperbole? A speaker of say, Italian, who has learned commonly accepted English is no better off than in Arkansas than if he had learned no English at all?
Maybe I’m just being thickheaded here but if someone points to an apple tree and says “bring me one of those grapefruit” you’re likely to say “I’ll be glad to but actually those are apples.” I do not see why a single arbiter is necessary for for there to be an appeal to authority. Even if prescriptivist grammarians disagree about some points they hardly disagree about everything. Some usages may always be in dispute; does this invalidate the 99% that they agree upon?
OK let’s call it something else then. I am content with “commonly accepted English” And I am not trying to apply and enforce a concept of correctness. I am suspicious of the idea that correctness has **no place ** in discusions of English. These seem like two different concepts to me.
Etymology and common usage can co-exist when they agree. It’s the times when they don’t (such as with “hopefully”) that trouble arises, and debates spring up. Both sides have a valid point with regard to what could be considered “correct”, thus the argument goes nowhere. That’s where I take issue with your statement that the source is the default position: what source is that? There is no single answer to that question, and nothing is achieved by attempting to determine it. As to commonly accepted English, I agree that it makes it easier to understand most (if not all) variants. Where we differ, I think, is in our definition of “commonly accepted English”. I submit that CAE is no more defined than the English language as a whole; it is merely the subset of the various dialects that contains the most common usages at the time of the set’s compilation. That very aspect is what makes it useful as a learning tool.
Sorry, bad phrasing on my part. I meant that he was less aided by learning CAE than he would have been by learning an Arkansas dialect, had he known beforehand of his destination.
Yes, I probably would say that, but my meaning would be something more akin to: “The item you are referring to is more commonly referred to as an apple. If you would like others to understand that you are referring to that item in the future, you would do well to call it an apple from now on.” I might also go on to clarify that a “grapefruit” is generally understood to be something else entirely, and thus he should avoid using that word to refer to any other item.
No. None of it invalidates anything, if you look at things from the standpoint that validity itself is an invalid concept with regard to this topic. But coming from a prescriptivist standpoint (which, bear in mind, I’m not saying that you are): if those who would hold us to a standard of “correctness” cannot agree upon what is correct, and furthermore, if the contested areas have proven themselves time and again to be unresolvable in any meaningful fashion, then perhaps we ought to conclude that there just is no “right” answer.
The reason they seem like two different concepts is because I believe in something very close to the level of “correctness” you’re trying to uphold. It’s called “efficiency of communication”, an earlier point of mine which I believe got lost in all the hullabaloo over standards. Given that the primary goal of language is communication, a given usage can be said to be efficient if the speaker and the listener both understand its meaning. Since you’ve ceded a term to me, I’ll give you one as well: this usage, applied in this manner, could be said to be “correct”. But what purpose would we serve in labelling it so? As to CAE, my first paragraph addresses what I believe to be our differences on that.
One thing I do want to make clear, not necessarily to trandallt (who seems to understand it), but to any lurkers who may be confused: I’m speaking from a purely ideological standpoint here. If a native speaker of English goes around calling apples “grapefruit” for no particular reason, he’s being a dumbass, and I will show no respect for his creative use of language. He isn’t “incorrect”, per se, he’s just remarkably inefficient…but then again, who ever said you had to be wrong to be a dumbass?
The thing is- there is no such thing as “the dictionary”. There are hundreds of them. It is true that to some extent- some are more authoritative that others (I’d trust Oxford on word origins) but none are “the” authority.
.
Ah but how about if it’s a “crabapple” or a “love apple”? 
The problem is- they don’t agree anywhere near 99%. And of course- they are always out of date.
Heh, these threads always crack me up. I understand language evolves, but the idea of “everybody gets a vote” is patently absurd. If everybody gets a vote and dictates language, I get my vote to consider them an idiot for improper use, voting aside. My ballot is cast.
More post-modernistic bullshit about how everybody is equally intelligent and all ideas are valid. :rolleyes:
No no no; I think it’s obvious from this thread that not everybody is equally intelligent. You’re misunderstanding the postmodern (so much as it is postmodern) view in this thread:
It’s not that all people are equally intelligent. It’s not that all people communicate with equal efficacy.
It’s that the best way to evaluate language use is on whether it gets the idea across efficiently and beautifully.
Prescriptivists like the OP come across like someone criticizing a hammer because the hammer’s head is square, not round, despite the fact that the carpenter is using the hammer to build a kickass house.
I’m saying that if the house is good, then the tool is doing the job, and if the house is bad, then the tool isn’t. We decide our goals, and then choose our words; we do not do it in reverse.
Throwing away the functional square-headed hammer is the sign of a lack of intelligence, and is not a valid idea.
Glad to clear that up for you!
Incidentally, those rolling eyes are fantastic. How did you ever think of that? Zing!
Daniel
Hey, Epimetheus:
That pretty much cover it for you? Or maybe you thought it was opposite day?
Oh yeah, and what LHoD said.