Why would I? It isn’t natural to me (it’s not the manner of speech I absorbed by osmosis from the speech around me growing up), and there’s no good reason, currently, to speak that way, given that nobody else does. If that were to change, well, tautologically, things might change.
I think English teachers do some useful things and some pointless, misguided things. I had an English teacher once insist that the word “till” can only be used in reference to a gardening implement, and that any dictionary would show that the only such word meaning “up to the time when” is “until”. Well, guess what looking at a dictionary actually shows? I, like everyone else, have had teachers reply to “Can I go to the bathroom?” with smug "I don’t know; can you?"s till I remember to use “may” to please them. That sort of teaching we could all do without.
But that same teacher who insisted so bizarrely and ignorantly on “till” being reworded as “until” was also the best teacher I’ve ever had; she did nothing for my ability to speak, but she did wonders for my abilities to write interestingly and engagingly with a deadline, not to mention to analyze literature and so on. It’s just that the value she provided in that arena was entirely disjoint from the silly prescriptive shibboleths she had, like most people, picked up somewhere and never thought about while passing down.
Intrinsically, it isn’t. It can be a useful guide to how other people speak, if it has been appropriately researched. But my point was to note the dissonance between the teacher’s claim about dictionaries and the reality of the matter in that one cutesy, but agreedly meaningless, anecdote.
Also, surely you realize that English teachers (in the sense of someone who lectures to students, assigns homework, and so on) do not typically write dictionaries… That’s a lexicographer’s job.
I’ve never claimed that there aren’t any rules. I’ve claimed that the rules of speech are the ones which are actually followed; to determine the rules is an empirical matter of observing how people actually speak. There are hardly any such rules that take the form of commands handed down from authorities above. And people learn all the rules of their native language without explicit instructions.
It may be that we actually agree, as you say, insofar as, for any particular piece of prescriptivist proscription I am dismissive of, you may turn out to be similarly dismissive. Yet you seem to insist on apparently purely theoretical grounds that we nonetheless need explicit prescriptive instruction… Can you point to any single example of a rule of speech which must be explicitly taught?
But lexicographers and English teachers are so disparate in their activities and areas of study that it’s rather odd to lump them together, like lumping together opthalmologists and football coaches just because both work with the human body.
Dictionaries are generally not meant to be prescriptivist, but rather descriptivist. It does depend a little on what dictionary you’re consulting, but, generally, they report on language as it is used, and may have a usage note regarding problematic usages. For example, words like “irregardless,” that many English teachers would consider non-words, are in the dictionary.
Pretty much all of them. Unless you think English classes should be abolished? Or if you think listening and discussing and socializing isn’t partly prescriptive even if we had no formal education.
It is impossible to escape the link between description and prescription. Prescription happens. And that’s okay.
I don’t think English classes should be prescribing rules of speech. As I said, I think they can do useful things, but that is not among the useful things they do.
Name a rule of speech which must be explicitly prescribed. (Yes, there is something you might want to call implicit prescription, in the way in which people pick up their native language by osmotic imitation. Is that semantic quibble really what you’ve been hanging your hat on this whole time? I could just as well say we need prescriptivism for walking and joking and videogames and fashion and all the rest of human activity, because people pick them up through imitation. That would be a meaningless construal of the debate.)
They can’t possibly NOT do that. That’s ALL they do. They issue rules, or if you prefer, suggestions, norms, conventions, best practices, good choices, whatever. The distinction isn’t that important at that level. If you don’t know the basic “rules” of spelling and grammar and whatnot, and follow them pretty well, you’ll fail at communication. Where those “rules” came from, or the fact that they constantly change and are subject to interpretation and nuance and disagreement, doesn’t really matter. You know them, and you’re glad you do, and you are thankful to your English teacher for making you follow them and testing you on them. You have to master the “rules” before you can break them.
Nobody can force you to use the language in any way. But people do impose social pressure, and sometimes more than that. Much like you can dress any way you want, and fashion is created out of nothing but social norms, but people still want to know the best way to dress. I agree that the word “rule” implies authority that isn’t really there, but whatever.
None MUST be. Many are though. Sometimes we fight about it, sometimes we all agree. No big deal. In essence, I’m being descriptive about prescription.
Let me put it this way, then: I don’t think English classes have any significant effect on the way people speak. They can do useful things, but that is not among the useful things they do. Among the useful things they do are providing experience with writing and with literature. But people arrive in English classes already well-formed speakers of English and leave largely unchanged in that respect (except for the effects of socializing with their co-students, which would have happened either way, English class or not, and have nothing to do with the teachers’ instruction).
(I am, of course, referring to English classes in the sense in which that term is usually used and not in the ESL sense)
And you still fail to provide a single rule of speech which demands explicit prescription! [That is, a rule characterizing how people actually speak, which is only followed by people as a result of having learnt it by explicit prescription]. If the wording of “needs” or “demands” throws you, point to a single rule of speech which ought to be explicitly prescribed.
Several of my high school classmates who had the same level of english instruction as I had, type stuff like this on Facebook:
“Pretty awesome day…got my hair done and found out I’m not going to have to pay anything out of pocket to fix my car!!! shoulda known when Don’t Stop Believin’ was the first song I heard on the radio this morning…”
“is it thursday yet!!! i wanna party my a$$ off good thing ive got a 4 day bday weekend woot woot bring on the patron!!”
So bearing in mind that this is incredibly anecdotal: was my high school english class incredibly swingy even within one class, or is competency with the written word at least somewhat divorced from traditional english pedagogy?
Yes, it’s true, people do nag each other and say “Hey, that’s not the proper way to speak”. It’s good to acknowledge this reality of the world.
When I call myself a descriptivist, I don’t mean to deny that this nagging happens. That would be stupid.
What I am saying is that all the grammar gotcha games and handwringing and so on that people engage in are pointless wastes of energy that accomplish nothing of value, and are largely grounded in ignorance of linguistics. I would prefer we stop wasting so much time on these, and I certainly do not wish to see them enshrined in any formal manner. I don’t think anyone needs to be explicitly taught how to speak their native language. I certainly don’t believe in any “But you have to know the rules before you can break them!” bullshit. The only rules people need to know in order to speak are rules they pick up anyway without explicit instructions.
What is a single instance of this nagging which has done anything good (something which would not just as well have occurred without explicit nagging)?
Maybe when you’re talking, but if you try to engage in any form of formal communication - writing a cover letter for a job, an article in a newsletter, etc. - you yourself follow pretty strict rules, and you expect others to follow them when reading. Everyone does. So it’s not bullshit, it’s how everyone works, including you.
”
good thing ive got a 4 day bday weekend