Er, wrong. Phenomenon is a perfectly regular noun, as are *octopus, apparatus, mitochondrion, *and virus. They just work slightly differently. (Take off the ending and add a different one, but it’s a system, not just random letters)
There’s been talk here, for example in this thread, about the fair-to-middling quality of mathematics instruction to which many of us are subjected in public school. This means that many freshmen arrive at college with the attitude that they can’t really do math, so they’ll major in humanities or psychology, and squeak through the Calculus Lite sequence that’s usually offered for those majors. They consider all technical and scientific majors closed to them. If these people had better math education before coming to college, we’d probably see more people in the ‘lucrative’ majors…and those majors would be less lucrative.
Bren Cameron was correct. People that go ape shit over people ending sentences in prepositions, and starting sentences with conjunctions, and splitting infinitives, just embarrass themselves.
Especially since the first and last examples you gave are not English grammar rules, but Latin ones that some pedant long ago erroneously decided should be applied to English. They were wrong.
In fact, one of the lovely things about English is how you can get different subtle meanings out of a split infinitive. “To boldly go where no man has gone before,” means something just a little different from “To go boldly…” or “Boldly to go.”
Ending in a preposition? Bah! Dad takes a book upstairs to read to his kid before bed. It’s about Australia, but it’s not the book the child wanted. Speaks the youngster, “What did you bring that book that I didn’t want to be read to about down under up for?” Perfectly good English sentence ending in SIX prepositions!
MLS: Especially since the first and last examples you gave are not English grammar rules, but Latin ones that some pedant long ago erroneously decided should be applied to English. [Latin derivatives underlined.]
Pffft. I don’t care much about the sanctity of Latinate English, and I don’t care if people choose to modify or ignore some of those “pedantic” rules like not splitting infinitives and not ending sentences with prepositions. But I just laugh at those counterrevolutionary types who think they’ve made a cast-iron case against such rules by objecting “Hey, those grammar rules are really Latin! They don’t belong in English anyway!”
Tell ya what, cupcake: if you give up all the Latin vocabulary in English, I’ll give up all the Latin grammar. You’ll have by far the harder job, since more than 60% of the English vocabulary is derived from Latin (I don’t mean cognates from common Indo-European roots, either, I mean originating in actual Latin words). Tough. If you don’t like what those early modern grammarian “pedants” did to good old-fashioned Germanic English by Latinizing it, then put your money where your mouth is and really de-Latinize the language.
But if you’re going to go on using all that Latin-derived vocabulary that those “pedants” helped provide, then cut them a little slack about their preference for a few Latin grammar rules. It’s not unreasonable that they thought a somewhat Latinized grammar was appropriate for such a heavily Latinized language. You don’t have to agree with them, but at least quit sneering at them. Or at least quit sneering at them in Latinized English.
Those pedants did not provide any of that Latinate vocabulary. The Latinate vocabulary had been part of the evolving language for centuries–hell, not a few of those words have been used by English speakers for a thousand years. English speakers have been in contact with Latin for that long–for longer.
The preoposition and split infinitive rules? They date from the eighteenth century. 1762, in fact.
There’s no need to de-Latinize English, and no one has said that there is. English steals words from every single language it comes across. English, to steal someone else’s metaphor, beat Latin senseless and took every word it could cram in its pockets, just like it does to every other language it comes in close contact with. For historical reasons, there was lots of exposure to Latin, so there was plenty of opportuinity to steal Latin words–for centuries before Robert Lowth decided English grammar wasn’t good enough without Latin rules. Stealing words is one of the ways English works. Finders keepers–the words are ours now. But we left their crummy grammar alone, I swear, officer!
If you think a single person ought to be able to declare new grammatical rules for arbitrary reasons, then by all means avoid ending sentences with prepositions. But don’t forget to avoid the words “yes” and “no”, since I’ve decided that since there are some Irish constructions and words in English and, ya know, I just like Irish, we ought to make English more like the Celtic languages. And Irish doesn’t have those words, just like Latin doesn’t have splittable infinitives, so it’s not proper to use them.
What, I can’t make a rule like that? Then why could Robert Lowth?
Or here’s a thought. Why don’t we do the right thing, and make English grammar correspond to the grammars of every language we’ve ever taken vocabulary from. We’ll create a whole new English grammar, and no one can complain! Don’t want to use those various Native American rules imposed on the language? Then don’t eat squash, you ingrate!
What, you don’t like that either? Huh, why not?
Here’s a better thought–do some reading on the history of the language.
If it weren’t for my study of Latin from a wee age, I would not have been the only one in the cinema shouting, ‘It’s Romani ite domum, Brian!’
Told mum it was an educational film.
Ms Boods, who has appalling grammar in 5 languages.
Now now. We didn’t steal those words. We ‘borrowed’ them.
Twirls mustache and laughs evilly.
Yes… borrowed them.
BC: *Those pedants did not provide any of that Latinate vocabulary. *
Wrong. It’s true that many Latin-derived words in English are much older than the early modern period—and I never said it wasn’t—but early modern scholars writing in English added a great many new Latin-derived words and also “cleaned up” or “re-Latinized” many older ones:
The Latin and English usage of these scholars had a great influence on what later grammarians considered “proper” English: Robert Lowth didn’t make all the rules of his “Short Introduction to English Grammar” up out of his own little head in 1762, nor did he single-handedly impose them on a helpless populace. Grammatical rules tend to crystallize what educated people are already doing with language, and Lowth’s vision of a “properly Latinized” English was far from unique.
BC: If you think a single person ought to be able to declare new grammatical rules for arbitrary reasons, then by all means avoid ending sentences with prepositions. But don’t forget to avoid the words “yes” and “no”, since I’ve decided that since there are some Irish constructions and words in English and, ya know, I just like Irish, we ought to make English more like the Celtic languages. […]
What, I can’t make a rule like that? Then why could Robert Lowth?
Who said you couldn’t? Go right ahead and make all the rules you like. If your “Celticized English” actually gets used by a significant number of people and significantly influences the way we generally think about and teach the English language, you won’t catch me whining that your rules are somehow illegitimate because they originally applied to Celtic languages.
Yes, vocabulary changes over the years in linguistic development. So does grammar. Sometimes those changes are “natural”, meaning more or less spontaneous and undirected, and sometimes they’re “artificial”, meaning somebody tried to make a prescriptive formal system out of them. It’s been happening at least since Panini wrote his Eight Chapters on Sanskrit grammar around the fourth century BCE. Why get all bent out of shape over who’s “allowed” to make grammatical rules?
I use “viruses” and “octopuses” – from that point of view they’re not different at all. Am I correct in thinking that the plurals are either “-es” or nothing, with an “-i” or “-ii” as a mistake? (I know “octopodes” is technically acceptable, but I’ve never heard anyone use it except when being deliberately archaic.)
Why get bent out of shape when those imposed rules are rejected? I’m a native-speaker, and I have as much right to decide which changes I think are worth accepting or rejecting as any other.
Your suggestion that anyone who rejects rules made up to force English to be more like Latin should therefore reject any Latinate words makes no sense. Your characterization of those of us who do reject the rules on the stated grounds as “sneering” at any Latin influence on the language is ridiculous. Your statement that the pedants who imposed the preposition and split infinitives rules gave us our Latinate vocabulary certainly implied that most of that vocabulary was due to their work–which, I’m glad to see, you realize isn’t true. That whole line of argument was nonsensical.
The fact remains that a small group of speakers decided that Latin was classier than English, and decided to force English to suit their “educated” tastes. The fact also remains that nearly every native speaker has trouble following those rules–which were indeed imposed on them by various school-teachers with no idea of the history of those rules–without producing abomniations like “up with which I will not put.” Yeah, language changes for various reasons, and some imposed changes stick and some don’t. When they don’t make sense, they don’t stick. These ones aren’t sticking, and frankly never did stick very well except as a list of rules that no one actually ever bothered to follow in real life. Sure, they stay in the list, but nobody actually writes or talks that way. They only come up when someone is trying to prove they’re more educated or higher class than someone else.
The fact also remains that English takes words wherever and whenever it pleases, but not grammar. It remains a very Germanic language, for all its Latinate vocabulary. It does not adopt grammar along with words–it knocks the edges off words to make them suit English grammar. English was never Latinized–Latin was Anglicized.
dwalin, Please see this page for what is meant when referring to regular vs. irregular nouns. I don’t pretend to be an accredited linguist or an English language maven, but there is a generally accepted set of terms used when discussing English pedantry (and yes I am using “pedantry” as noun, that’s the cool part about the language - you can change it to fit your meaning as you like).
To preemptively address anyone who checks out the above link and decides to point a finger and cackle: “Look! She’s wrong again! She said all regular nouns are pluralized with -s, when in fact they can end with -es, -ies, -ves, etc!” Well, I had instruction in English grammar for the first time in COLLEGE, since they don’t seem to teach it in public school anymore. My professor (an accomplished linguist) related to us that it’s common practice in the field to simply say -s when referring to that rule, since it’s implicity understood that there are varying -s endings and it takes too long to write them out each time.
Look folks, I understand this board is devoted to fighting ignorance and all, but my attempt to inject a little humor and personal support into the OP was immediately turned into a grammar witch hunt, and I feel like the point I was trying to make was missed altogether. I’m shocked to find that peeps are still bothering to respond to my post even days later. Fuck, this is the pit, not GQ or GD. Do you really feel the need to correct everything that is said with such a fucking “holier than thou” attitude? Maybe that wasn’t the intent but that’s certainly the vibe I’m getting, since the only responses to my posts have been to (sometimes incorrectly) point out the error of my statements.
Fuck, maybe I’m just being too sensistive. Yes I was wrong the first time, and I corrected it, but when people won’t let it go after that it makes me paranoid. I was a lurker here for a long time before I began posting, so I feel that I have a pretty good sense of what to expect when I post and others respond, and what the different personalities on this board are like. And yet, I still can’t seem to find my place here, especially after experiences like this thread.
Oh well. Fuck it. I’m still gonna post according to who I am and what I feel. Any professional linguists lurking, please feel free to affirm or discredit my latest statements regarding the English language as you like. I don’t fucking care.
Oh yeah, and English majors still rock.
Don’t take it so personally, Yamirskoonir. You really have to call into question someone’s meaningless nitpicking if they don’t know the proper plural formation for the word “virus”.
Yo, Yamirskoonir, chill dude. When I read your original post it sounded odd to me, but since I’m no linguist I figured you might’ve meant something other than, or in addition to, the definitions to which I’m accustomed. I don’t think anyone was really criticizing you personally, just remarking that their understanding was not the same as yours. Bickering is bickering, not meant to be hostile.
BC: Why get bent out of shape when those imposed rules are rejected? I’m a native-speaker, and I have as much right to decide which changes I think are worth accepting or rejecting as any other.
Exactly, which is why I said at the very beginning of my first post on this topic that I didn’t care if people choose to reject the “Latinized” grammar rules. In other words, I’m not getting “bent out of shape” about rejection of those rules at all. What I am mocking is the shibboleth that the rules are somehow “illegitimate” just because they were deliberately derived from Latin. Languages change in many ways, lexically and grammatically, “naturally” and “artificially”, and trying to make hard and fast rules about what kind of changes are permissible is the same sort of futile prescriptionism that you’re all upset about with Robert Lowth.
Your statement that the pedants who imposed the preposition and split infinitives rules gave us our Latinate vocabulary certainly implied that most of that vocabulary was due to their work–which, I’m glad to see, you realize isn’t true. That whole line of argument was nonsensical.
Good thing I was never arguing it, then. I’m quite well aware that English has been lexically borrowing from Latin for many centuries, without benefit of clergy or other learned lexicographers. However, scholastic “pedants” in the early modern period did also deliberately import thousands of Latin words into English in a conscious effort to expand various technical and other vocabularies, as I mentioned above. So your statement that “Those pedants did not provide any of that Latinate vocabulary” is incorrect.
These [changes] aren’t sticking, and frankly never did stick very well except as a list of rules that no one actually ever bothered to follow in real life. Sure, they stay in the list, but nobody actually writes or talks that way. They only come up when someone is trying to prove they’re more educated or higher class than someone else.
Nonsense. Many nineteenth- and twentieth-century authors wrote beautiful “Latinate” English in accordance with those rules, in a variety of contexts and in a very graceful and natural way. Almost all major languages have included “courtly” or “book-dialect” forms that are more “learned” or “artificial” in structure than vernacular forms, but nonetheless are perfectly habitual and easy to many of their users. It’s only your sort of reverse snobbery that declares all such “learned dialects” useless except for the purpose of showing off.
*The fact also remains that English takes words wherever and whenever it pleases, but not grammar. […] It does not adopt grammar along with words […] *
Wrong again. All languages modify their grammar somewhat in response to that of other languages that they interact with closely, and English has been no exception. For example,
No doubt some contemporary speakers consciously adopted those changes while others resisted them as making the language sound too “Dane-like” or “French-like”, and most people just ended up using them without realizing or caring where they came from. That’s just how linguistic change tends to work, lexically and grammatically.
Fend off such prejudice by getting a degree in science, also. It’s what I did.
Oh, lookit all the English majors turning a discussion on English major as a career into a grammar-spouting contest. Why, lizards puffing out the pouches on their throats couldn’t be more obvious and predicatable.
“People called the Romans they go the house” ?
Can’t speak for other people my age, but I’d always prefer to hire a liberal arts major with programming experience over yet another CS degree.
For me, English led to fun, money, and opportunity.