Similarities and Differences Between Prescriptive and Descriptive Grammars

Author Bryan A. Garner, in his article “Making Peace in the Language Wars” (published in Garner’s Modern American Usage 3rd edition, Oxford University Press, 2009), seeks to negotiate a cease-fire between two fighting countries, the prescriptivists and the descriptivists, by dispelling myths about each of their camps. First and foremost, Garner outlines the war is happening between the lines of our favorite novels and poetry, and he describes what each camp stands for. Prescriptivists desire to instruct the world around them on how to use the language by enforcing, or at the very least informing the general public about the rules of grammar. They are sometimes described as conservative and are very concerned

“Authority and American Usage” written by David Foster Wallace, poses an argument about the English language, and the different beliefs of its usage. This essay was written in defense of Bryan A. Garner’s, A Dictionary of Modern American Usage. His argument in “Authority and American Usage” is the difference the between prescriptivism perception and the descriptivism perception (Linguistic terms that could easily be made into smaller, more understandable words for people like me). Since the beginning of time, language has evolved. From biblical times, to Shakespearean times, to present day; the English language has been continuously changing since it’s birth and has no intentions on stopping.

Secondly, range of similarities and differences are perceived in the sets of rules constraining the language structure of Auslan and English. In comparison to English, sign languages are visual languages, hence it is distinct in modality and word-ordering structure (Damian, 2011). To illustrate, the words of spoken languages are delivered in a fairly linear pattern, both in time and on paper (Bejan, 2001). This linear sentence structure is observed in English, but the same is not demonstrated in Auslan. However, despite this distinction, the order of signs remains of importance to produce meaningful sentences. This is because Auslan conveys many grammatical features found in the English language at phonological, morphological and syntactic levels (Johnston & Schembri, 2007). An individual’s poor English grammar is attributed for sentence fragments. These poorly formed English sentences occur when a sentence lacks a subject, a verb or do not express a complete thought (Schuster, 2006). In the same manner, the wrong ordering of signs will affect the fluency of the language. For instance, the linear English sentence ‘many black cars have disappeared’ will be signed as MANY-BLACK-CAR-DISAPPEAR (Johnston & Schembri, 2007). In this example, it is important that the determiner (MANY) and adjective (BLACK) are situated before the noun (CAR) (Johnston & Schembri, 2007). This is done for the purpose of identifying the noun within the sentence, which subsequently lead to the formation

Simon states “some people are pleased to call linguistic evolution was almost always a matter of ignorance prevailing over knowledge” (209). This statement shows the opposing view of the liberal -linguist. On the other hand, the other group of people the opposition of the liberal-linguist mentioned by Simon believe that “there is such thing as Standard English” (208). This makes the works of this article balanced and truthful. As a conservative, Simon wants individuals to preserve the English language and not just go with any fad that may come upon us. Henceforth, Simon wants us to teach ourselves and he stresses training yourself. Though Simon presents favoritism toward what he describes as the minority or the conservatives. “we are here… to arrest unnecessary change” (209). He accurately reveals the two viewpoints regarding good English usage.

The second level grammatical-rhetorical analysis aims to investigate the relationship between grammatical choice and rhetorical function in written English for science and technology. Discourse analysis as interaction represents the third level of language description. Most importantly, interactional analysis outlines the concept of interpretation of discourse by the reader or listener. Discourse analysis appears to have steadily moved from surface-level analysis to a deeper description of language use. However, in the context of language teaching for specific purposes, applied discourse analysis seems to represent a rather narrow description of language in use and is inadequate in its explanation. In order to introduce a thick description of language in use, it is necessary to combine socio-cultural and psycholinguistic aspects of text-construction and interpretation with linguistic insights to answer the question: why are specific discourse-genres written and used by the specialist communities the way they are? Genre analysis as an insightful description of English for specific purpose texts has become a useful and powerful tool to arrive at significant form-function correlations which can be utilized for a number of applied linguistic purposes.

The article has been written by Barbara Wallraff who is English Language graduate. She is enthusiastic about the recent happenings to the English Language, that’s why she discusses with people about the universality of the English language. Ms. Wallraff has started the argument of the article by developing thesis statement on the universality of the English Language which has later been supported by related arguments of the article.

George Orwell states that, “our civilization is decadent and our language…must inevitably share in the general collapse” (Orwell 2000, 1), when he argues for prescriptivism (though toned down from what was taught and accepted in his day). While Garner posits that, “describers, meanwhile, remind us that linguistic change is a fact of life – and conclude that it’s therefore not worth opposing” (Garner, Making Peace in the Language Wars 2008, 272). When David Foster Wallace discusses descriptivism, he makes a historical reference to, “Philip Gove’s now classic introduction to Webster’s Third [which] outlines this type of Descriptivism’s five basic edicts: ‘1 – Language changes constantly; 2 – change is normal; 3 – spoken language is the language; 4 – correctness rests upon usage; 5 – All usage is relative.’” (Wallace 2005, 83). Wallace himself argues against most of these edicts, proving himself to uphold his snootitude. Bryan A. Garner creates a list similar to that of Gove’s, while addressing the argument that “learning grammar may seem like an exercise in pedantry,” which is a point argued by many descriptivists:

The purpose of this paper is to present the argument mapping of “The Logic of Nonstandard English,” by William Labov. To start off this understanding I will first define keywords in order for the reader to fully grasp the argument. Furthermore I will state the author's main claim and link them to the evidence Labov provides. In closing, I will show how these claims are linked together by giving my mapping of the interrelated parts, that as I understand, define the article’s overall structure. In the case here, I will be arguing that there are four strong ethnographic facts, one weak ethnographic fact, one general ethnographic explanation and one strong ethnographic observation. In this article, Labov is against the ‘deficit model’ used to

Throughout twenty-centuries ago, writers thought that ordinary language and literary language were two different languages. But this is an analytical assumption. There is only one language, which

Talking about “dialects”, a term often mentioned along is “standard language”. When being brought into comparison with “dialect”, “standard language” usually serves as a legitimate variant with the highest level of excellence (Bex & Watts, 1999). Though positive in nature, standardization - the procedure of standardizing a language – often raises heated controversy because of its consequences on not only linguistics field but also the society. In the second part of the essay, I will focus on the disadvantages of language standardization.

In the transition from Principles of Mathematics to “On Denoting”, the linguistic expressions that count as denoting phrases change because of the way that Russell views denoting phrases. In 1903, the determiners that are primarily considered are “all”, “every”, “any”, “a”, “some”, and “the”. In “On Denoting”, Russell introduces “no” and “the most primitive of denoting phrases” such as “everything”, “nothing”, and “something”. Consequently, in 1905 Russell analyzes denoting phrases not restricted to the six determiners and focuses analysis on denoting phrases such as “something is hungry”, “everything is hungry”, and “nothing is hungry”. Furthermore, in the denoting phrase “an Athenian studied with the author of The Republic”, the

It is not uncommon to say that grammar instruction plays an important role in language teaching. Regarding the status and importance of grammar teaching, a variety of opinions have been made. Batstone (1994) states that “language without grammar would be chaotic: countless words without the indispensable guidelines for how they can be ordered and modified” (p. 4). More vividly, Wang (2010) makes two similes. She compares grammar to the frame of a house, which is a decisive factor to ensure the solidness of it. Additionally, she regards grammar as a walking stick, whose function is to help and support students to learn English. Thus, the nature of grammar instruction manifests its own significance as it helps students

Perscriptive and Descriptive Language Use An essay or paper on Perscriptive and Descriptive Language Use. This research takes the form of an informative essay on the subject

The first thing that I will be discussing is the definition of descriptive grammar. A descriptive grammar is a set of rules about language based on how it is actually used. It can relate with a prescriptive grammar, which is a set of rules based on how people think language should be used.

In contemporary society the Standard variety of English is the most commonly used as it is respected and associated with a higher prestige. Its usage is also advocated by prescriptivists who believe that it is the ‘correct’ and only variety that should be used. Standard English is usually seen in formal settings, where its usage is necessary for official and public purposes. However, contextual factors play a vital role in determining the most appropriate variety to be used, which is supported by the Principle of Appropriateness. Certain contexts where a non-standard variety is necessary are in social media settings and in communities of different ethnicities, where they are undeniably required to create solidarity between speakers.