(OT) From the teacher's desk...

[Jen Piersol]

No: HPFGUIDX 10431

Ebony said...

> I'm not a linguist, but studying composition and rhetoric, which 
> means I tend to emphasize the overall process of writing and 
> style in my teaching and research rather than "nuts-and-bolts" 
> mechanical issues.  This means that my fifth grade English 
> classes very rarely consist of writing 50 sentences, underlining 
> the subject, then double-lining the predicate.  In fact, I have 
given 
> papers with no "surface level errors" grades of C or less... and 
> I've given papers with one or two spelling mistakes As. 

I'm a linguist (yippee!), and I'd just like to point out...

While linguistics is the study of language (encompassing phonetics,
semantics, etc) we don't as a rule instruct students how to use
"better grammar".  We just study how they use it, no matter if it 
is "incorrect" or not.  In fact, most linguists will tell you that
there is no such thing as incorrect English (or Spanish, or 
Bulgarian or whatever) usage.  If you understand it, it's 
correct. ;)

Just wanted to clear that up (not like anybody really picked out 
THAT as the most important point of your post, but...) although I 
admit, I haven't been following the "grammar question" thread, and 
I could be WAY off base here. :)

Jen (who wishes there were more interesting jobs for B.A. linguists)