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So, what's the difference? I know Ryu means school in Japanese. So does this mean Zen school? Or are people splitting hairs over the difference to these two forms? I was taught that Haiku didn't have to be about the seasons or nature. They could be about 'Yugen' (mystery), 'wabi' (poverty), 'aware' (impermanence), 'sabi' (isolation),'kumite' (combat) & other topics. Why all the fuss about classification? Why am I asking all these bloody questions?
And (yes; you can start a sentence with 'and' as long as you aren't using it as a conjunctive)If I may borrow a peculiarly American idiomatic expression that I have always liked:
WHY HAVE SO MANY PEOPLE GOT A STICK UP THE ASS ABOUT THIS? -
Why
ask the question in english? Neither form is written in english... -
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Why?
Good question. I don't speak Japanese so I am interested why people are sometimes dogmatic, by what you have correctly identified, as an alien form to English. But in many ways that is my point too. It has been adopted & adapted by the west. I have been told that many of my Haiku are in fact Senryu. This could be cultural. In England we don't make a huge distinction between the two forms. Other cultures probably do.
What is your opinion Just Rob? -
you don't think Jack Kerouac wrote haiku?
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i have no sticks
just write
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Sticks & stones
That sounds about right.
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Well, I have neither sticks nor stones, but I did attend a writer's conference recently where the keynote speaker was the (at that time) president of the American Haiku Association and a past president of the International Haiku Association. He had spent many years in Japan and wrote haiku in both English and Japanese.
He said haiku ARE about seasons or nature, not just about anything. They ARE 17 syllables, broken into 5, 7 and 5 syllable lines and they DO have a twist at the end. We Western poets can say whatever we like about haiku being "adapted", but that is a view held by Western writers and not by writers in general, worldwide and not by the various haiku associations. (Phrasing mine, not his.)
And why do you need to ask why so many people are so rigid about it? I think it's funny that we wish to change the form and call it the same thing. If we were to write a sonnet with 20 lines, would it still be a sonnet? Would we insist on calling it a sonnet? What if poets from the Far East were the only ones who chose to do that and they said the sonnet had "adapted?" Would that view be accepted by writers in general?
celtic queen -
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Cultural Dissonance
Many sonnets do not have 14 lines, Shakespeare & Donne wrote sonnets both with more & less lines. I am not a great Haiku scholar but Japanese have told me the form has been far more flexible right from the 'Basho' period.
The sonnet traditionally also has 10 syllables per line in English, but 11 in Italian & 12 in French. I have seen many sonnets on this site which don't conform to that either. The origins of the sonnet are actually lost in history & it was introduced into the Elizabethan court by Wyatt & further developed by the Earl of Surrey. It could, some people think anyway, be traced back (750 years) to a Sicilian song form which may have had its origins in a Moorish form derived from the Persian inspired by a Chinese form! Piero delle Vigne & Giacomo de Lentini in the 13th century probably wrote the first sonnets that we would recognise as such. Guittone d'Arezzo was the first to write the Italian (Petrachan) form. So it is debatable the sonnet is a purely western form in many respects. Variations on the form abound; from the Miltonic (no volta) to the almost psychedelic 'Pushkinian'.
You wrote an epic poem about the 'Ancient Britons' during the Roman invasions. Yet you didn't write in Gaelic or Latin. Have you mentioned the Celts of that time were cannibilistic headhunters who often brutally sacrificed their own children to their pantheon of Gods & Goddesses?
When British archeologists first discovered evidence for this in the latter part of the nineteenth century they were so shocked they didn't talk or write about it for decades. Yet many contemporary Roman writers actually witnessed atrocities. There are hundreds of child skulls still in the Thames where Boudicca's army threw them! Roman & Romano-Celtic women were horribly mutilated whilst still alive & also many of their bones are still being found in the river Thames. Yet it didn't stop you writing your poem about Celtic life in 90BC. You didn't know how to correctly use the nominative & accusitive 2nd person personal pronouns in Middle English, but it didn't stop you using them for poetic effect. (hint: Nominatives normally proceed verbs & verbal auxilliaries, Accusitives normally follow prepositions, verbs & conjunctives, Datives are indirect, Genitives singular & plural denote possession or source, Vocatives are appeliative, all were different according to case) In my country many of these pronouns are still used in dialect. You can imagine how we feel when they are utilised incorrectly.
My point being is that I don't mind so much when people are being creative, but it seems that a lot of people are being overly pedantic, myself probably included. Maybe my sense of British litotical irony doesn't come over well in email. This must be a cultural difference, I have noticed people from other cultures find irony difficult to detect. The English just can't help it. Strangely we didn't invent the word 'irony' which is from a Greek root meaning 'to dissemble', now that's ironic!
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wow, what a thoroughly fascinating history of the sonnet!
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Short sonnets
Thanks, I thought it was a bit spartan myself. I may write a coloumn about the history of the sonnet. -
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Great!
Be sure to set a good example and credit all your sources, so we know you're not making it up out of whole cloth.
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Your points are well made, and taken.
In NZ, a new form of sonnet, popularized by James K Baxter, has arisen. Known as 'contemporary sonnet', it consists of seven unrhymed couplets.
(removes stick from arse)(ass is still a donkey, to us) (prepares to apologise)
I apologise for air-raiding you about the haiku form, earlier.
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Air-raids, shelters & blitzes
It's ok, where would we be without a good debate? The sonnet has always had variations, look at G.M Hopkin's caudate sonnets or Emily Dickinson's odd non (5 feet of iambic pentameter)sonnets look very 'modern' now. I think the Haiku debate is going to go on a bit. After all that is how we learn. I don't know whether you have ever been in higher or further education but academic disputes can last decades. Long may they reign! -
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(smoothes ruffled feathers) I'm participating in higher and further education as we speak.
The King is dead. Long live the King!
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Feel better?
celtic queen -
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Yes
I was just thinking out aloud so to speak. You can see where I'm coming from though. Still it's always good to have a lively debate. -
How did you like the found poem by Dylan, Celtic?
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"Filled the air with barbarous dissonance." --Milton.
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Evil, be thou my Good: by thee at least Divided empire with Heavens King I hold by thee,
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Well, ea,
It looked like Dylan was having a good time! I think I'll stick to the "regular" form of poetry, though. *Waiting for cynewulf to give me the history of regular poetry and explain that I really don't know how to write it, anyway. 8>)* -
Cynewulf, I don't write much haiku, only a bit here and there, and I certainly don't claim to be an authority on it. That's why I was telling you what a past president of two recognized haiku associations had to say about it. I don't know who you spoke to about it, but I'm gonna go with the past president.
As for my comments concerning the sonnet, you seem either to have missed the point or avoided it. If you change the form of a poem - any poem that is a fixed form - is it still really that form? Isn't it a new form? Why can't we just give it a new name? Or use the name that the form we actually used already has - such as senryu instead of haiku? You're complaining about people insisting that a haiku is such and so and a senryu is such and so. But what about you and others who are insisting that what they've just written is this or that even though the form or content is different? Do you have some particular aversion to your poem being called a senryu instead of a haiku?
celtic queen -
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Crossed wires, gremlins & ontological subjectivity
That was just my point, the sonnet is not really a fixed form. I don't know why you think I'm being ad hominem about this. As I have said before, to me, the difference between 'senryu' & haiku is an ontologically constructed one. I am not sure about deconstructing it as a form. Maybe this is a postmodernist debate & there is no truth but the subjective. If objective 'truths' have an inherent plasticity then aesthetic 'truths' will as well. Particularly if what we are talking about is cultural commodification & how that affects the haiku as a form. Which; goes back to my point concerning cultural relativism. How relevant is the cultural milieu to the haiku/senryu as a form? Do you think this debate is an ontologically subjective one?
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Got your dictionary handy, folks?
ad hominem? Now I didn't say that. I didn't feel personally attacked. Well, actually, I did, but I don't think you meant it that way. Ontological? I think that's giving this argument and poetic forms more weight than they deserve. I might go along with postmodernism, but I actually think it's simpler than that. I really do think the cultural milieu is important to the haiku and its varieties. And what I really think goes on is that somebody (or a lot of somebodies) tried to write haiku, found it very difficult - which it is, to do well - and just said "Well, I've adapted it." The same with the sonnet and any other "form" poetry that started one way and was "adapted". Even if you don't want to call a sonnet a fixed form, it is considered such. And you can spin that however you wish. When people think of a sonnet, they think of 14 lines of rhyming iambic pentameter. I know there are variations, but that's what most people think of.
Now, in your earlier post, you criticized my use of "accusitive" pronouns (even though I told you that wasn't a term in wide usage here - which you also argued against), saying imagine how your folks who use them in dialect feel when they are "misused." I could just say, well, I've simply adapted them. Language changes all the time. So deal with it. Now, what's the difference between that and a haiku or a sonnet? You think one is incorrect and the other is fine and those who don't have a 'stick up their ...' (I don't use phrasing such as that in my everyday - or any other day - speech.) There goes that cultural thing, again. Or is it? Many in my culture would agree with you and not me.
To me, a form is a form is a form. When you write something other than that form, it is a different form, not an "adapted" form. So call it something else. Go down in history as the guy who invented a new poetic form.
celtic queen -
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Quod scripsi, scripsi...........
I really don't think you have understood my argument. I am sorry. I am so used to having long debates with fellow academics that I get a bit carried away. I don't know what your educational background is, you certainly seem to need a dictionary a lot, but I thought my stance was a cogent & lucid one. I am just fascinated by the ontological discrepancies in interpretations of form. I don't think you have understood my use of the term 'ontological'. As a concept, along with hermeneutics & eisegetics it has more than one connotation in semiotic (linguistic) terminology. I am not trying to sound as if I have swallowed a dictionary but it is part of the way many educators have to think. I only mentioned 'postmodernism' because of its many takes on subjective ontologies,ie, how we construct our own realities & how they interact with 'perceived' other objective reality constructs. Also I was wondering about the cultural commodification of various forms, which is linked into how we perceive ourselves & our own culture.
I admit the sonnet is considered to be 14 lines of iambic pentameter by many people. The fact that most people don't know that it is only really a convention in that form I put down to ignorance.
I stand by what I say about 'accusative' pronouns:
"Of,or, relating to being the grammatical case that marks the direct object of a verb or the object of any of several prepositions."
Webster's Ninth New Collegiate Dictionary.
You will find that educated people both in America & England will prefer the term accusative over objective in relation to grammar because the term 'objective' has many other meanings & connotations in semiotic & linguistic theory. Therefore it can become confusing to apply it to grammar. I know in many schools children are taught to use the term 'objective' instead, but this is educational political correctness gone mad in my opinion! I have seen similar things with the term 'transitive' in relation to a verb. Educationalists can call it what they bloody well like, it is still transitive if the action of the verb moves from the subject to the object. Note I didn't say nominative to accusative, quod erat demonstrandum.
Of course language changes all the time. Did you know if you say, 'It is me' as a phrase you are using incorrect grammar? Language & semiotic signifiers are consistently changing all of the time. Most grammar is in fact a convention of form developed, in English anyway, by seventeenth century grammarians trying to apply Latin based grammar to a Germanic language. Many of the problems started in English when we started to use verbal auxiliaries to denote future & future historic tenses. Our syntax started to change somewhat to compensate. Of course if you wish to use the wrong pronouns (remember what I said about ontological subjectivity) it is up to you. I just thought you might think about who is going to read it & do they know how accurate it is. You may alienate as many people as you attract, or at least confuse them. Which goes back to what I said about conventions in language & how they are perceived ontologically.
I'm sorry, I don't understand the tautology in the last paragraph of your post. I apologize if I have sounded overtly patronizing but I am used to having quite deep debates about language. I think you have misunderstood what I was trying to say.
I am essentially intrigued in the ontological perception of literature & its form & content. You seem to think I am arguing for no apparent reason other than to sound superior or something , hence your 'dictionaries' comment.
This was not my intention, I thought I had put my argument lucidly, cogently & as well as can be in a thread. I apologize for any misunderstandings.
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Patronizing? You? Never!
cynewulf, the dictionary comment was a joke, but it does bring up a good point. You advise me with the pronoun thing to keep in mind who is going to read what I write. I would invite you to go back through these forums and read some of the entries. Do you find any others like yours? Perhaps you need to take your own advice.
My educational background does not matter. I am not an academic, though I am the mother of one and the mother-in-law of another. You may insist all you want about the use of the term 'accusative' over 'objective', but I've looked it up several times since you first mentioned it to me, and what I find over and over is that in modern English, such case distinctions have largely gone by the wayside, substituted by the term "objective." Now if you don't want to accept that, well, that's up to you, but it IS just you and not academics or those who deal in linguistics in general, especially those in America. For myself, I am considered by most to have a powerful vocabulary and an especially good grasp of grammar. Yet, I've managed to live quite well for the last 60 years without ever hearing the term "accusative pronoun" until now. And even if I had, what has that to do with haiku and senryu?
I've told you what I think about that and you have yet to address that directly, choosing instead to focus on these side issues, such as accusative rather than objective and my example of sonnets.
As a matter of fact, I do have my dictionary out a lot. I consider it good recreational reading. I collect dictionaries. And as for being patronizing, well, I'm sure you don't mean to be, but it seems you just can't help yourself.
celtic queen -
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ignoratio elenchi
Hmmm, I am still not sure what your point is in many respects. By your reckoning then as a British & Commonwealth citizen I am not a 'subject' of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II but a 'nominative'. It is not me that is patronising so much but that you can't take any criticism.
I don't know why you're beleaguering this point so much. I know my own job & have taught grammar & English language & literature enough. I know what I am talking about. I have just emailed a friend of mine from New York & she agrees with me on this.
I can't help being patronising (sorry we spell it more often with an s) to people who are going to be pedantic about the fact they have little or no knowledge of English grammar. English case distinctions have not gone by the wayside. Pronouns still change with case. I think the correct use of grammar is an important thing in education. I see far too much dumbing down today, & as a professional educator I find it irritating. I blame the hippies in the sixties, you weren't a flower person were you?
The very first time I replied to one of your threads you got very defensive about something. I think if you are going to write about the ancient Celts & the iron age, it wouldn't hurt to be a bit more accurate about them as a race. Did you do any research? If you were a hippy it would explain why you appear to have misunderstood my entire argument about the perception of the semiotic with regards to haiku.
As for collecting dictionaries I think you should get some better ones. May I recommend Fowler's Modern English Usage & perhaps the Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology.
I really don't understand why you have taken this so personally. I have found that the sort of people who can't take criticism in a constructive way have other issues that are bothering them.
If it means anything to you I have thoroughly enjoyed this tete a tete, you have made my day. And I thought Germans had no sense of humour! (Oh, before you say it, you can start a sentence with 'and' as long as you are not using it as a conjunctive, whether you are English, Canadian, American, Australian or a New Zealander).
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The Queen's nominative?
Cynewulf, I throw up my hands in surrender. I have no idea what you're talking about there.
As a matter of fact, I am actually very good at taking constructive criticism and seek it diligently. But you know, my friend, most people, before they criticize someone's work, read it first. You read (I think) a single excerpt that had been changed for an AP contest and that was a lead-in to a love story. You have no idea how accurate I am about anything.
Regarding English grammar, I have never said you didn't know what you were talking about, or that the term "accusative" was inaccurate, only that it wasn't in wide use in America.
I have tried to bring this discussion back on track, back to why people want a haiku to be called a haiku and a senryu a senryu. You keep coming back to English grammar and insisting that only you are correct. Who is actually being defensive and pedantic here?
And remarks like your last one is why you are seen, at least by me, to be patronizing (we spell it with a "z"). As for enjoying the tete a tete, I agree. I laughed out loud at your previous post (the one I made the dictionary comment about) and even read it to my husband. And I thought it was just the Germans who took themselves too seriously!
cq
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sie wollen den Krieg. Der es geschrieben hat Ist schon gefallen.- Brecht
Some people just can't recognise a wind up when they see one. You wouldn't last five minutes in the North or Midlands of England with your attitude. (We have an acerbic sense of humour, remember John Lennon?)
You are still wrong about grammatical terms used in the US. You forget that I know many educated Americans. I may be being pertinacious, but I'm having fun. Honestly, you have taken this so personally. It's not my fault you have no grasp of the fundamental intricacy of English grammatical forms. You are not on your own either! In my experience most English people have problems with grammar. You can see how exasperated it makes an educator like myself.
I asked you a bona fide question about the grammar you were utilising & because you didn't know what I was talking about & had to recourse to a dictionary, you have been trying to convince me that Americans don't know their nominative cases from their accusatives! Notwithstanding that they call them by another name! I have told you umpteen times this is blatantly not true. An objective case preposition is called 'objective' case in England as well. You have not been listening to what I have been saying. Please do me a great favour; never teach grammar. Sorry, I have just fallen off my chair. I haven't laughed so much since I read the most recent Andrew Motion poem.
Oh dear.......I'm much better now. Oh yeah.....& while I am on a roll.....You say you may affect a British accent. Do you mind awfully if I enquire which accent? Received pronunciative, Estuary, Home county, Standard southern, Cockney, Norfolk Burr, West country, Black Country, Scouse, Mancunian, Brummie, Anglian North, Geordie, Mercian, Mercian east, Carlisle, Lancashire, Yorkshire, Wirral or by 'British' are you including Scotland, Wales & Northern Ireland, because they have even more accents & dialects!
I still say you have not understood why I asked the question about haiku/senryu in the first place. I am not doubting that some people have different takes on these appellations. My question is WHY we have differing ontological perspectives on this. This is what really fascinates me. It is the semiotic signification that intrigues me about this whole debate. If you want to contribute to that, I am all ears.
"Nowe spede vs atte oure begynnynge" (Mandreville's Travels)
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You two crack me up. In America, we call it 'objective' - as far as I know, we always have. Never heard 'accusative' - ever. Never. I have a degree in writing, by the way, from Loyola Marymount University
Now, if linguists working within the English language want to change the label, that's cool. But, they really ought to confer with linguists in other languages. I can only speak intelligently about English and Latin, but I can tell you, unequivocally, that it was always 'objective' in my three years of Latin study.
Now, as to whether common Americans (or any "common" population of any English-speaking country) recognise and/or use the objective forms of pronouns properly is really beside the point.
I think the study of language is fascinating, but it will always be a case of Academics attempting to enforce or recognise rules. Language predates rules, and it will continue to evolve in spite of academic exercises.
Consequently, if someone misuses a subjective noun where an objective pronoun should have appeared, the rule is pretty much worthless.
The good news is this: language is about communication. If you (or I, or anyone) can understand what has been said, screw the rules.
When writing, or using language in a professional setting, of course the conventions of grammar should be closely followed, but probably 99% of language is used informally - and should only be judged by how effectively it communicates the intended idea.
People who go around correcting the grammar of others have entirely missed the point (and probably don't do too well at parties and pubs).
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Communication
..as I understand, can take place only between equals. -
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That sounds awfully neat and tidy to me. Are you saying that, for instance, Cynewulf and Celtic Queen cannot communicate because they are unequal?
Communication takes place when one person speaks and another person listens (or one person writes and one reads).
And are we talking about linguistic equality? Sociologic? Cultural? Economic?
Nope, whoever said that communication can only take place among equals probably felt that he or she had no equal. He was wrong. -
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1st paragraph - yes, to me it is obvious that they are not communicating, because they are speaking from differing knowledge (unequal).
2nd paragraph - no, because I can listen to, for example, a Japanese person speaking, but they are not communicating. I can read German, but the gaps in my knowledge mean that the communication fails.
3rd paragraph - for communiaction to take place, all of these criteria must be met.
4th paragraph - take, for example, any new law. Law is the process of recognition of the wishes of the majority in a society, and follows social changes by a long period of time.
By the time the new law is enacted it has become an imposition on the society by the ruling powers. The ruled, and the rulers, are not equal. The new law fails in its attempt to communicate the wishes of the ruled.
That's not a very clear example of what I tried to communicate! -
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You really believe that?
1st paragraph: they are not communicating because they are not listening (reading) objectively - it has nothing to do with knowledge.
2nd paragraph: I should have added "in the same language". It goes without saying that I cannot communicate with Japanese, since I am not conversant in Japanese - however, a degree of communication can occur, even in this instance. This happens all the time - people use certain universal sign language. For instance, I can point my fingrs inside my mouth and most people will se that as "I am hungry" or "Let's eat" (or some variation). Peole who are choking reach for their throats instinctually - communicating nonverbally.
3rd paragraph: Bullshit. I have less than 10,000 bucks in the bank, but I can still communicat with millionaires. I am from the middle class, but I have worked with upper and lower classed people with no apparent communication difficulty. (Also, if communicants must be equal, where does this leave all th teachers in the world?)
4th paragraph: You are right. Bad example. Besides, one example does not prove your point. Law very often leads rather than follows social change - anti-smoking and drunk-driving ordinances are an example of this.
The truth is, no two people are equal (and, of course, Judeo-Christian philosophy tells us that all people are equal - if you buy that) - so, in that case, either communication is entirely possible or entirely impossible according to this whole "Equality" criteria.
Wanna try again?
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Equality
I think you guys should stick to the topic in hand & stop getting too involved with the fun CQ & myself are having. Why do you think that haiku as a form has so many interpretations? -
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I think that an attempt has been made to enforce artificial conventions to the "form".
I believe that the form is much more organic than Occidental writers will ever appreciate.
I also believe that it is a form that originated in the Orient - it is culturally and linguistically inaccessible to Occidentals. The conventions, I believe, are the product of Westerners attempting to apply inappropriate conventions to a distinct form that should not be understood in the English language.
The Japanese language, as I understand it, has nuance that cannot be effectively communicated in English. I have tried writing English language haiku, senryu, etc., and I have found it wholly unsatisfying.
Incidentally, the thread is what it is. You get to start it, but you don't get to contro the direction it takes.
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Objectivity
Well, maybe it is regional thing in America. I agree with what you are saying, well to point, but I have studied a lot of grammar & all the Americans I have spoken to about this agree with me. In fact I believe the terms I used were older, & you have changed them in the US possibly.
I was only winding CQ because she seemed to miss the point I was trying to make about the perceived differences in the debate in question. It is not a matter of academics making pointless rules anyway. The distinction I made was not who was right or wrong, but that the difference in appellation between objective/accusative & subjective/nominative are made for reasons of clarity by linguists. They are not made to confuse people.
I don't agree about 'screwing' the rules. Grammar, although in many ways a convention, is important in the transmission of information. You can break rules when you know them. Shakespeare did this regularly. The difference was that he knew what he was doing.
I think people who comment on other people's threads without realising that CQ & myself have not fell out about this & are having a good laugh at each other, probably don't too to well at parties & in pubs. If I thought I had badly upset CQ I would stop & apologise. But I think you are drastically underestimating the lady. She has held her own so far. Plus I quite liked her poetry, what I've seen of it anyway. I think she could tap a huge market with it.
Get a sense of humour Scott. -
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Dude, if I didn't have a sense of humor I wouldn't be laughing right now.
The "rules" really aren't rules at all, are they? They are conventions.
But, if a guy comes up to me and says, "We was all drunk", I know exactly what he means. So, the language was effective, accomplishing exactly what was intended by the speaker. It doesn't sound right to you or to me, but it was effective, nonetheless.
I can say "I am me" or "I am I" - and I have communicated the exact same message.
Academia really does'nt make rules. I understand this. They attempt to apply conventions to a language that developed as oral communication. Often, the conventions are treated as rules by educators - fortunately, academics can't control the language by application of conventions, else, I fear the language would die.
Case and tense (and, to a degree, person) really don't have much influence for the average speaker. You and your friends can talk about this all you like, but you can't keep Joe Blow from using the language the way he is comfortable using it.
Incidentally, I am nearly fifty years old - and accusative has never come up in any of my classes. I began my study of Latin in 1972 - and my Latin textbook is copywrite 1966. "Accusative does not appear in any of my texts. click on the link for personal pronouns here: http://titan.iwu.edu/~writcent/elements_of_grammar.html - no mention of accusative.
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Duelling yoyos
I have books on grammar printed before WW2 & they refer to accusative cases etc. How do you explain that all the Americans I know on line & personally know these terms then. You aren't one of those 'hill billies' are you? I have seen the film 'Deliverance'. -
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I guess you know a lot of really old people.
By the way, I did find mention of "Accusative" in a secondary Latin textbook that I bought in college around 1976 - it is copywrite 1949, so that fits your timeline. -
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You say tomato
Well it depends what you mean by old I reckon. Most of the Americans I know are in their 30's & 40's. There is a move towards dummification in my country as well. I was once told that I couldn't teach 'transitive' verbs by that name. The 'new' name was something George W. would have been proud of. Something like 'kinetificaterised' or something like that. I looked at the woman who told me this (a sociology graduate, I think) & said (with as straight a face as I could) what do I call coital or joining verbs then? She gave me no answer. I said do you know what they are? She didn't answer then either. Do I teach with the new politically hippy dummified correct term, Do I Fork! -
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Well, this is a big part of the reason that I, a relatively accomplished writer with a degree in English, will be teaching mathematics next Spring.
It is your job to sweat these details - and possibly the only people who really care are other educators - but most of your students will really have no need for more than a rudimentary understanding of grammar in their day-to-day lives.
As I said before, in professional communications, grammar truly is important - but that probably comprises less than one percent of all communication.
The study of language is fascinating, but it is the study of a thing in motion- the English language is undergoing, right now, a major genesis brought on by the Info Age (computers, PDAs, and cellular phones, most notably). -
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Grim grammar
Well, you are right in a way, but I think a firm grasp of grammar is an important foundation to understanding & more importantly appreciating the English canon. I will carry on teaching basic & advanced grammar, & I don't care what the hippies say. I am pissing into the storm admittedly, but I have to, for my own conscience if anything else. I may not be able to stop dummification but I going to fucking try! Even if it is pointless & futile, I know I am making some difference however insignificant. -
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You keep blaming the hippies, but that isn't really accurate is it? In the first place, as much as some might argue the point, we stopped producing hippies around 1972. IN the second place, the working class in Pittsburg or in Manchester have contributed more to the "dumbing down" of the English language than all the hippies in the world.
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The thing is, Elements of Style, Elements of Grammar, and Elements of Poetry are pretty much the gospels of writing for students in the US - so I am pretty comfortable with the conventions there.
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Words,words, words, words, words-Hamlet
Are they text books? -
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They are commonly used to augment textbooks in school. All three are relatively compact books seen in nearly every secondary school English classroom. Not textbooks in the strict sense of the word.
The style and grammar books are also commonly found next to the dictionary on most American secretaries' bookshelves.
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"You two crack me up."
I have a sense of humor - you are the one who apparently is having difficulty recognising the ridiculous.
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To the Germans,
I offer my apologies for my last comment. It was meant only as a joke. I realize it was a poor one and I am sorry for any offense it caused.
celtic queen -
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Deutschland Unter Alles
Yes, & I would love to apologise to the German people for any offence that I have caused. But I am not going to, because I know they have a bloody sense of humour! -
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not to mention, a command of the accusitive. It's taught here; I learned about it here (to my chagrin.)
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Accusative, even.
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Adding your reply:
Cynewulf
Jun 25 4:54 AM
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