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Originally Posted by roboat  Wow! That is certainly the first time I've heard that perspective!  Without any rancor, Roboat, you really have to read more, in the right areas.
Then, you know, it's like totally OK to dis the old rulz? If alot of people say it or whatever, then how you gonna get up in my face wit it? nowamsain?  It's certainly more than appropriate to diss the old rules/prescriptions that never were rules of language.
Good Lord, what exactly DO you teach in English class? 
Does anyone agree with you? |
I teach the English language as it is used by educated speakers the world over, Roboat, though I hardly make use of the dialects I'm unfamiliar with.
Actually, over my many years of teaching, I find my views are pretty well right in line with those of informed language science, and what's most important of all, actual language use, for it is the ultimate arbiter of what's correct.
Would you study, say, pigeons and make up all sorts of rules about how pigeons should behave, how they should coo, when they should coo? Of course not and yet that's exactly what was done with respect to the English language. Is that how any scientific study should proceed, by making up fictions instead of observing what's actually the case?