Posted on 01/10/2005 10:26:26 PM PST by nickcarraway
One of the smaller, but no less bloody skirmishes in the Culture War is being waged on the linguistic front. For those new to the field there are essentially two camps: one made up of linguists, lexicographers, academics or language liberals; the other of conservatives or prescriptivists, the so-called "linguistic luddites." The conservative's anguish over the decline of the English language, the linguists charge, is no different than his distress over the decline of culture in general. This "whining," writes linguist Alan Pagliere, is a mix of nostalgia, self-righteousness, and ignorance of the reality of the laws governing and of the myriad variables involved in language change.
Indeed, the battle cry of the language liberal might be, "Languages change. Get over it." Most linguists judge that language change is neither good nor bad, and, anyway, resistance is futile. Languages, like hemlines, will change whether we want them to or not. This indifference to standards is reflected in the latest editions of our popular dictionaries in which words that are commonly misspelled (alright) or misused (disinterested) have been given the lexicographer's stamp of approval.
Yet despite all this talk of transformation the mother tongue has gone remarkably unchanged since the King James Version of the Bible began to stabilize the language in the mid-seventeenth century. Words come and go, yes, but a letter written 367 years ago by John Milton to Benedetto Bonomatthai reads much like one composed by a good writer today:
I am inclined to believe that when the language in common use in any country becomes irregular and depraved, it is followed by their ruin or their degradation.
Now note the dissimilarity between the writing of Chaucer and Shakespeare after a mere 225 years.
Chaucer: Whanne that April with his shoures sote
The droughte of March hath perced to the rote.
Shakespeare: Weary with toil, I haste me to my bed,
The dear repose for limbs with travel tired;
Often there is good reason to be skeptical of change, particularly when it comes about out of laziness and the dumbing-down of grammar rules. Again, compare Fowler's inflexible 1926 Dictionary of Modern English Usage to current grammars like Woe is I, in which rules that are troublesome or too difficult to remember are pronounced outdated or dead. (Rats, if I had known this was possible in my college days I would have pronounced Algebra outdated and dead and gotten on with my binge drinking.)
What the conservative sees as threats to the mother tongue are dismissed by the linguist as the natural progression of language, and nature trumps civilization (here represented by long-established rules) every time. These threats include the politicization of language, as in politically correct speech; threats from bureaucrats, businessmen, and politicians who use language to obfuscate, confuse and deceive, or in the case of academics to disguise a dearth of ideas; and, finally, threats from linguists who promote a laissez-faire approach to language.
Ever since the ancient Egyptians began scratching hieroglyphics into sandstone, civilization's most brilliant writers and thinkers have maintained a deep appreciation for -- in Swift's phrase -- the "proper words in their proper places," and felt it their duty to defend their language against its natural tendency to slide back into barbarism. In the preface to his 1755 dictionary Samuel Johnson noted how "…tongues, like governments, have a natural tendency to degeneration; we have long preserved our constitution, let us make some struggle for our language." Johnson's statement would get only derision from today's anything-goes linguists.
The difference between the Age of Johnson and now is that proper and elegant language today is seen as elitist and anti-democratic, whereas once it was considered every educated man's duty to uphold. Here is linguistic pioneer Friedrich von Schlegel writing in 1815:
The care of the national language is at all times a sacred trust and a most important privilege of the higher orders of society. Every man of education should make it the object of his unceasing concern to preserve his language pure and entire, to speak it, so far as in his power, in all its beauty and perfection.
Language, being an important part of our national heritage, as well as our cultural identity, necessary says a great deal about what kind of people we are. A slovenly, anarchic language reflects poorly on us. The language liberals may have abandoned their duty to preserve the language, but the recent popularity of "why oh why" books such as Lynne Truss' Eats, Shoots & Leaves and Robert Hartwell Fiske's Dictionary Of Disagreeable English prove that the public is serious about its upkeep. Once again academics and other language liberals have shown themselves to be out of touch with the mainstream and their opinions hopelessly irrelevant.
When someone says, "just between you and I" cold chills run up my spine.
After reading your example,I quite despair of the future of our mother tongue.
Bump for later...
Those letters were indeed beautifully written.
I didn't mean economically, I meant in terms of breadth and scope. There is still art and classical music out there for those who care to search them out. The Von B. and Shakespeare comparisons are unfair since those works have endured. We don't yet what will endure from the mass of our culture.
That said, our language is becoming more technical in nature.
Welcome to the club.
English has been greatly enriched in the expression of new sciences. Much has been lost in verb usage. English is the most verb-rich language on earth (or it was). We are losing that, and I blame the friggin' teachers' unions.
End of rant.
Except for the Chuck Berry song, "Johnny Be Good" which is aboard the space ship we sent out 20 or so years ago to travel for eternity through space.
Alien cultures finding that gem will be perplexed for sure.
By the way I like the song.
If you go back 40-50 years,you'll see that even the most banal movies and T.V. programs had better word usage and much more varied vocabularies,than today's do. And should you go back to movies made in the 1930's,there's even a more yawning abyss.
I don't know -- there were still more than half a dozen papers in NYC in 1950. Perhaps I should choose one of the others. Afterall, the NYT was always considered upscale.
Years ago I bought a diary a homeless guy was selling on the street just off St. Marks. The diarist was a young girl circa 1930. The formality and over-blown romantic phrasing in it was maddening to read. However,the handwriting was beautiful.
What depresses me most is to read letters home from the front. Compare letters home from the Civil War to the Vietnam war.
This nation robbed her sons of the classical education they deserved. Rather than turn that around, the devolution has continued apace.
You like handwriting? It's my one wee vanity...I have an almost perfect Palmer hand.:-)
I can think of a half dozen rock songs that will endure 200 years from now. Universal themes and all that.
You're absolutely right;sadly.
Handwriting is fascinating in that it was considered a "status symbol" at one time, much like the ability to actually construct a sentence. A couple years ago I'm at the house of some whacked out European in California and he actually gave his children handwriting lessons. The tutor came in and instructed them on the care and use of a fountain pen, etc. etc. etc.
Arrrggggh! That means you could care less. What you mean is "I couldn't care less."
Just so you know, stupid white boys have been say aks for ask for, oh, at least 600 years ("I axe, why the fyfte man Was nought housband to the Samaritan?" -- Chaucer, 1386) and probably back well into Old English (as "acsian") for over 1,000 years. It was considered good literary English as late as 1535 ("Axe & it shall be given you." -- Matthew 7:7 in the Cloverdale Bible).
I'm sorry but I'm with the "liberal linguists" on this one. Languages change over time. The question is how much voice recordings will act to push back that change.
Incorrect contractions and homonyms irk me most.
What's wrong with that? Some people still use a fountain pen (I do!)and should know how to take care of it.
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