Pat’s Polemics

On-going brilliance

Search
  • Shortcuts

Prescriptivism: How It Works… or doesn’t

  09/23/2019       Pat Barrett      Add Comment

Some societies have a tense relationship with the language that bears them. My French neighbor exclaimed, when I told him our new French teacher was (Continue Reading)

What English Teachers Don't Know
If you’d like an e-mail notice of each new post, subscribe here:
Loading

Recent Posts

  • I’ve been tracking the one third……….
  • Typically of conservatives………
  • Even more on who/whom
  • When is it an attack and when is it evidence?
  • I hate it when I agree with conservatives.

Recent Comments

  • Pat Barrett on Time to replace the top leadership of the Democratic Party
  • Sandra Verbeke on Time to replace the top leadership of the Democratic Party
  • Pat Barrett on Speculation on leaked draft opinion re Roe
  • 伟思礼 on Speculation on leaked draft opinion re Roe
  • Pat Barrett on Speculation on leaked draft opinion re Roe

Categories

Archives

Meta

  • Log in
  • Entries feed
  • Comments feed
  • WordPress.org

Great example of how a quotative works

  07/06/2018       Pat Barrett      Add Comment

My grandson was speaking of a little kid in his karate class and he said, “Christian does not like not pay attention.” The first thing (Continue Reading)

Linguistics, scolds and guardians, What English Teachers Don't Know

Good Use for Grammar

  09/05/2017       Pat Barrett      Add Comment

I recently got two e-mails, one from Amazon and one from Walgreens, both of which I have recently dealt with. Both were headed, “Your order (Continue Reading)

What English Teachers Don't Know

McWhorter on Black English

  05/28/2017       Pat Barrett      Add Comment

C-Span had McWhorter discussing his book, Back Talk, Black Talk. In his talk he laid out, in his usual fashion, the structure of discourse on (Continue Reading)

grammar & language change, Linguistics, scolds and guardians, What English Teachers Don't Know

… fall the facts where they may.

  04/11/2017       Pat Barrett      Add Comment

Is this construction, verb + subject + modal embedded in an adverbial clause an archaism, obsolete? What is its origin. Is it like “now I (Continue Reading)

What English Teachers Don't Know

Unexpected variations

  03/18/2017       Pat Barrett      Add Comment

Recently, John Kasich amused viewers of the GOP primary by saying things like, “The economy needs healed.” Standard English says either ‘the economy needs healing’ (Continue Reading)

What English Teachers Don't Know

Prescriptivism – short version of entry

  02/21/2017       Pat Barrett      Add Comment

This comment should not have to be made, but I have read so many posts to listservs by teachers who assert the absolute superiority of Standard (Continue Reading)

What English Teachers Don't Know

Frozen expressions as repositories of the old grammar

  11/13/2016       Pat Barrett      Add Comment

Look me in the eye. How explain the “me”? A frozen expression from a time when English used a dative case “me”. Now I lay (Continue Reading)

What English Teachers Don't Know

When prescriptivism helps

  05/18/2016       Pat Barrett      Add Comment

Let’s take a look at how prescriptivism can interfere with establishing whether or not an expression is standard English or not. Let’s say the question (Continue Reading)

What English Teachers Don't Know

Ruining my reputation on the Stack Exchange

  03/29/2016       Pat Barrett      5 Comments

The English Language & Usage blog of the Stack Exchange irks me no end. Some of the answers are good. One really dumb thing happened: (Continue Reading)

What English Teachers Don't Know

Response to “Bribes”

  09/24/2015       Pat Barrett      Add Comment

There must be some understanding of how people learn as well as some understanding of how people eat. The connection? Re the latter, the more (Continue Reading)

What English Teachers Don't Know

A matter of perspective or of words?

  03/20/2015       Pat Barrett      Add Comment

Do our words affect our perception or even effect our perception? Here are three examples: I read the directions to where a drop box for (Continue Reading)

What English Teachers Don't Know

Watching the process…..

  03/15/2015       Pat Barrett      Add Comment

As I was reading about the Hanseatic League, Hanse in Low German, Hansa in Latinate language, it struck me how basic such organization and binding (Continue Reading)

What English Teachers Don't Know

blue & black or white & gold

  02/27/2015       Pat Barrett      Add Comment

Interesting how adamant people get about something clearly a matter of perception. Kind of like the learning/acquisition issue.

What English Teachers Don't Know

A start on Fukuyama’s first book

  02/09/2015       Pat Barrett      Add Comment

I took all summer and and fall, after I started in the spring, to finish Fukuyama’s big book, The Origins of Political Order. I recommend (Continue Reading)

What English Teachers Don't Know

Where does it all come from?

  10/30/2014       Pat Barrett      Add Comment

“ Our unspectacular (but not horrible) performance on tests is because of our high child poverty rate, about 23%, second highest among 34 economically advanced (Continue Reading)

What English Teachers Don't Know

Basics II

  07/03/2014       Pat Barrett      Add Comment

My web guru has assured me that the attention span of my readers does not sustain the long entry I posted on Basics. I’m trying (Continue Reading)

What English Teachers Don't Know

Big Main Intro to BASICS

  07/01/2014       Pat Barrett      Add Comment

Over the years, since July of 2008, a few items have appeared under the category Basics. All of them seem to be worth reading in (Continue Reading)

What English Teachers Don't Know

What Amis said……….

  06/18/2014       Pat Barrett      Add Comment

“If there’s one word that sums up everything that’s gone wrong since the war, it’s ’Workshop.’ After ’Youth,’ that is.” I hope that’s right; I (Continue Reading)

What English Teachers Don't Know

Rejoinder to the post-racial comments

  06/15/2014       Pat Barrett      Add Comment

A rejoinder to those who say our racial problems are over because we have a Black president: both India and Pakistan have had female presidents; (Continue Reading)

What English Teachers Don't Know

Ups and Downs, Ins and Outs

  03/03/2014       Pat Barrett      Add Comment

Human societies are so complex we cannot make final judgments in most cases about what is good and what is bad. There is usually a (Continue Reading)

What English Teachers Don't Know

Excerpt from a book everyone needs to read for the survival of our schools and profession

  09/17/2013       Pat Barrett      Add Comment

Of equal importance are the topics that corporate reformers don’t talk about. Seldom do they protest budget cuts, no matter how massive they may be. (Continue Reading)

What English Teachers Don't Know

Outline of World Geography

  08/29/2013       Pat Barrett      Add Comment

In 1972 I taught a class in multiculturalism at the Phoenix OIC. It upset a lot of people that I was selected to do so (Continue Reading)

What English Teachers Don't Know
  • 1
  • 2
  • 3
  • Next
Theme By: Benajmin Lu
Powered By: WordPress