What is "correct" in language usage?
Jan. 11th, 2012 10:16 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
barking_iguanaI've been getting into some discussions on usage over at Facebook, stemming from something ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
yesthattom posted on Google+. While I think the push-back against prescriptivism over the past few decades has been beneficial and generally correct, I also think people are undercutting themselves (and worse, those younger than themselves whom they influence) by taking an absolutist stance on the matter.
When speaking among people in your own social setting, anything that makes you easily understood, or even not so easily if you're doing it for a reason, is correct. Telling people that how they and their families speak is "wrong" is empirically nonsensical and it puts an uncomfortable barrier between themselves and any other manner of speaking.
But there is also a common English across subcultures and regions that facilitates communication across those boundaries and even, through writing, across generations. For good reason, that standard changes much more slowly than the vernacular in some particular high school. It is useful to know that standard, regardless of how similar it is to your everyday speech, both to understand with more confidence what one reads and to write or speak in a way that strangers will have more confidence that they understand you.
There is also high-status spoken English, which is similar to the standard, but not quite the same thing. It is useful to know that, as well. There are situations where even people who don't speak that way at home tacitly agree to do so in that context. There, they judge others' ability to fit in in more meaningful ways that are not quickly revealed by the same people's ability to conform to this high-status spoken English. That is not fair in that people whose home English is much closer to high-status English have a large advantage, but this vetting does serve a purpose and is not likely to go away. It is certainly a valid way of life to say "fuck you" to this form of conformity, but it is useful to have the option to participate if and when one wants to.
yesthattom posted on Google+. While I think the push-back against prescriptivism over the past few decades has been beneficial and generally correct, I also think people are undercutting themselves (and worse, those younger than themselves whom they influence) by taking an absolutist stance on the matter.When speaking among people in your own social setting, anything that makes you easily understood, or even not so easily if you're doing it for a reason, is correct. Telling people that how they and their families speak is "wrong" is empirically nonsensical and it puts an uncomfortable barrier between themselves and any other manner of speaking.
But there is also a common English across subcultures and regions that facilitates communication across those boundaries and even, through writing, across generations. For good reason, that standard changes much more slowly than the vernacular in some particular high school. It is useful to know that standard, regardless of how similar it is to your everyday speech, both to understand with more confidence what one reads and to write or speak in a way that strangers will have more confidence that they understand you.
There is also high-status spoken English, which is similar to the standard, but not quite the same thing. It is useful to know that, as well. There are situations where even people who don't speak that way at home tacitly agree to do so in that context. There, they judge others' ability to fit in in more meaningful ways that are not quickly revealed by the same people's ability to conform to this high-status spoken English. That is not fair in that people whose home English is much closer to high-status English have a large advantage, but this vetting does serve a purpose and is not likely to go away. It is certainly a valid way of life to say "fuck you" to this form of conformity, but it is useful to have the option to participate if and when one wants to.
