My vote is for the broader view.  I really want to get away from teaching
usage issues as much as possible while still helping people to the "standard
American English" dialect.  That standard is so busy changing that we are
hard pressed to define it, I suspect.  "Myself" is regularly used as a
non-reflexive subject or object now; I is regularly used as an object of a
preposition and as subject of some infinitives--He asked Jane and I to eat
with him.

> ----------
> From:         Johanna Rubba[SMTP:[log in to unmask]]
> Reply To:     Assembly for the Teaching of English Grammar
> Sent:         Thursday, March 25, 1999 11:25 AM
> To:   [log in to unmask]
> Subject:      Re: what grammar needs to be taught and why
>
> On Wed, 24 Mar 1999, Bob Yates wrote:
>
> > Johanna Rubba wrote:
> >
> > > This makes it sound like the only people we are teaching to when we
> teach
> > > grammar is speakers of nonstandard dialects. I don't think Bob intends
> > > this to be inferred.
> >
> > That is a most ungenerous reading of what I wrote.
>
> Hence the 'I don't think' clause.
>
> >  I am assuming that
> > we teach grammar to all native speakers of English to help them make
> > conscious decisions about what is appropriate, defining appropriate as
> > being standard or textually felicitous.
>
> Yeah! Right on!
>
> >
> > > And I do see a connection to text structure. I've claimed before that
> > > choices about sentence structure are governed by the need to manage
> > > information flow in texts.
> >
> > This statement is right.  However, the central question is whether
> > knowledge of
> > argument structure is necessary to resolve issues of information flow in
> > a text.
>
> Yes. I'm posing this question. People who have a lot more experience than
> I in teaching composition would have a feel for an answer to this
> question.
>
> > Excuse me, but the ONLY way to answer that question is to ask who the
> > students are.  I can think of any number grammatical structures I have
> > to be prepared to teach to non-native speakers that I never have to
> > teach to native speakers.  For example, native speakers never have to be
> > taught about how the article system in English works.  The entire
> > distinction of count/non-count nouns is never something native speakers
> > have to be taught. etc.  These distinctions have important implications
> > for certain grammatical decisions that are influenced by information
> > flow.   I don't know of any study which reveals that native speakers
> > have any difficult with these structures.
>
> One area in which the count/mass distinction might be needed is if we want
> to try to maintain (in formal writing, at least) the distinction between
> 'fewer' and 'less' and 'number' and 'amount', which is being lost.
> 'Less' and 'amount' are winning out over 'fewer' and 'number' in
> front of plural count nouns. So I'm _very_ frequently seeing and hearing
> expressions like 'a large amount of students' and 'less students', where I
> would naturally say 'a large number of students' and 'fewer students'.
>
> As a linguist, I recognize the futility of trying to maintain distinctions
> that the general population seems determined to lose; so I guess the
> relevant question is: How much does the collapse of this distinction
> bother people who will be judging our graduates? Here's an item to include
> on all the Hairston replications that people are doing.
>
> A general question for ATEG subscribers and for the SSS committee is being
> raised here: should K-12 grammar instruction be more-narrowly focused on
> 'things native speakers have trouble with in learning the formal
> standard variety of English' or should it be broader, 'to give speakers of
> English a relatively thorough understanding of how English works'?
>
> The more-narrow focus may be a practical, more-attainable aim in the short
> term. What do other listers think of the value of the broader scope? One
> value I see in it is that it would give students a basis for considering
> and forming opinions on such issues as language legislation and Ebonics in
> the schools.
>
> ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
> Johanna Rubba   Assistant Professor, Linguistics              ~
> English Department, California Polytechnic State University   ~
> San Luis Obispo, CA 93407                                     ~
> Tel. (805)-756-2184     Fax: (805)-756-6374                   ~
> E-mail: [log in to unmask]                           ~
> Office hours Winter 1999: Mon/Wed 10:10-11am Thurs 2:10-3pm   ~
> Home page: http://www.calpoly.edu/~jrubba                     ~
> ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
>