Interesting question, David. Here's how I got into it, in the very
late 1960s.
I was teaching English as a full-time, long-term substitute at a
public school for gifted boys, and my students often asked me
questions I could not answer. I would tell them I would try to find
the answer, and then I would ask my fellow department members. Nearly
always, they did not know the answer either. (The chair would have
known, but nobody talked to him.)
This was a time when some people feel English teachers "knew their
grammar." But these guys' knowledge was as thin as a toothpick. I
use "guys" because they were all male; no females allowed on staff at
that time at that school.
No former teacher below college level ever instilled my interest in
studying grammar, quite the contrary.
So I started studying linguistics on my own (at first) then in
graduate school.
EdS
On Sep 3, 2010, at 3:46 PM, David Kehe wrote:
> I imagine that most of us on this listserv have an intrinsic
> interest in studying grammar. In other words, we study it just for
> the joy of it. But why? Is it in our DNA to find grammar so
> interesting? Did someone, for example, a former teacher, do
> something that instilled in us this interest?
>
> I would be interested to hear from any of you why you like grammar
> so much and/or how you came to like it. It seems that if we could
> figure out what makes it so interesting to some, we might be able to
> come up with ways that we could help our students develop an
> intrinsic motivation for studying it too.
>
> Thanks,
>
> David Kehe
> Bellingham, WA
>
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