Dear Eduard,
Please stop. Stop using ALL CAPITALS as it is SHOUTING. Stop insulting list
members. Stop being rude to Johanna Rubba. Stop forgetting that she's a
respected member of this list. Stop being off-topic (as it drives me
off-topic as well - this silly message is proof).
Please stop.
Elek
Budapest, Hungary
(no credentials, author of *four* books you haven't read, very poor
linguist, not even native speaker, lurking list member, easily annoyed,
poster of irrelevant messages, hater of myths, fighter against
provincialism, belonging to a different world than yours)
----- Original Message -----
From: "Eduard C. Hanganu" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Saturday, March 18, 2006 4:01 PM
Subject: Re: Breaking the Rules
> Dear Craig:
>
> I don't know why you posted this message. Who is Johanna Rubba? From
> the list of "credentials" at the bottom of her message she appears to
> be a mere instructor of Linguistics. I don't know what makes her
> think that she is an expert in language. Her e-mail is nothing more
> than an uninformed DIATRIBE, which breaks the rules of courtesy and
> decency she talkes about. While she chides me for *insulting* some
> people, her message contains no less than a dozen of offensive and
> gratuitous comments on my behalf.
>
> She tosses two books around (which, by the way, I have read), to
> *prove* that I don't know what I am talking about. Should I return
> the favor and ask her about the books *she did not read*? I find
> nothing relevant or of value in her message. As I said, it is all a
> diatribe which mixes ignorance with myth and insults. If you call her
> nonsense a "fine articulation" then we belong to different worlds.
>
> Do you know of any forum where people discuss language and grammar in
> an informed, and scholarly manner, free of provincialism and myths?
>
>
> Eduard
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> On Fri, 17 Mar 2006, Craig Hancock wrote...
>
> >---------------------------- Original Message -----------------------
> ----=
> >-
> > I'm forwarding another thoughtful post from Johanna.
> > I think polemical positions are less dangerous when expressed
> (I'm
> >thinking of Eduard's post), but that's in part because they provoke
> >fine articulations like those I'm relaying. ATEG brings people
> >together from different places. Johanna raises important issues
> about
> >mutual respect and collegiality.
> >
> >Craig
> >
> >
> >
> >Subject: Re: Language Change
> >From: "Johanna Rubba" <[log in to unmask]>
> >Date: Fri, March 17, 2006 2:35 pm
> >To: "Craig Hancock" <[log in to unmask]>
> >Cc: [log in to unmask]
> >---------------------------------------------------------------------
> ----=
> >-
> >
> >Hi, Craig,
> >
> >Although my take on these "polemics" is different from yours, I hope
> >you'll post this. I don't find these polemics at all delightful. To
> >treat baseless claims about language as legitimate opinions is
> harmful
> >and misleading to those listers who haven't had the opportunity to
> >study language deeply.
> >
> >I'd like to ask Eduard Hanganu to please study the situation a little
> >more carefully before he starts throwing around offensive claims
> about
> >Americans and linguists, etc. It's just plain rude to call the
> >findings (note I do not say "beliefs") of lifelong scholars of
> language
> >NONSENSE. Putting the words in caps is not exactly diplomatic.
> >
> >Eduard's ethnocentrism is obvious, and his claims about language and
> >linguistics are spurious. It's about time he realized that he is in
> >dialogue with scholars, like Herb Stahlke, whose knowledge of many
> >aspects of English and language in general is extraordinary and far
> >outstrips my own. Eduard is speaking anecdotally from his own
> >experience, as well as drawing in studies that are irrelevant to how
> >much speakers _subconsciously_ know about their language. A lot of
> this
> >knowledge is laid out in, for example, the Quirk et al. grammar of
> >English and the newer Huddleston and Pullum. I'd like to ask Eduard
> how
> >many school or college textbooks cover even 1% of that material, and
> >yet it is drawn from descriptions of the use of English by English
> >speakers (some with a lot of education, some not). I'd also like to
> ask
> >him how far he has read into either book. The fact that he appeals to
> >institutions like the Academie Fran=E7aise (yes, a few of us know
> about
> >it) proves his misunderstanding of sociolinguistics and the history
> of
> >how such institutions arise in stratified societies. Those who
> believe
> >in such institutions have a serious misunderstanding of how language
> >works. It's very practical to cultivate a lingua franca (or dialect
> >franca?) to sustain communication across the boundaries of speech
> >communities. (I don't like calling it a standard dialect anymore,
> >because "standard" is ambiguous between a neutral interpretation,
> such
> >as standard measurements, and an evaluative stance, such as "standard
> >of excellence".) But there is no need to attach false claims to such
> a
> >language variety. It is not superior to other dialects. It may be so
> in
> >the sense that it has a large vocabulary, but that is a historical
> >accident. Any language's vocabulary can be expanded. One might indeed
> >say that English came about most of those words dishonestly -- too
> >weak to invent them themselves, English speakers took them from other
> >"superior" languages like Latin and Greek. Many languages and
> dialects
> >have more subtlety in their grammar than "preferred" English does.
> They
> >express distinctions such as remote vs. recent past and temporary vs.
> >long-lasting states in the verb system (both characteristics of
> African
> >American English), not in separate phrases. English morphology is
> >"impoverished" compared to, say Turkish or Inuktitut. Such
> comparisons
> >are fruitless. Are the complex verb systems better than the separate
> >phrases? Can Inuktitut express a wider range of meanings than
> English?
> >There's more than one way to skin a cat.
> >
> >Every culture, literate or not, has a language that has the full
> >potential to express whatever concepts the culture comes up with.
> This
> >has been true for many thousands of years, well before Romania spoke
> >Romanian and those TWO THOUSAND years of history got started. America
> >has a history going back at least TEN THOUSAND years of indigenous
> >languages that are as complex and beautiful as a particle
> accelerator.
> >Funny how most of them were never written. I wonder how much Eduard
> >knows about Navajo verbs or Mikasuki tone systems. The history of
> >literacy and scholarship of a culture has nothing to do with the
> >quality or expressive potential of its language.
> >
> >I am in full agreement with Eduard on one thing -- the level of
> general
> >and specific world knowledge, not language, is abysmal in far too
> many
> >parts of the United States. This can't all be blamed solely on the
> >schools, and it has nothing at all to do with language. We have a
> >fundamentally anti-intellectual culture (which is ironic, given that
> >the country was founded by intellectuals of a high order). People are
> >happy with their MacDonald's bread and their NFL circuses (get the
> >reference to ancient Rome?) Those who have the resources to improve
> the
> >schools (taxpayers, the government, and the hyper-rich corporations
> and
> >stockholders) choose to invest that money elsewhere or keep it to
> >themselves. They also choose, often for purely political reasons, to
> >ignore the wisdom of those who study language for a living. Too many
> of
> >them have Eduard's understanding of language. As a result, millions
> of
> >children are essentially thrown into the garbage bin -- prison,
> >permanent low-wage jobs, low standards of living, poor health care,
> the
> >list goes on and on. Back in the late 1970's, an experiment was
> carried
> >out in which African American children were taught reading in a
> program
> >that transitioned them from books in their native dialect on themes
> >familiar to them to the "preferred" English texts used in general
> >language arts instruction. Those children made six months' gain in
> >reading ability in four months of using the program, and tested just
> >fine on a national standardized reading test for their grade level.
> The
> >publisher (I believe it was Houghton-Mifflin) decided not to market
> the
> >program because of the stigma of African American English. What do we
> >say to the many thousands of children who never got to benefit from
> >such a program? They become dropouts, gang members, prisoners, teen
> >parents, and many of them die at an early age thanks to the violence
> in
> >their communities. The public school system teaches middle-class
> >children to read and write in their native dialect. Why are they the
> >only ones deserving of this treatment? (In telling this story, I am
> not
> >acceding to the superiority of "preferred English". The
> >socially-determined facts on the ground are that children need to be
> >fluent in this dialect to have equal opportunity. The point is that
> it
> >is not necessary -- indeed it is harmful -- to endow that dialect
> with
> >some kind of intellectual superiority.)
> >
> >This list is intended for civilized discussion. It is of no benefit
> to
> >make baseless claims and insult whole populations. It is not in the
> >spirit of the list to be rude. I realize that I may have crossed that
> >line myself in this message, but perhaps the same tone is needed to
> >bring the point home. Or perhaps Eduard is like far too many people
> >engaging in "debate" today under the guise of "fair and balanced"
> >public discussion, who simply will never admit that they are wrong
> >about something no matter how many facts you throw at them.
> >
> >Dr. Johanna Rubba, Associate Professor, Linguistics
> >Linguistics Minor Advisor
> >English Department
> >California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo
> >E-mail: [log in to unmask]
> >Tel.: 805.756.2184
> >Dept. Ofc. Tel.: 805.756.2596
> >Dept. Fax: 805.756.6374
> >URL: http://www.cla.calpoly.edu/~jrubba
> >
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> >
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>
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