I would like to raise an issue brought to mind by the discussion of
whether one should call FALLEN, for example, a perfect participle, a past
participle, or a passive participle.  It seemed to me that the discussion
elided the difference between a name and a complete description.  I doubt
that any system of nomenclature is ever accurate in the sense for which
traditional grammatical terminology is sometimes criticized on this list
for not being.  In baseball, a "pitcher" also fields, covers first base,
and bats (in the National League).  Obviously, it would "more correct" to
call shortstops "left second basemen."  When you study Latin, you have to
memorize R, RIS or RE, TUR, MUR, MINI, NTUR as the personal passive
endings.  This is an extremely valuable piece of information for a young
Latinist.  It turns out that these endings are also used with "deponent"
verbs, which are active in meaning, but no classicist has ever suggested
that R, RIS or RE etc. should be called anything other than "passive"
endings.
        Any grammatical term can be deconstructed.  Why call TREE a direct
object of a "transitive" verb in a sentence like I SEE THE TREE.  In fact,
you are not doing anything to the tree.  Light waves emanating from
it are impinging on your eyes.   Or to take an even more obvious example,
how can we say that the verb in I ENDURED SLINGS AND ARROWS is in the
ACTIVE voice?  What about I SLEPT ALL DAY?  Why call the infinitive "THE
infinitive" when a participle is just as non-finite as it is?
        Nevertheless, from my perspective as a college teacher outside of
English, I think it would be extremely valuable to students to have a
grasp of traditional terminology with all of its alleged imperfections.
When you teach a foreign language, it is helpful to know that in English,
AM, IS, and ARE are called the "present tense" forms of the "infinitive"
BE, that HAS/HAVE BEEN is the "present perfect tense" etc.  In discussing
writing, the topic of the passive voice often arises.  It would be helpful
for students to understand that you were referring to compound verbs
constructed of forms of BE plus a "past participle."  When a student looks
up (say) IMPUGN in a dictionary and sees "V. TR." after it, it would
helpful if he understood what that meant.
        What I am urging is that it would make sense for English teachers
at all levels to adhere to traditional terminology as found in
dictionaries.  It seems to me that a problem in language arts education is
terminological anarchy that leaves students confused without any
compensatory gains.
        Thanks for your time!  I'm looking forward meeting some of you in
Minneapolis.  (I'm not nearly so argumentative in person.)

David Mulroy
Classics, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee