At 12:07 PM 7/21/2006, Paul E. Doniger wrote:
>Of course that sentence needs revision, and of course the student 
>who wrote it needs to be taught that it is in error. One could start 
>by trying to show that the word 'at' is redundant and therefore 
>unnecessary. . . .

DD: A fair amount of redundancy is needed for effective 
communication. See any work on communication theory. Shannon at the 
Bell Labs is a good start. As a receiver getting progressively deaf, 
I will vouch for that. I look at eyes, body gestures, and appreciate 
the inherent redundancies in every day high standard English. I have 
noticed that tilting my head and squinting often gets me a 
re-transmission in a redundant but different text message. The 
important thing is to get the info in the message across. The same 
thing when I address students. I watch their eyes and body reactions. 
If I get Round eyes, I rephrase and try again. But the understanding 
of the format (Grammar) the message is being transmitted in helps a lot.

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