Judy Diamondstone wrote:

> YES, grammar is meaningful/ has a semantic basis, and,
> as Bill McLear implied, HAS to be distinguished from the "linguistic
> etiquette" that prescribes a standard variety for everyone.

This seems to identify one of the big divides in conceptualizing grammar.
I can think of any number of grammatical distinctions that don't seem to have
any semantic basis.

Here is one formal property that is not reflected in the underlying meaning and
that poses some problem in writing standard English.

Consider the tag question for the following sentence:
    1) Everyone is sick of hearing about Monica Lewinsky, (?) isn't he?

(?) isn't he/she?

2)
aren't they?
Notice you cannot say
     3) *Everyone are sick of hearing about Monica Lewinsky, aren't they?

This is the kind of evidence which shows that there are formal distinctions in
grammar which can not be related to some underlying semantic difference.


> Re: Paul's question, how to "fix" students' grammar,
> I think the problem might be in the question. If you
> teach the distinction between grammar, which does
> have a semantic basis, and those conventions which
> do not, or for which the semantic basis holds ONLY
> for writing (like the distinction between "their/ there")
> then pointing out the 'error' does not impugn the
> language that students use to make sense. It's an
> error only with respect to standard written English,
> which is itself inappropriate in many informal settings.

The only problem with this truism is deciding what the purpose of learning about
grammar is.  Do we really have to teach students, especially those in primary
school, their particular dialect? (Wasn't this exactly the misunderstanding in the
Ebonics debate?)  For better or worse, isn't one of the purposes of schooling to
teach literacy and one of the purposes of literacy is to control the formal
standard?

Does anyone know of any academic journal that regularly accepts papers that are
written in non-standard English or fail to follow the there/their distinction?

Bob Yates, Central Missouri State University