Herb:

In his book The Oxford English Grammar Greenbaum (1996) describes 
traditional grammar and some of its essential characteristics in the 
following words:
 
Traditional grammar adopts the approaches and descriptive categories 
used, particularly in school grammars, in the eighteenth and 
nineteenth centuries. Traditional grammars describe solely, or 
chiefly, the written language and are indebted to Latin grammars for 
some of their analyses of English. (p. 26)

Besides school grammars, adds Greenbaum, “scholarly reference 
grammars of the first half of the twentieth century, such as the 
major work by Otto Jespersen (cf.n.1) have also been considered 
traditional grammars (p. 26).
 
Traditional grammars are also considered “prescriptive,” and 
not “descriptive.” Williams clarifies the distinction in this 
manner: “We say that traditional grammar is prescriptive because it 
focuses on the distinction between what some people do with language 
and what they ought to do with it, according to a pre-established 
standard.” (p. 50).
 
Referring to the approach these grammars take in the definition of 
grammar terms, Greenbaum specifies that such grammars use “notional” 
descriptions or formulations:

Traditional grammars typically make use of notional criteria; for 
example, defining a noun as the name of a person, place, or thing 
rather than by formal criteria such as that nouns typically take 
plural inflections or that they typically may be introduced by the. 
Grammars that make frequent use of notional definitions are notional 
grammars. (p. 26)
 
This classification of the word classes appears at first sight as an 
oversimplification and reduction of their grammatical roles, but the 
purpose of such an approach is to make the notions accessible to a 
large group of students, from the first grade to college. Huddleston 
(1995) makes the following comment about the notional approach:

Notional definitions are characteristic of much traditional grammar – 
and of the grammar taught in schools in many places even now. Their 
appeal is clear. The avoid the apparent circularity of the structural 
approach where a noun, say, is explained by reference to heads, noun 
phrases, subjects, objects, dependents, singular and plural 
inflections, and so on, all these other terms being just as much in 
need of explanation as ‘noun’ itself. The notional definition by 
contrast does not mention any technical terms of syntax beside the 
one being defined: it is expressed instead in terms of apparently 
everyday and intuitively obvious concepts 
like ‘person,’ ‘place,’ ‘command,’ ‘request.’ (p. 56).
	
The notional definition approach to word classes has been criticized 
again and again, and termed incorrect and inadequate. Fries (cited in 
Mulroy, 2003, p. 70), commented that some parts of speech could have 
multiple functions in the sentence, while Huddleston (1995) mentioned 
that “the trouble is that the notional definitions simply don’t give 
the right results,” and supported his point of view with an example 
concerning the noun definition: “Take first the one we have given for 
noun – the name of a person, place, or thing. If we interpret ‘thing’ 
to mean ‘physical object,’ then clearly the definition does not 
provide a necessary condition for nounhood” (p 56). 

The claim that traditional grammar definitions are “inaccurate” 
and “antiquated” seems to be founded on a simplistic understanding of 
those definitions. Indeed, “Fries was right that traditional 
grammarians have not been entirely consistent in their definitions of 
the parts of speech” (Mulroy, 2003, p. 70), and Huddleston showed 
that “notional definitions simply don’t give the right results” 
(1995, p. 56), but structural definitions need even more 
clarification than notional definitions, according to Huddleston 
himself (p. 56), and such definitions are far from perfect, too. More 
than that, the terms in the traditional grammar seem more adequate 
for basic and intermediate grammars than the structural ones: 
The parts of speech are traditionally taught to young students, and 
the ways in which they have been taught reproduce the way in which 
classificatory schemes are usually internalized. One starts with the 
prototypes: the clearest, most familiar examples of a category 
(Mulroy, 2003, p. 70). 

In order to make the prototype notion clear in the mind of the reader 
Mulroy refers to the means through which children come to recognize 
different species of birds as they begin “with a familiar and 
unproblematic example of the category,” not “with an abstract 
definition.” The same principle applies to the learning of word 
classes:

So, too, in teaching the classes of words, it is natural to begin 
with prototypical examples. Names of persons, places, and things 
provide a good collection of nouns. As one continues to study 
grammar, more refined criteria come into play, often subconsciously. 
Nouns are words that act like prototypical nouns. The decisive 
criteria of the parts of speech have to do with the rules governing 
their forms and the kinds of words with which they are combined. 
(2003, p. 70)

*********


What else needs to be said about traditional grammars?

Eduard 

	


On Fri, 18 Aug 2006, Herbert F.W. Stahlke wrote...

>I have a feeling this debate over traditional grammar will continue 
to
>go in a circle.  We don't agree on what traditional grammar is.  We
>don't agree on the relationships between traditional grammar and
>language learning and teaching.  If we want to spend some time
>specifying what traditional grammar is and what it teaches and
>encompasses, then we might have a productive topic to discuss.  I
>suspect Eduard, Phil, and I, for example, agree on more than is
>apparent, but we're using different language and making different
>assumptions.
>
> 
>
>Herb  

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