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Bruce,

This isn’t a direct reply to your question, but I thought it might be useful to introduce a distinction. People’s ability to draw meaning from sentences like the one you quoted may be saying something about the process of reading in addition to, or even in some cases as opposed to, the process of spoken language comprehension. If someone walked up to you and attempted to say those words roughly as they are spelled (“roughly” given that some of the clusters are non-English-able), you probably would have a great deal more trouble figuring out what was going on. That does not, of course, mean that such studies are irrelevant to theories of grammar, only that their relevance has to be interpreted in reference to the status of reading as an activity in *some* regards separate from innate language use.

Bill Spruiell

Dept. of English

Central Michigan University

From: Assembly for the Teaching of English Grammar [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Bruce D. Despain
Sent: Saturday, March 18, 2006 9:21 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: Language Change

Did anyone notice the grammatical errors in the excerpt I sent yesterday?

I think there was a message in it about how our mind also seems to overlook grammar in trying to get meaning out of language. The first phrase in the second sentence is dangling grammatically independent of the sentence to which it is attached. It should probably be taken out as another sentence something like this:

The phaonmneal pweor of the hmuan mnid was rcneltey rleaved by smoe rscheearch at Cmabrigde Uinervtisy.

The rest of that sentence is also a bit awkward, so I'm sure this is not really the best solution. Like a lot of what we do it was probably not felt important enough for a rewrite from the first draft (writer was uncomforatble in the new medium?). Inadvertently this made a second very important point. Another message was in the message. For a teacher it is like peeling an onion. Fix the first layer stuff first (like orthography), then the next layer will be revealed for revision.

My question: is the next layer to be corrected the syntax and then the morphological and phonological niceties after that. Does the syntax correct itself when we go directly to the semantics in making meaning? Do we experiment with different syntax until the correct meaning pops out, or does thinking of the meaning naturally let only that one (correct) way come to the surface? Maybe different authors can be allowed to find their own way.

I'm sure some of you can articulate this better than I have.

Bruce

----- Original Message -----

From: [log in to unmask]">Bruce Despain

To: [log in to unmask]">[log in to unmask]

Sent: Friday, March 17, 2006 11:39 AM

Subject: Re: Language Change

We've talked about the formal constraints of grammar. Look what's been going around on the Internet. It demonstrates the kind of wiring built into the mind for processing the printed word:

i cdnuolt blveiee taht I cluod aulaclty uesdnatnrd waht I was rdanieg. The phaonmneal pweor of the hmuan mnid, aoccdrnig to rscheearch at Cmabrigde Uinervtisy, it deosn't mttaer in waht oredr the ltteers in a wrod are, the olny iprmoatnt tihng is taht the frist and lsat ltteer be in the rghit pclae. The rset can be a taotl mses and you can sitll raed it wouthit a porbelm. Tihs is bcuseae the huamn mnid deos not raed ervey lteter by istlef, but the wrod as a wlohe. Amzanig huh? yaeh and I awlyas tghuhot slpeling was ipmorantt!

Bruce
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