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

From: Frances A. Sheppard <[log in to unmask]>

To: <[log in to unmask]>

Sent: Sunday, May 28, 2000 6:44 AM

Subject: Re: Horrors before a long weekend.





> My point is that there are many, many teachers who have not had enough grammar

> and punctuation in their high school courses and seldom in college. Students

> are not being taught and since most of us have been students, many of us were

> not taught. I have been teaching business English since 1975 and have heard

> complaints from hundreds of students. Let's figure out how to solve the

> problem, not how to say it doesn't exist. College comp courses are very

> different from business writing courses, but they both rely on knowledge of

> grammar and punctuation.

> 

> MAX MORENBERG wrote:

> 

> > Like William McCleary and David Neyhart, I suspect there's been some

> > mistranslation on the student's part.  The advanced comp teacher could have

> > been railing against the overuse of "of" phrases in, for instance, academic

> > and business writing.  And he/she also could have pointed out that such

> > writing often misuses passives and that writers should be careful about

> > both-cludgy, overnominalized sentences and weak passives.  It wouldn't take

> > much for a student to confuse the issues.

> >

> > A colleague, who was in the middle of  a lit crit article, the other day

> > stopped me in the hall and said in desperation, "there should be a law

> > against more than two 'of' phrases in any sentence."  Anyone who reads

> > academic prose should sympathize with that statement.

> >

> > I'd give your student's advanced comp teacher the benefit of the doubt.

> > The only way you'll find out what the professor really said is to ask

> > him/her.  Max

> >

> > Max Morenberg

> > English Department

> > Miami University

> > Oxford, OH 45056