Correctness in Language

[Admin]

Thank you for the information in this part of the course! I have to start by saying I got thorough 3 minutes of teacher Ronnie's video on double negatives before I had to turn it off. I was genuinely shocked at her attack of artists and their lyrics and the kind of language she used to describe these. I have admittedly recommended to my students before to use YouTube as a tool for revising grammar, given that there's a multitude of teachers offering lessons on there. I might think twice after watching this particular lesson....

As someone who has learned English in a quite prescriptive classroom environment (as I'm sure many of us have) and then later taught it the same way, I'm guilty of having taught that double negative are "incorrect" and that the McDonald's slogan "I'm loving it" is "wrong" and you cannot use the stative verb 'love' in the continuous form. I no longer agree with these strict views and have taken a totally different approach in class now. It is still difficult, however, when you are teaching EAP, for instance. Does anyone have any experiences with "correctness" inside or outside the classroom?

[Deborah Ayers]

I couldn't make it through this video either because I felt she was being too harsh on usage. I think she also fails to realize that sometimes, popular culture or certain ethnic groups speak a certain way as a way of defying the authority figures who don't really represent them.

There are also entire languages built on purposefully not being understood by authority e.g. Cockney Rhyming Slang, Yiddish, Ebonics, etc.

[Rachel Laycook]

I didn't even open the video of Ronnie-- not interested in giving her views on youtube! But I can see from that cover image and the language she has "corrected" on the board is from a very prescriptivist view. I'm from the southern U.S., where AAVE is used heavily and is totally acceptable. The policing of that English has racist intent disguised as a desire for "propriety" (i.e. if this is how you speak you are not legitimate in this society).

The fact that many Spanish speakers will create sentences like this because of how this grammar works in their L1 is another addition to the example of double negatives being acceptable-- I doubt many of us have heard a double negative used without any particular emphasis on the negation and thought "2 negatives makes a positive so he means the opposite of what he's just said!"... it seems like a way of policing others and creating an us vs. them divide (the smart vs. dumb, the native vs. the non-native, the right vs. the wrong, the higher vs. lower class, however you'd like to cut it).

There are some regularities that, if not used in communication, can create confusion. However, I think taking these "rules" at face value erases a lot of what happens in communication-- we use intonation, body language, context, etc. to build meaning into our speech. It is a rich process that doesn't rely only on grammar or vocabulary, and telling someone that breaking a "rule" will make them unintelligible is likely not as true as some teachers would like to believe.

[sameerco1971]

In my view, there is no one correct form. Being correct doesn't mean that other alternatives are incorrect. In addition to that, judging others as stupid just because they are different is not fair.

[Kunlong Jin]

I guess we need some rules on perspective levels as almost every one of us are educated from a school. And the school teaches standard English and English rules. They are designed for exams or academic usages. But outside the classroom, there are hundreds of varieties of English usages in the world. It is really hard to define which is correct or incorrect. It might be unacceptable today but with the time passed and more and more people are using it, then it will become a acceptable usage one day. New words are emerging every day and many are collected in the Oxford English dictionary every year, which shows their official status in the English language.

[Daniel Palmer]

Many of my friends and family use double negatives, and I find find myself 'slipping' into using them when I'm around them (I spent many years learning how to speak in a more SE way, mostly to improve the perceptions of potential employers and my peers). I would say however, that I find the use use of double negatives to be more emphatic, and that they carry more 'weight'.

[severoc]

If Ronnie really is a teacher then she should know better about linguistics variation. This video is outrageous.

[erenkenny]

In the video, she said 'ain't ' is not in the dictionary but actually it is. The video does not actually reflect the "correct" teaching. I didn't finish the video as she called to use ain't is "stupid" etc. In Turkish, there is a negative concord as in other languages.

[TJ]

The fluidity of language is what makes it so interesting. I don’t use double negatives myself (not a regional feature of the English I speak) but do share these aspects when teaching because not only is it the language user’s choice but also may come up in an encounter. When teaching to exam spec. the freedom to just explore is impeded somewhat but I hope I’d still be less prescriptivist than the teacher in the video.

[abdisyam]

When I was learning English in EFL context, my teacher taught me that it was incorrect to use double negative. To me, the term 'incorrect' meant no body uses this particular pattern . However, as I studied overseas and encountered people using double negative in their speech, I realised that it is not about being 'incorrect' to use double negative, but it is about different varieties of English. A language pattern does not automatically become incorrect just because it is not used in one variety. Therefore, we should probably better describe variations in English as different rather than incorrect.

[Nidhi Lakhisarani]

Isn't language supposed to be about communication mainly? It is very common for African-Americans to use double negatives and with English being the international language, there are multiple varieties of the language throughout the world. Moreover, English is said to be one such language that can deliver the message with complete comprehension from the listener even if the grammar is incorrect. I think that is a very respectable quality of the language. Of course, there is always going to be 'correct' and 'incorrect' usage but that is completely subjective. If British and American Englishes can be accepted widely, why not other varieties of the language?

[profebeth]

I totally agree with you Nidhi! The concept of correct and incorrect indicates a binary view that I don't share about language. And unfortunately, any designation of groupings inherently signifies a value judgment. You're either in or you're out.

[Monica RP]

The video - what a talking point! As many others, I couldn't watch it until the end either.


However, I did use to teach that double negatives are wrong...until I realised that it was far more beneficial for students to be exposed to the varieties of the English language. At first, they found it confusing, but then, the students realised that their comprehension skills had been improving. The more you know, the more you understand.

[tony]

Language is flexible, and I believe grammar rules exist to prop it up, to form the skeleton of it, so to speak. The sole purpose of regulations is to create order from chaos, while regularities commonly reflect language patterns. Arguably, a slight deviation from the standard does no harm, does it? All the more in case when the language is ‘played with’, for instance in songs, poems, etc. I have to admit that as long as the meaning does not get distorted, those so-called ‘non-standard’ usages that at first blush seem to be grammatically incorrect should be tolerated.

[Philip Kruger]

I also had some serious problems with Ronnie's video but watched it to the end just to see how deeps she digs the hole for herself. She is condescending and insulting and is certainly on my DON'T WATCH list. (Or, should I call it my "Ain't watching that never again list"? )

I grew up in a very prescriptive environment as far as English is concerned and was taught that way, so the negative concord falls harsh on my ear and I don't use it, but I hear it very often as my other language, Afrikaans, uses it and people around me often translates Afrikaans directly into English bring the 'double negative' with. For me it is mainly about communication - Do I understand what the speaker is saying? Is there any chance of misunderstanding? If not, use the negative concord by all means if it is common in your version of English.