atw: Re: SEC: UNCLASS re: Pet hates

Naomi Kramer:

> Yes... this would have to be the biggest problem I have faced in being a 
> technical writer - not having had more than 2-3 formal lessons in 
> English grammar!  Our German teacher taught us more about English 
> grammar than our English teachers ever did.  *sigh*

That's always the way. More on this below.

> Fortunately for me, my mother is very literate (is literacy an absolute? 
> Is it possible to be more, or less, literate?) and I read a lot as a 
> child... and picked up grammar as I went along.  I keep meaning to do 
> some serious reading on the subject, with the idea that I could apply 
> actual rules, as opposed to feelings of what is generally correct, to my 
> work! :-)

There's the rub.

There are two "angles" to grammar; the difference between them is implicit in 
the fact that we "learn" to speak our native tongue very fluently before we 
even 
go to school. Learning grammar is not normally part of language acquisition. 
That 
term is preferred to "language learning" because it's so unconscious _and_ 
essentially untutored. We "learn" to walk because the adults around us give 
material and conscious help in developing the skill; we get remarkably little 
(if 
any) help from adults in learning basic rules like putting the subject before 
the 
verb in a declarative clause.

Studying a foreign language, on the other hand, is indeed learning. We learn 
the 
grammar at a quite theoretical level. We need to live in a community where that 
language is the norm if we are to acquire real fluency.

So our knowledge of grammar exists (or can exist) at two levels -- the 
unconscious or internalised knowledge that enables us to be fluent, and the 
formal knowledge that enables us to be analytical. And that's the key point: 
you 
don't need formal training in grammar to be literate. (No, it's not an absolute 
term; 
George Bush is more literate than my 3-y-o grandson, but less literate than  . 
. . 
ummm . . . well, just about anyone else!) You do need formal training in 
grammar 
to be able to look at something that you think isn't right, and work out both 
what 
is wrong and how to fix it. In other words, formal grammar is a tool for 
analysis 
rather than for communication.

That accounts for Naomi's awareness that "knowing the rules" can make a 
difference to the professional communicator.

And it's well known that trained linguists have a higher "processing threshold" 
-- 
they are more likely to pick up multiple possible interpretations of a 
structurally 
ambiguous statement, for example. Another useful professional skill!


Michael Lewis

--------------------------------------
Brandle Pty Limited, Sydney, Australia
www.brandle.com.au
--------------------------------------


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