[etni] style versus grammar: points off?
- From: David Reid <reidnomad@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: etni@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Sun, 28 Nov 2010 10:44:22 +0200
Hi, Etniers,
I agree with Batya (in her post from 28. November) when she says that one
should encourage clarity and conciseness in expression, and that there are
better styles with which to express the examples I brought up (in my posts
about "can not"). However, the original question was whether one should take
off points for a particular usage. I was under the impression that a teacher
should encourage better style but, at the school level, take off points only
for grammatical mistakes. My point was that there is room for "can not" in
modern English grammar and that it is an admissible style, even if it is not
the style most favoured by English speakers. I am not sure that a school
teacher is justified for taking off points for a grammatically correct
sentence simply because the style is not optimal. Indeed, clarity and
conciseness are often subjective: from a mathematician's point of view, most
English teachers would not be able to write an essay either in optimally
clear or in optimally concise style. (No offense meant.) Hence, perhaps
annotations such as "OK, but it would be better as: ....." or "OK, but
awkward. Better:..." without a loss of points would be more appropriate.
David Reid
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