Ch. 1 and 2
One thing I found interesting throughout the first two chapters was that at first, the sentence patterns seemed very complex. I found myself getting hung up on simple structures like verbs, nouns, adjectives, adverbs..blah blah blah. It's relieving to see that the 'pattern' concept is self explanatory. They are patterns, and once you recognize how they work, they make more sense (most of the time).
Question: Do you think that our innate abilities to write, is in itself, its own grammar? In other words; by writing your own way, correctly, incorrectly, so on and so forth, whatever...can you agree that even though it may be incorrect according to our language rules, that it still can be considered correct in your own grammatical style? Maybe my horrible grammar is a testament to this...lol.
posted by Anonymous @ 9:30 AM
9 comments
9 Comments:
If I'm writing for myself, like journaling or freewriting, I don't care much about the grammar. In fact I try not to think about it at all. If something comes out wrong, I can usually figure it out later. However, if I wrote this way for others, I wouldn't really expect them to understand it if I did made errors. So yes, I suppose in our own little heads if it makes sense to us and the audience is only ourselves I say why not? I'd say the only thing to be careful of it is to make sure you're not making habits of errors in your writing that would creep into your more formal writing.
Whenever I'm writing for myself I don't think about rules of grammar or writing. Just like different groups of people in different regions of the world have their own grammar, so do we, as individuals. I think that as long as we are able to convey our thoughts and another person can understand those ideas then it doesn't matter if we have written correctly or incorrectly.
I think it is possible for "bad grammar" to still be considered grammar. In a way, each of us has a set of rules we follow instinctively, and those rules are grammar. I just wonder how certain rules came to be regarded as "correct." Was it simply because they were the most common?
I'm not sure if I'm understanding the question correctly, but I'll do my best: I think if you have "your own grammatical style," then technically it would be wrong because there is only one set of guidelines (I think). However, I have read books where there are no periods, commas, etc. where the author's purpose in omitting these items was to create an effect, which I thought was genius. And as I've said in a previous comment, I believe that to like your own writing is the most important thing so I am all for having "your own grammatical style."
No. I don't really think that we have innate abilities to write. We have innate abilities to vocalize. We learn how to speak from our parents. I think that we learn how to write from listening to speach patterns and by reading. I think that you can learn to write in a grammatically correct manner, without taking a grammar class, if you read a lot. But you have to be reading selections that are grammatically correct to begin with. It's almost like a chicken and egg conundrum.
When I write something in German I don´t think about sentence patterns or the like. I just have a feeling for what is wrong and what is right. If I had to teach German grammar, I guess, that would be really hard. However in English, as it is my second language, it is really helpful to have a set of rules you can stick to.
I guess I am really hung up on grammar and the correct usage of it. I should say white, middle class, west coast grammar. I have a hard time even writing a rough draft because I can't stand grammaical or spelling errors. So in my mind there is only one correct grammar. Ebonics, street slang, bario or regional grammar simply doesn't apply to me.
I think everyone has their own grammatical style, regardless of how they speak or communicate. However, that is your own style and yours alone. Not many people will understand it, so to fully communicate to an audience, is when a universal english grammar is used.
Even when I IM or text message I tend to get hung up on grammar. I don't like to make mistakes. I have trouble sending off a message without first making sure it is grammatically correct. That being said...I do like to mix things up a little in order to indicate things I can't easily indicate in a little message like this one. Take the above as an example. I used an elipsis to indicate a pause in my thought process. I like to do things like that which aren't exactly grammatically correct in order to easily indicate things I am doing while typing. I use elipses to indicate pauses instead of typing something like: (I stop for a moment to organize my thoughts). However, I find myself having to work at keeping this way of communicating out of my essays for class so that I don't make grammar mistakes.
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