29 messages over 4 pages: 1 2 3 4
Volte
Tetraglot
Senior Member
Switzerland
Joined 6440 days ago
4474 posts - 6726 votes 
Speaks: English*, Esperanto, German, Italian
Studies: French, Finnish, Mandarin, Japanese
| Message 25 of 29 12 June 2011 at 3:33pm | IP Logged |
Cainntear wrote:
Moving it to the other clause seems very strange. It feels like we're giving more information about the background than the more important main clause
*The ground was wet because it had been raining all day yesterday.
And that's with the word "yesterday" in a neutral position at the end of the clause. If we put the word at the start of the clause, the effect is increased substantially:
*The ground was wet because yesterday it had been raining all day.
We've now drawn so much attention to the rain that it really seems like the main point of the sentence, but the tense is clearly background information.
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The first of those sentences sounds entirely natural to me; it simply has a different meaning than your earlier examples. To me, it says "The ground was wet (at an unspecified time, probably clarified by context) because it had been raining all day yesterday", rather than the ground being wet specifically yesterday. The second sounds a little odd, but not out of the realms of what I'd expect in speech if someone was rethinking a bit as s/he went along.
1 person has voted this message useful
| Cainntear
Pentaglot
Senior Member
Scotland
linguafrankly.blogsp
Joined 6012 days ago
4399 posts - 7687 votes
Speaks: Lowland Scots, English*, French, Spanish, Scottish Gaelic
Studies: Catalan, Italian, German, Irish, Welsh
| Message 26 of 29 12 June 2011 at 10:23pm | IP Logged |
Volte wrote:
Cainntear wrote:
Moving it to the other clause seems very strange. It feels like we're giving more information about the background than the more important main clause
*The ground was wet because it had been raining all day yesterday.
And that's with the word "yesterday" in a neutral position at the end of the clause. If we put the word at the start of the clause, the effect is increased substantially:
*The ground was wet because yesterday it had been raining all day.
We've now drawn so much attention to the rain that it really seems like the main point of the sentence, but the tense is clearly background information.
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The first of those sentences sounds entirely natural to me; it simply has a different meaning than your earlier examples. To me, it says "The ground was wet (at an unspecified time, probably clarified by context) because it had been raining all day yesterday", rather than the ground being wet specifically yesterday. The second sounds a little odd, but not out of the realms of what I'd expect in speech if someone was rethinking a bit as s/he went along.
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OK I know what you... I see what you mean, but we're not going to... we can't consider reformulations as... and performance errors as comprise... erm constituting grammatically valid sentences aren't um can we? ;-p
1 person has voted this message useful
| Volte
Tetraglot
Senior Member
Switzerland
Joined 6440 days ago
4474 posts - 6726 votes
Speaks: English*, Esperanto, German, Italian
Studies: French, Finnish, Mandarin, Japanese
| Message 27 of 29 12 June 2011 at 10:36pm | IP Logged |
Cainntear wrote:
Volte wrote:
Cainntear wrote:
Moving it to the other clause seems very strange. It feels like we're giving more information about the background than the more important main clause
*The ground was wet because it had been raining all day yesterday.
And that's with the word "yesterday" in a neutral position at the end of the clause. If we put the word at the start of the clause, the effect is increased substantially:
*The ground was wet because yesterday it had been raining all day.
We've now drawn so much attention to the rain that it really seems like the main point of the sentence, but the tense is clearly background information.
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The first of those sentences sounds entirely natural to me; it simply has a different meaning than your earlier examples. To me, it says "The ground was wet (at an unspecified time, probably clarified by context) because it had been raining all day yesterday", rather than the ground being wet specifically yesterday. The second sounds a little odd, but not out of the realms of what I'd expect in speech if someone was rethinking a bit as s/he went along.
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OK I know what you... I see what you mean, but we're not going to... we can't consider reformulations as... and performance errors as comprise... erm constituting grammatically valid sentences aren't um can we? ;-p |
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I'd consider it important to do so, but perhaps I'm just too much of a descriptivist at heart. I think anything in that category should be clearly marked as such - but, for instance, your example sentence in the post I'm repyling directly to now sounded perfectly natural to me, although I wouldn't use it as an example of spoken eloquence or exemplary writing style.
1 person has voted this message useful
| Cainntear
Pentaglot
Senior Member
Scotland
linguafrankly.blogsp
Joined 6012 days ago
4399 posts - 7687 votes
Speaks: Lowland Scots, English*, French, Spanish, Scottish Gaelic
Studies: Catalan, Italian, German, Irish, Welsh
| Message 28 of 29 13 June 2011 at 12:37am | IP Logged |
Volte wrote:
I'd consider it important to do so, but perhaps I'm just too much of a descriptivist at heart. I think anything in that category should be clearly marked as such - but, for instance, your example sentence in the post I'm repyling directly to now sounded perfectly natural to me, although I wouldn't use it as an example of spoken eloquence or exemplary writing style.
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Everyone acknowledges the existence of an "internal model" of language, and performance errors (even if sometimes systematic and predictable in and of themselves) aren't part of the core meaningful model of language (even accounting for Freudian slips!).
Or to put it another way, performance errors aren't "target language", but "near misses".
Teaching using performance errors as a model of correct English would be taking descriptivism a little too literally....
1 person has voted this message useful
| Volte
Tetraglot
Senior Member
Switzerland
Joined 6440 days ago
4474 posts - 6726 votes
Speaks: English*, Esperanto, German, Italian
Studies: French, Finnish, Mandarin, Japanese
| Message 29 of 29 13 June 2011 at 5:25am | IP Logged |
Cainntear wrote:
Volte wrote:
I'd consider it important to do so, but perhaps I'm just too much of a descriptivist at heart. I think anything in that category should be clearly marked as such - but, for instance, your example sentence in the post I'm repyling directly to now sounded perfectly natural to me, although I wouldn't use it as an example of spoken eloquence or exemplary writing style.
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Everyone acknowledges the existence of an "internal model" of language, and performance errors (even if sometimes systematic and predictable in and of themselves) aren't part of the core meaningful model of language (even accounting for Freudian slips!).
Or to put it another way, performance errors aren't "target language", but "near misses".
Teaching using performance errors as a model of correct English would be taking descriptivism a little too literally.... |
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I said 'natural', not 'correct' - that is, I wouldn't be surprised to hear it from a native speaker.
Teaching rarely seems to include showing people how to change what they're saying partway through. I don't think this should be taught early, but I do think it's important to know, regardless of how it's labelled or categorized.
1 person has voted this message useful
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