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Natives mistakes in their own languages | ||
Tags: Error | Native Speakers | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : General discussion |  | |
| Ari Heptaglot Senior Member Norway Joined 6382 days ago 2314 posts - 5695 votes  Speaks: Swedish*, English, French, Spanish, Portuguese, Mandarin, Cantonese Studies: Czech, Latin, German | Message 9 of 65 20 April 2011 at 10:39am | IP Logged | |||||||||||||||||
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Not only isn't there such a thing as a "common error", there's no such thing as an "error" at all. That language can somehow be "incorrect" is just bollocks. Language can certainly be inappropriate, however. Saying "I'm a bring yo ass down" in a university literature debate might not be appropriate, but neither is "I shall endeavor to defeat you" in a rap battle. Saying "bullscroncles" when you mean "pizza" is pretty much never appropriate, but that doesn't mean that "pizza" is somehow more correct.
That's srtictly speaking. In practice, we can use "correct" to mean "not appropriate under any circumstances", but we should be aware that this is a shorthand. Inappropriate language will draw attention from your message, get you laughed at, scorned or misunderstood. Thus, you'll have to learn to use appropriate language. This may well include using "good" as an adverb in some situations and use "well" in others. It will pretty much always include forming plurals with "s" and using words that exist in your listeners' vocabularies. 4 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||||||||||||||
| Mrs. Dalloway Triglot Groupie Italy Joined 4769 days ago 70 posts - 95 votes Speaks: Italian*, EnglishC2, Russian Studies: GermanA2, French, Danish | Message 10 of 65 20 April 2011 at 10:41am | IP Logged | |||||||||||||||||
That is exactly what I wanted to add. I see your point, but the processes of modification of the language you're spaeaking about take place during long periods of time. We can't appeal to them to be indulgent on all sorts of variations. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||||||||||||||
| Ari Heptaglot Senior Member Norway Joined 6382 days ago 2314 posts - 5695 votes Speaks: Swedish*, English, French, Spanish, Portuguese, Mandarin, Cantonese Studies: Czech, Latin, German | Message 11 of 65 20 April 2011 at 10:57am | IP Logged | |||||||||||||||||
No. Languages have conventions. They do not have rules. Failure to adapt your speech to the conventions of your listener will result in problems in communication. This is what we're learning as second language learners. We're learning to adapt our speech to a completely different set of conventions. We can liken this to symbolism in art. A dog is commonly used to represent loyalty. I can paint a painting with a snake that symbolizes loyalty. People who look at my painting will probably not realize that my snake represents loyalty; they will misunderstand. Does this mean that the snake doesn't represent loyalty? Of course not. Does it mean that my painting is somehow incorrect, that I have broken the rules of symbolism? No. But my choice of a snake might not have been appropriate for the thing I wanted to communicate. 9 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||||||||||||||
| Rameau Triglot Senior Member Germany Joined 5907 days ago 149 posts - 258 votes 4 sounds Speaks: English*, GermanC1, Danish Studies: Swedish, French, Icelandic | Message 13 of 65 20 April 2011 at 11:38am | IP Logged | |||||||||||||||||
My, what a lovely alternate spelling you've invented there! (Sorry, sorry, I couldn't resist) But seriously, if, say, I use a different word than than the one I intended to ("I want to eat your mother" instead of "I want to meet" your mother). or am under the impression that a work I do use intentionally means something quite different than what it is generally accepted to mean (I say "Eating your own mother is completely awesome!" because I assume that "awesome" must mean the same thing as "awful"), I think it's pretty clear that I made an error. You could of course argue that I simply used the words inappropriately, but then again, if my house collapses around me due to my inept building skills, and someone points out the assorted errors I made in its construction, would you make the argument that I made no errors at all, but simply employed my tools and building materials in a manner inappropriate for the context? We could even go so far as to say no one ever makes any errors at all, ever, they just behave in manners inappropriate for their situations and goals. By which point we're engaging in petty semantic debates in order to try to persuade each other that we shouldn't engage in petty semantic debates. I must say, though, I would be extremely interested in attending both the literary debate and rap battle you describe.
Again, that's more a semantics argument than anything. What are rules but conventions? No one's going to arrest me if during a chess game I move my pawn two spaces on its second move, but my opponent will probably get annoyed, even if I note that the accepted way in which the pieces move have changed quite a bit over the centuries. The fact is that we have agreed upon standards for the sake of clarity and that someone wrote them down to make them easier to keep straight, thereby giving us rules. The fact that they're not unchangeable or inviolable doesn't make a great difference: if it's normally accepted that we play in one way, and my opponent and I have neither an explicit nor implied understanding that we'll be playing differently (and how we'll be doing so), my move simply comes off as playing incorrectly.
The difference is that--at least in our culture--there are no agreed upon standards for symbolism (though this is by no means a universal), and also that we're dealing with subjective meaning as opposed to objective structure--I could, for example, argue that the perspective is off on the car the snake is driving, for example. At which point you, the painter, would be free to scoff at your literal-minded critics and their silly, confining rules which are inimical to free artistic expression, and empty you wine glass over my head. Which is not an illegitimate view point, but I still remember the mantra I heard over and over again in my art classes--you need to learn the rules before you start to break them. Because even if you very deliberately set out to break convention, you have to do so in such a way that people used to the conventions understand how you're doing so and to what effect, instead of just simply being outright confused by what they see. Edited by Rameau on 20 April 2011 at 11:39am 9 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||||||||||||||
| Ari Heptaglot Senior Member Norway Joined 6382 days ago 2314 posts - 5695 votes Speaks: Swedish*, English, French, Spanish, Portuguese, Mandarin, Cantonese Studies: Czech, Latin, German | Message 14 of 65 20 April 2011 at 12:42pm | IP Logged | |||||||||||||||||
Haha, well played! Of course, this is a spelling that is not considered appropriate anywhere, so we could call it an "error", as a shorthand. We could also surely call it a "mistake". It's quite possible to use inappropriate language by mistake, of course.
Well, yeah. You seem to be using the word "error" to mean "mistake" here, in which case I completely agree with you. We might be dealing with different conventions here when it comes to the word "error". :)
Well, here's the clincher: You relate it to the situations and goals. We can say, I guess, that one makes an "error" if one speaks in a manner that won't communicate the intended meaning to the intended person. I'm aboard with that. What I'm arguing against is the view that there is some sort of standard that applies to all English and violation of these standards is always an error. It's all dependent on the situation, you with me? If you and I speak a dialect where "awesome" means "awful", then saying "Eating your own mother is awesome" while meaning "Eating your mother is awful" is not incorrect. It's not an error. It's appropriate in the situation. There's no dictionary that would list this meaning, no teacher that would teach it, and maybe nobody but you and me will get it, but it's not an error. When we speak we adapt to the conventions of your language and mine. There is no need to adapt to an independent, standardized rules set. We can violate the accepted "rules" of grammar and vocabulary all we want as long as the violations are within the speech conventions of the two of us. The "rules" vary from situation to situation. People often try to counter descriptivism with "there needs to be an accepted standard, or nobody will be able to communicate", but there is no reason to assume that this standard is independent of situation. It is formed anew in every conversation, in writing or speech, between two or more people. That's my point here.
Well, sure, I guess I'm trying to indiate my point by switching the terms. Rules may be conventions, but the words have different connotations. And there is a difference between language and the chess match that I think is highlighted by the word choice. The rules of Chess are fixed during a game. They can't change, or the game becomes meaningless. But the conventions of language are constantly, with every word, being redefined and renegotiated. I use a term you haven't heard before and you ask and I explain it. From then on, the term is within the conventions. The rules changed. I use a swear word, which before was unclear whether or not it was appropriate and your reaction will change the rules. I use "good" as an adverb which immediately slightly changes the rules. And so on. Chess doesn't work that way.
Doesn't matter. If there are agreed upon standards for symbolism, my snake still symbolizes loyalty. I painted the friggin' snake and you can have no authority over what it symbolizes. It may be that everyone in the world will believe it symbolizes envy, but that doesn't change the fact that when I painted it, I intended for it to symbolize loyalty. And so it symbolizes loyalty. One more example of this situation-dependent rules set: Let's talk about the TV series Firefly. The show is set in the future and language has changed. Captain Reynolds says "My boat is the fastest gorram boat in the verse." This wouldn't be accepted in any English classroom, but it's hardly wrong. It's a scifi series and the language is completely appropriate, because such language is within the conventions accepted by the audience. If I'm talking to you and we're both fans of the series, calling a spaceship a 'boat' is perfectly correct, even though it violates the "accepted standards". Or does it? Actually, the "accepted standards" are accepted right in the conversation and the only people who need to accept them are you and me. Nobody else. Same thing if we're both accustomed to say "You is" instead of "you are". Not incorrect. Not inappropriate. 4 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||||||||||||||
| lingoleng Senior Member Germany Joined 5098 days ago 605 posts - 1290 votes | Message 15 of 65 20 April 2011 at 2:21pm | IP Logged | |||||||||||||||||
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There is one thing I don't understand:
How do all these people, who advocate - in correct and well structured English, by the way - descriptivism, integrate this very honorable mindset into their teaching or studying? Don't you correct mistakes, errors, crude barbarisms? Where are the popular textbooks for teaching the colloquial English (dialects) of the uneducated working class? Why does Assimil teach a different standard? An irrelevant question? Or a rhetorical one ... Edited by lingoleng on 20 April 2011 at 2:27pm 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||||||||||||||
| Splog Diglot Senior Member Czech Republic anthonylauder.c Joined 5469 days ago 1062 posts - 3263 votes Speaks: English*, Czech Studies: Mandarin | Message 16 of 65 20 April 2011 at 3:08pm | IP Logged | |||||||||||||||||
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Eggcorns seem relevant here
1 person has voted this message useful |
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