What I read
In "For whom, the bell tolls" (2018), The Economist argues that its editors were right to break the grammatical rule that the object form of the English relative pronoun who is whom. The argument traces the history of such word forms in English from the time of the epic story of Beowulf the monster killer to the modern TV series The Simpsons, pointing out that with the exception of indirect objects following a preposition, most native English speakers no longer follow, or even know, such rules of English grammar.
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My response
As soon as I saw the title and the image, I thought that this was a good article for our EAP class, in which (preposition + relative pronoun) we do worry about grammar more than when we're writing a quick note on Facebook. Like all languages, English is constantly evolving. I remember when I first read Shakespeare, whose (possessive relative pronoun) work is early modern English, in high school that it was very difficult, and I needed the help of notes to explain things in Macbeth. Fortunately, Macbeth is an exciting story of a king being murdered by a plotting husband and wife, and with witches, prophecy, ghosts and battles. That was when I was but 12 years old. By the time I finished high school, I'd read a lot more Shakespeare, and his 400-year-old English was no problem. But a look back at Chaucer's English, from the late 14th century, showed his middle English to be almost incomprehensible, and I can only read Beowulf, which is Old English from about 1,000 years ago, in modern translations: early English is very different from modern English, which gets its identity from Vikings, Norman invasions (1066), the rise of Latin in the Middle Ages and its resurgence in the Renaissance, and further injections of Germanic languages from my royal family, and then lots of other additions from all over the British Empire. And then there is the normal evolution that every living language has. I'm reminded of this when I visit Australia and listen to my young nieces and nephews, whose version of English is very different to mine, as I also see on their FB posts.
In my own life, I've noticed big changes, even in academic English. When I was at university, we did not start sentences with coordinating conjunctions such as and, but, so, and the like. But today, this is common, even in formal academic English. I sometimes start a sentence with and or but, but in my formal writing I don't feel comfortable starting a sentence with so. Perhaps in a few more years, that will also come naturally do me, but not just yet.
I think that The Economist made the right decision to break the grammar "rule" about who / whom.
In my own life, I've noticed big changes, even in academic English. When I was at university, we did not start sentences with coordinating conjunctions such as and, but, so, and the like. But today, this is common, even in formal academic English. I sometimes start a sentence with and or but, but in my formal writing I don't feel comfortable starting a sentence with so. Perhaps in a few more years, that will also come naturally do me, but not just yet.
I think that The Economist made the right decision to break the grammar "rule" about who / whom.
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My question
Who decides what is correct grammar? In other words, by whom is correctness decided? And how do you decide what is grammatically correct?
This question is not specifically about English grammar. It's about the grammar of any language, including that of your native language.
This question is not specifically about English grammar. It's about the grammar of any language, including that of your native language.
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Reference
- For whom, the bell tolls: In the court of common usage, an old pronoun is losing its case. (2018, March 3). The Economist. Retrieved from https://www.economist.com/news/books-and-arts/21737489-whom-bell-tolls-court-common-usage-old-pronoun-losing-its-case
Although I usually make a new title that better reflects my own writing in response to my chosen source, in this case, I copied the original title. I like The Economist's title for its article, which is a clever play on a famous novel. The title of Ernest Hemingway's novel is For Whom the Bell Tolls, without the comma that changes the meaning significantly. Commas are important!
ReplyDeleteWhen I finish your blog summary, I jump directly to the article before reading your response. It is a great article that give me more insight about language evolution. I found myself seldom use whom. One possibility is that I didn't found much in reading nowadays and I believe that my writing, at least some parts, is the reflection of my reading experience.
ReplyDeleteBack to your question, I think there are two main parts who decide the grammar correction. First, there is an organization that responsible to collect and update the developing language. For example, in Thailand we have the Office of Royal Society who responsible to publish Royal Institute Dictionary. I guess that there are some counterparts in other languages. Second, the people using that language themselves will determine the futuristic change in grammar. As people in society evolve by time, their language used are subtlety changed as we can trace back in historical records, books or old writing pieces.
For the last question, I had a bad habit not to check for grammatically errors and it resulted in my poor writing skill. Despite of well organization or brilliant idea to convey, my writing score plummeted due to grammatical errors. However, I try to change and practice more nowadays. I try to learn from publications (since my work is related to reading a lot of academic publications) or online discussion about some trivial points (such as www.english.stackexchange.com).
Could you please suggest me how can I checking grammatical correctness properly?