NORTHWEST UNIVERSITY, KANO

Faculty of Humanities
Department of English and Literary Studies

PhD: English language

Course Code: 9302. Course title: Issues Language

Birth of Prescriptivism (traditional grammar)

By
Name: Yawale Hassan Kademi

Introduction
PRESCRIPTIVE GRAMMAR

(Rule-Based Grammar, Normative Grammar, Traditional Grammar)

English grammar had its shape formed in the 18th century. A number of rules and norms on the

correct use of English were formulated in the 18th century and copied from book to book all

these years. It was assumed that the authors were to be trusted and they were regarded infallible.

This grammar of English that originated in the 18th century is called traditional grammar or

prescriptive grammar.

Ignoring the truth that language is a record of the conventions followed by the members of the

language community and also that the authority that the grammarians refer to is the native

speakers, the traditional grammars unscrupulously made English grammar a copy of Latin

grammar. The main exponent of traditional grammar was Robert Bishop Lowth who published

his ‘A Short Introduction to English Grammar’ in 1762. Close at his heels were Lindlay Murray,

J.C Nesfield, Wren and Martin etc. An examination of some of the rules of traditional grammar

will clearly indicate that they are contrary to the fundamental aspects of language.

Traditional grammarians were crippled by their Latinate fallacy, a fallacy that made them believe

that Latin had a perfect grammar. So they prescribed that a sentence should not end with a

preposition. To them it is wrong to say, for instance,

: ‘This is the tool I worked with.’

: ‘He is taller than me.’ cannot be correct according to them, as Latin grammar considers the

equivalent of ‘than’ as a conjunction which is to be followed by a noun in the nominative case.

‘He is taller than I’ should be the grammatical sentence; it is the shortened form of ‘He is taller

than I am’.

The mechanical application of Latin grammar made them disapprove of the sentence: ‘It’s me’,
which is an answer to the question ‘Who is there?’ They insist on the use of ‘it’s I’ as the

complement should be in the same case as the subject. The semantic fallacy of traditional

grammarians accounts for the definitions of many of the parts of speech. They define an

interrogative sentence as one that asks a question:: ‘What have you have done?’ But all questions need
not be interrogative.
: ‘You are ready for the test?’
Structurally the sentence is a statement, but it becomes interrogative in nature when it is said
with a rising intonation. Traditional grammarians are preoccupied with the same prescription of
rules and ‘norms’ or standards of usage. Hence their normative fallacy. They were very
particular that language activities should be logical. Sentences like ‘Make the circle rounder’, ‘I am going
home tomorrow’ suffer from their logical fallacy. If it’s a circle it must be round and in
their view it may be absurd to ask to make it rounder. It is difficult to find the logicality of the
word ‘his’ in ‘He put his hand in his pocket’. The question they ask is ‘Do we think that he put
somebody else’s hand in to somebody else’s pocket?
All traditional definitions were not based on meaning. Some are based on meaning, some on the
function and some on the form. An adjective is defined as a word that modifies a noun, a
definition based on function i.e. the role of the word. The use of such different criteria for
classification makes it difficult to decide to which class a word belongs. e.g. ‘brick house’: Here
the word ‘brick’ functions as an adjective. The same word can be used as a noun since it is the name of a
thing.

Traditional grammar regarded only the language of great literature worth studying. Dialectal
forms were looked upon as ‘bad English’. It also ignored linguistic changes and considered them as
having a corrupting influence on language. The ban on the use of double negatives and the use of ‘due
to’ at the beginning of a sentence are also due to their preoccupation with Latin grammar. But the
increasing awareness of the fundamental nature of language has freed English grammar
from the clutches of the rigid Latin grammar.

The Origins of Traditional Grammar

By “traditional grammar” I mean the kind of grammatical system set out in and presupposed

by standard modern grammars of Greek and Latin like Kühner-Gerth or Kühner-Stegmann.

Since grammars of this kind traditionally have been followed quite closely by grammarians

of other languages, one may speak of traditional grammar quite generally (Robins, 1997) [14]

Grammars of this type consist of three parts: a phonology, dealing among other things with
the sounds of the language; a morphology, dealing with word-formation and inflection; and

finally, a syntax, in which w

e are told which combinations of words constitute a phrase or a

sentence (Crystal, 2003) [7]

. Moreover, such grammars are characterized by a certain set of

concepts, especially the so-called grammatical categories—that is, notions of various parts of

speech like that of a noun or a verb, and notions of various features of these parts of speech

which traditionally are called “accidents” or “secondary categories.” Examples of such

accidents are gender, number, case, mood, and tense (Aarts, 2001)[1]

Traditional grammar is a framework for the description of the structure of a language

(Huddleston & Pullum, 2002) [11]

. Traditional grammars may be contrasted with more

modern theories of grammar in theoretical linguistics, which grew out of traditional

descriptions. While traditional grammars seek to describe how particular languages are used,

or to teach people to speak or read them, grammar frameworks in contemporary linguistics

often seek to explain the nature of language knowledge and ability (Chomsky, 1965;

Radford, 2004) [6, 13]

. Traditional grammar is often prescriptive and may be regarded as

unscientific by those working in linguistics (Pullum, 2009) [12]

the patterns for word inflection and the rules of syntax by which those words are combined

into sentences (Crystal, 2010)[8]

The term traditional grammar refers to the collection of prescriptive rules and concepts about

the structure of language that is commonly taught in schools. Traditional English grammar,

also referred to as school grammar, is largely based on the principles of Latin grammar, not

modern linguistic research in English (Baugh & Cable, 2013)[4]

what is and is not correct in the English language, not accounting for culture or modernizing

in favor of maintaining tradition. Because it is fairly rigid and rooted in the ways of the past,

traditional grammar is often considered outdated and regularly criticized by experts (Baron, 2000)[3].
Even so, many children learn this proper, historical form of grammar today (Greenbaum & Nelson, 2002)
[9].

CHARACTERISTICS OF PRESCRIPTIVE GRAMMAR

Remarkable characteristics of prescriptive school of thought in grammar include that grammar is all

about the rules meant for correct usage of a language; it is not interested in the description of the
natural

language. This follows that prescriptive grammar believes itself as an authority that tells a language user
what

to say and what not to say, what is right to say and what is wrong to say, despite what the native
speakers of a

language agree is acceptable. To put the position of the prescriptivists in a proper perspective, they
assume the

position of a judge or magistrate. This position could not be unconnected with their classical view of
language

since what we study today as grammar originated from them. Also, this type of grammar was the only
one

(Latin grammar) taught in schools, until the 16th century when the first grammar of English emerged.
The view

Prescriptive grammar which bears the following synonyms: traditional grammar

, normative and

classical grammar, is known to be the beginning of study and teaching of English grammar. Its origin
goes to the

Ancient Greek and Roman scholars; notably among them are Dionysius Thrax, Protagoras, Plato,
Aristotle,

Varo and Priscian. Thrax identified two fundamental units for grammatical analysis. They are the
sentence, also
known as logos and word. He describes the sentence as the upper limit in grammatical description while
the

word is the lowest unit of the prescriptivist about language is that it is God – given, therefore cannot be
tinkered with and by so doing

must remain as it has been in its original form, hence the first grammars of English in use were
prescriptive,

modeled after Latin. This is acknowledged by Lowth (1775) in his Short Introduction to English Grammar,
one

of the pioneers of English grammar after 16th century thus: “The aim of this grammar was “to teach us
to

express ourselves with propriety… and to enable us judge of every phrase and form of construction,
whether it

be right or not” (P. 10). This is an attestation that whatever English grammar in use, even long after the
century,

was still prescriptive and Latin- oriented.

The following include the characteristics of prescriptive grammar usages:

1. It rejects stranding. That is, it condemns a sentence that ends in a preposition. This implies that

constructions like “What do you think about?” and 3 and 4 above which so many educated English
scholars

across the globe accept, are ungrammatical in the traditional grammar paradigm. On this note, Pullum
and

Huddleston (2002) remark: “The result is that older people with traditional educations and outlooks still
tend to

believe that stranding… is always some kind of mistake” (P.10).

2. A sentence must end with a subjective case of pronoun. Therefore, “It is I” is the correct and

acceptable usage according to prescriptivism while “It is me” is adjudged wrong, regardless of the
position of
the pronoun in the sentence, whether it ends the sentence or not, the rule remains static and
unchallenged. To them anything other than that is a violation of their own concord [Link],
sentences 7 and 8 by Huddleston(1976) are, to the Prescriptivists, ungrammatical.

3. The personal pronoun who should appear in the subject position while whom should be used in the
object position.

4. Countable nouns should collocate with the determiners few or fewer, while non-count nouns go with
little or less, as in “No fewer than 500 students attended the class yesterday” , while “Less than 500
students attended the class yesterday” is prescriptively ungrammatical or ill-formed. Other ill-formed
constructions in this paradigm include: “Joe was a little boy at the time”, “There is a little house just in
front of the museum”.

5. In respect of concord, a noun or pronoun used as a singular subject should go with a singular pronoun
reference, just as it goes with Government and Binding(GB) rule of generative syntax. Therefore,
modern day constructions like “Everybody should come to class with their opinions” is prescriptively
ungrammatical. By this rule, sentence 2 by Quirk and Greenbaum (1973) is rendered ungrammatical.

6. Omission of relative pronouns is frowned upon. For example, “This is the house he built’is wrong,
while the correct form is This is the house which he built.
STRENGTHS AND WEAKNESSES

In all fairness, it could be an academic injustice to totally dismiss or condemn traditional grammar. One
of the reasons is that this type of grammar which could as well be labeled legalistic for its strict
adherence to the rules has become today the basis for identifying marked and unmarked sentences.
This, we believe, could be indisputable because rules cannot be disregarded in the teaching and learning
of a language. For example, we do not believe that there is an English scholar that will say or write *I
goes to work everyday or*He teach Syntax and the society considers it as an acceptable construction
unless in a context of humour, jocularity or something in that ilk. In other words, the rule that provides
or prescribes concord or grammatical concord is still welcome by all schools of thought in grammar. In
word classifications, that is parts of speech, we acknowledge that the earliest and original division of
English words by Thrax into nouns or onoma and adjective (one class), verb or rhema, particles, articles,
pronouns, prepositions, adverb and conjunctions, still hold sway today in grammatical analysis by
teachers and scholars alike. What has been done to it are mere slight modifications – resulting in eight
parts of speech. Some of these modifications and additions which are a build up on classical grammar
come from such contemporary grammarians like Quirk and Greenbaum (1973) who included articles and
demonstratives to make it ten classes. While Morley (2000) excludes demonstratives and substitutes it
for determiners in concurrence with Bloomfield (1933). The minimalist, Radford (1997), only adds
complementizers, also to arrive at ten parts of speech. Some of the modifications we see are a matter of
nomenclature or change of name. It goes to attest that language teachers today still adopt these word
classes introduced by the traditional grammarians. For this, Andrews(2006) argues that “most linguists
or language hobbyists are likely to be descriptive grammarians who analyze and explain a language’s
uses while most practicing teachers probably work with prescriptive grammars (p. 2). On the other hand
(weaknesses), it appears that prescriptivists lose sight of the truth that language is a sociolinguistic
phenomenon, for this reason,a social event. In that case, it is something meant to adapt to the social
needs of the users in a context of situation and the prevailing changes in a society . Jowitt (1991) shares
this idea which traditional grammarians do not accept: “Language and society develop side by side,
social changes bring linguistic changes” (p. 26). This line of reasoning accentuates the point that people
and societal changes try are inevitable factors that determine the use of language. An instance is the
words mankind and humankind. Of yore, mankind was the only acceptable word used to denote human
beings in general, despite that it is sexist, favouring only men, but contemporary English today
welcomes the need in society to welcome gender equality, balance and inclusiveness, hence humankind
today is increasingly becoming acceptable. The same applies to the personal pronoun their which has
been introduced to avoid the clumsiness of his or her expressions in sentences, as we find in sentence 2
above by Quirk and Greenbaum (1973,p.182). These go to say that language, unlike the prescriptive
school of thought, should not be taught or construed as a static event that must remain in its original
pure form prescribed by the traditional grammarians. Rather language should be treated as a
sociolinguistic event, just as the use of slangs, colloquialisms, argots, conversational principles, speech
acts, and even regional varieties are sociolinguistically apt. This points to the fact that one of the
shortcomings of this type of grammar is its failure to admit creative use of language which is one area
that
makes language use interesting and worth using as it happens in literary pieces, figurative and
imaginative pieces of writing. While pointing out the shortcomings of prescriptivism, an opposing school
of thought, represented by Chomsky (1965) ,comments: But the fundamental reason for (the)
inadequacy of traditional grammars is a more technical one. Although it was well understood that
linguistic processes are in some sense “creative”, the technical devices for expressing a system or
recursive processes were simply not available until much more recently. In fact, a real understanding of
how a language can (in Humboldt’s words)” make infinite use of finite means “has developed only within
the last thirty years in the course of studies in the foundations of mathematics. (P.10) The ground on this
argument is that prescriptivism cannot be said to possess adequate paraphernalia to account for
language system, probably due to its conservative stance towards language analysis and description
which only adopts Latin, Greek and written languages as the only correct and prestigious model for
language description and analysis. Its shortcomings and criticisms have opened more frontiers for
others, including Descriptive Grammar.