Return to Index

The Grumpy Grammarian

A poll on this website contains some interesting statistics in response to a question about why grammar is faulty.  The question asked in this poll is:  "If you were to select the main reason why people fail to use correct grammar in speech and writing, what would you say that reason is?"  This ongoing survey has been running for several years now and has, as of this writing, 221 responses.  Although the sample is too small to yield definitive results, I surmise that the proportion who give a certain response would be about the same if we had many more participants.

The chief reason, selected by 31%, is:  "They don't care / They think it is unimportant."  The next two reasons, selected by a fourth and a fifth of respondents, respectively, are:  "Grammar isn't taught, or isn't taught enough, in school" (24%) and "They hear and see too many bad examples" (20%).  In summation, 75% of the answers selected amount to some variation on "they don't know proper English" (44%) or "they don't care" (31%).

Comparatively few (one-fourth) select other possible reasons why people fail to use correct grammar.  Among the leading responses in this minority segment are that people don't read enough or watch too much TV (8%) – which might be taken as a variation on "they don't know" – or that "grammar is illogical / inconsistent" and "grammar is just too complicated / difficult" (6% each).  Both of the latter responses come, no doubt, from people who are themselves "grammatically challenged."  We might reasonably add this 12% to the one-fourth who say that grammar isn't taught, or isn't taught enough, in school, for they themselves are probably victims of this neglect.  A very small percentage (2%) answer that "proper English is no longer necessary."  That's only five out of 221, but it is still alarming (especially since these are people who visited a grammar site) that anyone holds this opinion.  Six individuals (3%) answered that "some other reason" besides those listed in the poll accounted for people's failure to use correct grammar; this finding suggests that our poll did list all of the major reasons.

Overall, the views expressed in this survey paint a discouraging picture for those of us who respect the English language.  When the consensus is that people who abuse the language either don't care or don't know any better, we can't hold out much hope.  If there is a prevailing view that correctness doesn't matter, coupled with a lack of instruction regarding what is correct, we could be moving in the direction of "anything goes" – what I call linguistic anarchy.

Such a trend does not necessarily mark "the end of civilization as we know it."  I wouldn't go that far.  Nevertheless, I find it disheartening.  Language, it seems to me, is the crown jewel of rational beings.  It enables us not only to benefit from a higher level of communication than other living creatures have but also to establish bonds with one another beyond those that are driven by instinct or genetic programming.  Without verbal thought (which is to say language), our imaginatiion and our ability to think in abstractions would be seriously limited.  Our ability to understand and enjoy the complex emotional relationships that we human beings have would also be seriously limited.

Language is how we externalize our thoughts and ideas and – yes – our feelings.  To make language "work," we have evolved conventions of use – certain agreed-upon principles that enable us to use language efficiently and to understand one another.  These conventions are what we call "grammar."  It is not, as an increasing number of people seem to think it is, a bothersome set of rules created in a vacuum.  Even the least grammatically knowledgeable among us recognizes, for example, that if we were to arrange words in utterly random order, we would have nothing more than a series of noises that have little meaning.

Although these conventions evolve (language is dynamic, not static) and we must be flexible enough to accommodate changing conventions, we embark on a hazardous path toward linguistic anarchy when we declare that the prevailing conventions do not matter at all and are not worth teaching and learning.  Syntax matters; therefore, grammar matters.

I can think of many reasons for the "don't know / don't care" viewpoint, including the misconception that rules of grammar are abstractions that have no application in the real world.  We can use language very well, thank you, without knowing anything about its mechanics, just as we can manipulate physical objects with no knowledge of physics.  That analogy doesn't quite hold up.  Certainly, we can muddle along without this knowledge, but we cannot use the tool of language as effectively without some understanding of grammar as we can with it.

Another reason for the indifference, and even hostility, to correct English is that some of the advocates of proper grammar and usage go too far to the other extreme.  By their inflexibility and insistence upon rules for the sake of rules, they encourage opposition.  While no respectable grammarian wants to cheer on the kind of sloppiness that has been emerging in recent decades, we need to allow for levels of propriety.  In some circumstances, complete adherence to the most formal conventions is appropriate; in others, we need to be willing to allow a more relaxed application of conventions.  Sometimes language wears its formal attire; sometimes it lounges about in more casual dress.  Nevertheless, it's worthwhile to have access to dress clothes in our linguistic closets, even of we are more comfortable in casual, everyday attire.  That doesn't mean that we should dress like slobs because we don't know how to dress ourselves properly or don't care.

We will always bend the rules and sometimes break them.  However, that's no reason not to understand what the rules are.  There's a vast difference between simple ignorance (not knowing) and the arrogance of choosing to remain ignorant.  The latter is a manifestation of stupidity.