Professional Development Reflections
Keynote Speech: Geoffrey Pullum - Writers UA Conference, Long Beach, CA
March 2007
In March 2007 I attended the Writers UA conference, for writers of online technical assistance, in Long Beach California. One of the speakers was the grammarian Geoffrey Pullum, of the University of California at Santa Cruz. As conference attendees who wrote for a living, we all had a keen interest in writing correctly. What did a professional grammarian consider correct?
What did you do that for?
Is a preposition a bad thing to end a clause with? Not according to Mr. Pullum. This is a myth, he says, originating with a 1762 essay by John Dryden, in which he attempted to “correct” his literary rival, Ben Johnson. Dryden’s writings, however, didn’t follow his own rule, and he hastily revised all of his works for a second printing. Since then, public perception has abhorred the innocent clause-terminating preposition, despite the “rule’s” scurrilous origin.
In some cases, of course, a distinction between ordinary and more formal speech can be made by fronting the preposition, e.g., “To where should I address this?” as opposed to “Where should I address this to?” However, in many contexts, “stranding” the preposition at the end of the clause it is the only coherent possibility. Fronting it in some cases simply makes no sense, so for what would you want to do that?
“To boldly split…”
Star Trek fans will be relieved to know that their favorite show is above censure, at least grammatically. According to Mr. Pullum, not only is splitting an infinitive not a grammatical faux pas, it’s actually impossible in English, since we don’t technically have an infinitive.
What most people consider the English infinitive, Pullum calls a “plain form,” with “to” as introductory word. This is, of course, not normal use of a preposition, but rather, as he says, “a useless little dingle-dangle.” Since the preposition and the “plain form” of the verb are two different, distinct words, there’s nothing to split!
Pullum said that if you look up “split infinitives” in any grammar and usage guide, they will all agree that split infinitives are grammatical and often preferable to other alternatives. A quick Google search confirms this, from such notable sources as The American Heritage Book of English Usage (quoted at Bartleby.com) and AskOxford.com (both of which, along with Wikipedia, refer to the infamous Star Trek quote). Strunk and White call it a violation of correct grammar, but then admit that it might sometimes be permissible. Of course, Strunk and White are trained professionals—we probably aren’t meant to even occasionally split infinitives at home.
“And every one to rest themselves betake.”
The search for a gender-neutral pronoun has resulted in, on one hand, unilateral use of masculine forms, or on the other, such eyebrow-raising neologisms as sie/hir and zie/zir. But, says Pullum, these circumlocutions are unnecessary, since for the last 700 years, writers from Chaucer to Shakespeare to Austen have made liberal use of “they” as an epicene pronoun with antecedents that don’t identify a particular person.
It’s often argued that using “they” in these situations can be ambiguous, but usage has rendered it so common that it seldom is. For example, the case of the anonymous “they:” “They’ll be mad to find their car towed,” clearly refers to the singular owner of car, even though you don’t know who it is.
“They” in this usage can be not only ungendered but unnumbered as well, without any ambiguity. “Everyone does what they want,” is perfectly fine, according to Pullum; even though “everyone” is singular, there is no question that “they” is not plural but merely indefinite.
Of course, if the pronoun’s antecedent is an identified person, the language is designed so you must make a choice about gender, even if the identified person’s gender is unclear. Thus, you can’t say, “Chris left their pen behind.” Chris is, patently, either male or female, and not knowing doesn’t get the speaker off the grammatical hook. In this particular case, the neologism proponents may yet have their day.
However, in most cases where this issue arises, the antecedent is completely unidentified, and thus truly ungendered; therefore the argument to only use “he” in these cases is not only unnecessary but slightly absurd. After all, if “he” is truly gender neutral, why can’t you ask “I forget, was it your father or your mother who broke his leg?”
Relative Clauses Which are Integrated
The ambiguity argument is usually trotted out to defend “don’t introduce a relative clause with ‘which, ’” but Pullum noted that proper use of commas will trump ambiguity every time. In fact, it’s fairly difficult to come up with an appropriately comma’d sentence which is still ambiguous.
As it happens, this is not a rule of grammar, it’s “just a prejudice.” Henry Fowler, in one of the first books on English usage, noted that the kind of relative clause that needs commas (a non-restrictive clause) almost always used “which.” He noted whimsically that it “would be neat” if the non-restrictive clauses always used “which,” and the restrictive ones, sans commas, always used “that.” English grammarians latched onto this idea, but according to Pullum, “nothing in the history or structure of the language is on their side,” not even the venerable Strunk and White—or at least, not Strunk.
The original printing of “The Elements of Style,” which predates Fowler’s observation, was produced by Strunk alone. Not only is the “rule” about “that” and “which” conspicuously missing, but Strunk’s own prose uses “which” at the beginning of restricted relative clauses. In subsequent editions, White not only added the rule, he altered Strunk’s prose to follow it!
Breaking the Rules
Hearing the history behind these calcifications was enlightening, and was enhanced by Mr. Pullum’s engaging speaking style. To tell the truth, I’ve always followed these “rules” where I could, but blithely broke them as I saw fit. As with any linguistic endeavor, for every rule there are usually at least a few exceptions.
In March 2007 I attended the Writers UA conference, for writers of online technical assistance, in Long Beach California. One of the speakers was the grammarian Geoffrey Pullum, of the University of California at Santa Cruz. As conference attendees who wrote for a living, we all had a keen interest in writing correctly. What did a professional grammarian consider correct?
What did you do that for?
Is a preposition a bad thing to end a clause with? Not according to Mr. Pullum. This is a myth, he says, originating with a 1762 essay by John Dryden, in which he attempted to “correct” his literary rival, Ben Johnson. Dryden’s writings, however, didn’t follow his own rule, and he hastily revised all of his works for a second printing. Since then, public perception has abhorred the innocent clause-terminating preposition, despite the “rule’s” scurrilous origin.
In some cases, of course, a distinction between ordinary and more formal speech can be made by fronting the preposition, e.g., “To where should I address this?” as opposed to “Where should I address this to?” However, in many contexts, “stranding” the preposition at the end of the clause it is the only coherent possibility. Fronting it in some cases simply makes no sense, so for what would you want to do that?
“To boldly split…”
Star Trek fans will be relieved to know that their favorite show is above censure, at least grammatically. According to Mr. Pullum, not only is splitting an infinitive not a grammatical faux pas, it’s actually impossible in English, since we don’t technically have an infinitive.
What most people consider the English infinitive, Pullum calls a “plain form,” with “to” as introductory word. This is, of course, not normal use of a preposition, but rather, as he says, “a useless little dingle-dangle.” Since the preposition and the “plain form” of the verb are two different, distinct words, there’s nothing to split!
Pullum said that if you look up “split infinitives” in any grammar and usage guide, they will all agree that split infinitives are grammatical and often preferable to other alternatives. A quick Google search confirms this, from such notable sources as The American Heritage Book of English Usage (quoted at Bartleby.com) and AskOxford.com (both of which, along with Wikipedia, refer to the infamous Star Trek quote). Strunk and White call it a violation of correct grammar, but then admit that it might sometimes be permissible. Of course, Strunk and White are trained professionals—we probably aren’t meant to even occasionally split infinitives at home.
“And every one to rest themselves betake.”
The search for a gender-neutral pronoun has resulted in, on one hand, unilateral use of masculine forms, or on the other, such eyebrow-raising neologisms as sie/hir and zie/zir. But, says Pullum, these circumlocutions are unnecessary, since for the last 700 years, writers from Chaucer to Shakespeare to Austen have made liberal use of “they” as an epicene pronoun with antecedents that don’t identify a particular person.
It’s often argued that using “they” in these situations can be ambiguous, but usage has rendered it so common that it seldom is. For example, the case of the anonymous “they:” “They’ll be mad to find their car towed,” clearly refers to the singular owner of car, even though you don’t know who it is.
“They” in this usage can be not only ungendered but unnumbered as well, without any ambiguity. “Everyone does what they want,” is perfectly fine, according to Pullum; even though “everyone” is singular, there is no question that “they” is not plural but merely indefinite.
Of course, if the pronoun’s antecedent is an identified person, the language is designed so you must make a choice about gender, even if the identified person’s gender is unclear. Thus, you can’t say, “Chris left their pen behind.” Chris is, patently, either male or female, and not knowing doesn’t get the speaker off the grammatical hook. In this particular case, the neologism proponents may yet have their day.
However, in most cases where this issue arises, the antecedent is completely unidentified, and thus truly ungendered; therefore the argument to only use “he” in these cases is not only unnecessary but slightly absurd. After all, if “he” is truly gender neutral, why can’t you ask “I forget, was it your father or your mother who broke his leg?”
Relative Clauses Which are Integrated
The ambiguity argument is usually trotted out to defend “don’t introduce a relative clause with ‘which, ’” but Pullum noted that proper use of commas will trump ambiguity every time. In fact, it’s fairly difficult to come up with an appropriately comma’d sentence which is still ambiguous.
As it happens, this is not a rule of grammar, it’s “just a prejudice.” Henry Fowler, in one of the first books on English usage, noted that the kind of relative clause that needs commas (a non-restrictive clause) almost always used “which.” He noted whimsically that it “would be neat” if the non-restrictive clauses always used “which,” and the restrictive ones, sans commas, always used “that.” English grammarians latched onto this idea, but according to Pullum, “nothing in the history or structure of the language is on their side,” not even the venerable Strunk and White—or at least, not Strunk.
The original printing of “The Elements of Style,” which predates Fowler’s observation, was produced by Strunk alone. Not only is the “rule” about “that” and “which” conspicuously missing, but Strunk’s own prose uses “which” at the beginning of restricted relative clauses. In subsequent editions, White not only added the rule, he altered Strunk’s prose to follow it!
Breaking the Rules
Hearing the history behind these calcifications was enlightening, and was enhanced by Mr. Pullum’s engaging speaking style. To tell the truth, I’ve always followed these “rules” where I could, but blithely broke them as I saw fit. As with any linguistic endeavor, for every rule there are usually at least a few exceptions.