I read McWhorter's piece on THE NEW REPUBLIC. It is fine--I guess. But the biggest problem with the piece was this: "On the one hand we associate it with emotional honesty, vernacular warmth, and sex – Al Green would not have had a hit with “Why Don’t We Venture to Consummate Our Relationship?” or even “Let’s Have Sex” instead of “Let’s Get It On.” Yet it’s not a dialect – a sound – that we associate with explaining Greek verbs or cosines or engaging in complex reasoning. Black English sounds cool, and even hot, and maybe “sharp” – but note that sharp is what you call someone who you wouldn’t necessarily expect to be smart … and who you don’t actually think is all that smart." Of course, this statement is now fixed--it now correctly reads "Marvin Gaye." I'm sorry, I don't care what training you have but if you don't know RIGHT FROM THE BEGINNING that Marvin Gaye sang "Let's Get It On," your argument just falls apart.

I like this part a lot: “The fact that America is a complex society and that we’re made up of many different strands and that those strands can be woven together in a compatible manner was the essence…”

Regarding Trent Lott's moment in the spotlight, I get where Glenn is coming from in saying that we're all Americans, and that those who kept sending Strom Thurmond back to the Senate are Americans as much as anybody else. I also get his complaint regarding the great scads of sound and fury that come about in reaction to something someone said, while all around us, much more important problems seem to pass unremarked. And yes, the self-appointed wardens who make careers out of "policing language" for its race-related content are more than a little tiresome, not to mention lacking in credibility and too often downright unhelpful. However, I don't think it is completely wrong for there have been a reaction such as there was to what Lott said. Societies evolve, and hopefully, they progress, and one of the important elements of this movement is the decision by enough people that such and such a word or statement is now defined to be offensive, or that such and such a viewpoint is now defined to be repugnant. Yes, the Lott episode was picayune in and of itself, but it is also symbolic, a watershed

Granted, a lott ;^) of the uproar was driven by people purely looking for a partisan edge. But not all of it, and certainly not nearly to the degree that the noise surrounding the Reid line is. I agree with what Glenn said at the beginning of his comments on this: there is a real difference there. Reid used a word that is now borderline inappropriate in most contexts, and he spoke an uncomfortable truth. That's it. By contrast, Lott made a clear statement of support for a thoroughly objectionable idea.

Well said. Matt agrees.

Quoting Invisman52: Of course, this statement is now fixed--it now correctly reads "Marvin Gaye." I'm sorry, I don't care what training you have but if you don't know RIGHT FROM THE BEGINNING that Marvin Gaye sang "Let's Get It On," your argument just falls apart.

Is it John's fault that all sexy soul singers look alike?

Quoting uncle ebeneezer: Well said. Matt agrees.

Thanks for letting me know. In the end, though, I think we can all agree that Lott, like Rod Blagojevich, ought to be banned from all public appearances until he does something about that hair.

Re: Harold Ford Here is some analysis by a New Yorker who is only half paying attention:
1) He's conservative, which also the problem with Gillibrand, so that gains us nothing.
2) To those in New York City, he comes off as not knowing a thing about living in the city. i.e. He doesn't know the importance of taking the train to work (even if you get driven to the train like Bloomberg). However, as a New Yorker from Tennessee, I have to admit I feel a strong lizard-brain resonance with him. Who knows. More informed analysis by New Yorker Peter Feld. (He says Ford is insane.)

Quoting osmium: However, as a New Yorker from Tennessee, I have to admit I feel a strong lizard-brain resonance with him. Who knows.

I don't know if it's that I'm a New Yorker from New York (with additional stops in New Jersey, Connecticut, Rhode Island, California, and Massachusetts) but I will say that my own lizard-brain responded every time I saw him on the teevee in 2006 and 2008 as follows: "Man, I don't know what it is, but I wouldn't trust that guy as far as I could throw a hole in the ground." Kind of like the way I felt about John Edwards.

More informed analysis by New Yorker Peter Feld. (He says Ford is insane.)

Thanks for the link. Always nice to be able to rationalize my visceral reactions!

The US political debate is a "madhouse". Everything is upside down! 1.The Republican vigorous defense of Sarah Palin for VP even though see had responsibilities as a mother of small children and especially a mentally challenged child is a total victory for radical feminism and an absolute defeat for traditional conservative values. 2. The militant demand of Republican leaders for Harry Ried's resignation regarding his "Negro dialect" comment" is a total victory for race sensitive political correctness and a absolute defeat for ... what ever the Republicans used to call their position ... "common sense???" Discuss!

Quoting bjkeefe: I don't know if it's that I'm a New Yorker from New York (with additional stops in New Jersey, Connecticut, Rhode Island, California, and Massachusetts) but I will say that my own lizard-brain responded every time I saw him on the teevee in 2006 and 2008 as follows: "Man, I don't know what it is, but I wouldn't trust that guy as far as I could throw a hole in the ground."

Well, I'm just saying because he's from Tennessee. Really I'm not serious--like, I wouldn't vote for him just because of that. Really, like all NY senators, the winner is going to strike this balance of seeming to wink-nod to both the city and upstate, making them believe they're really daddy's/mommy's favorite. But the conservative leaning: I would say neither Gillibrand nor him are going to be loved down here. And his "I took a helicopter tour to Staten Island" thing is about the wrongest thing possible to say. The correct response is: "Have you been to all 5 boroughs?" "Yes, of course, and I love this city!" Why was that so hard? I can't be a more natural politician than him--I'm an idiot.

Quoting osmium: But the conservative leaning: I would say neither Gillibrand nor him are going to be loved down here. And his "I took a helicopter tour to Staten Island" thing is about the wrongest thing possible to say.

I am unable to rid myself of the thought that Harold Ford was created by George Soros to make liberal New Yorkers say, "Y'know, that Gillibrand really isn't so bad after all."

Quoting David Edenden: [...] Everything is upside down! [...]

Heh. I know what you mean. We haven't seen anything this funhouse-mirror-like since that time when the best golfer was black and the best rapper was white.

Quoting bjkeefe: I am unable to rid myself of the thought that Harold Ford was created by George Soros to make liberal New Yorkers say, "Y'know, that Gillibrand really isn't so bad after all."

Another link. The Harold Ford listening tour. (My policy is that Gawker is shiat, but this article is hard to argue with.)

Never mind the (other) N-word. THIS SIMPLY MUST NOT STAND:

When Bush invited Reid for coffee in the Oval Office in the final weeks of his presidency, the president’s dog walked in, and Reid insulted the president’s pet. “Your dog is fat,” he said.

(h/t: Juli Weiner)

Quoting osmium: Another link. The Harold Ford listening tour.

Heh. Not doing a whole lot to beat down the "limousine liberal" image, is he?

(My policy is that Gawker is shiat, but this article is hard to argue with.)

Is shiat the new shite? If so, meh. I think they're sharply funny sometimes, which is about all I ask out of political snarkers. (I am too bored by what passes for celebrities these days to make Gawker a regular read, though, I gotta admit.) ========== [Added] Shoulda checked before I asked.

Glenn said it best: "this is all superficial." Why go there? Nothing to be gained, learned or resolved. Waste of their time.

Quoting Salt: Glenn said it best: "this is all superficial." Why go there? Nothing to be gained, learned or resolved. Waste of their time.

I think you're confusing how and I would like things to be with how they actually are. I think this was a useful discussion about an issue that, like it or not, stupid as it is, is An Issue.

Nice to see these two back. Richard Feynman, the American physicist, spoke with a street-wise Queens accent and a vocabulary to match, which made it hard for him to be taken seriusly by his peers at first -- except for John Archibald Wheeler, who was himself from a southern, Scotch-Irish, working-class background. And of course a cockney accent in Britain suffers the same disability. So I think Glenn is right here when he suggests this is more about class than race. One surprising thing about Obama's speech patterns I've begun to notice by the way -- and I wonder whether John McWhorter would agree? -- is a certain lack of range, an inability to speak off-the-cuff in a relaxed conversational style. He has a limited repertoire of rhetorical cadences no matter the subject, always delivered slowly and deliberately, with a certain falling note at the end. It starts to get old after a while and may not work well over the long haul. This cannot possibly be how he talks when he is alone among friends. Could it be he needs a speech coach?

Quoting bjkeefe: Is shiat the new shite?

shiat and fark are the accepted versions of some popular words on fark.com. sometimes i use them, perhaps to be clean. i think shiat has a nice out loud sound to it though. i even say it sometimes.

Quoting BornAgainDemocrat: Nice to see these two back.

Richard Feynman, the American physicist, spoke with a street-wise Brooklyn accent and a vocabulary to match, which made it hard for him to be taken seriusly by his peers at first -- except for John Archibald Wheeler, who was himself from a southern, Scotch-Irish, working-class background. And of course a cockney accent in Britain suffers the same disability. So I think Glenn is right here when he suggests this is more about class than race.

One surprising thing about Obama's speech patterns I've begun to notice by the way -- and I wonder whether John McWhorter would agree? -- is a lack of range, an inability to speak off-the-cuff in a relaxed conversational style. He has a limited repertoire of rhetorical cadences no matter the subject, always delivered slowly and deliberately, with a certain falling note at the end. It starts to get old after a while and may not work well over the long haul.

This cannot possibly be how he talks when he is alone among friends. Could it be he needs a speech coach?

That, "Wahh, he's a robot," is pretty weak shit. You can say that about anybody. You

Okay. Have to call bullshit on John's analogy because it denigrates the value and purpose of proper grammar, diction and syntax. If a Martian came down and took down the grammar of a ghetto guy in Baltimore, he would be quite confused by lack of agreement between nouns and verbs (plural vs. singular), present tense and past tense, double negatives denoting a negative not a positive. There is a reason you don't go to a ghetto guy from Baltimore to draft a contract. For the record, you wouldn't get your contract written by a hillbilly, either.

I think the comparison between Reid and Lott is largely apropos, but only in one of the two respects that matter: both said something which was itself forgivably stupid and not indicative of racism, but which was indicative of obliviousness (or at least insufficient attentiveness) to a matter of racial importance about which people are sensitive — Reid's statement belied that he is surprisingly behind the times in his nomenclature, Lott's statement belied that he was shockingly ignorant of the real importance of our nation's racial history. (Contra Glenn, I think that if Lott really believed it was fine to have been a Dixiecrat, he could not have escaped thinking about the subject enough to know that he, as a politician, could not indicate this publicly, so that the only conclusion to draw is that he hadn't thought about it, which says something different, but not something good.) Where I differ with John is that I think we are entitled to expect more from our elected officials than not being racists — I expect them to also be effective leaders and worthy policy-makers. If simple lack of moral repugnancy is the only

Quoting claymisher: That, "Wahh, he's a robot," is pretty weak shit. You can say that about anybody. You might as well just call him a dork and snicker at him.

Well said.

Quoting osmium: shiat and fark are the accepted versions of some popular words on fark.com. sometimes i use them, perhaps to be clean. i think shiat has a nice out loud sound to it though. i even say it sometimes.

I can see that. Me, I'm gonna stay old school when I wanna go polysyllabic: "shee-yit."

Quoting Salt: Okay. Have to call bullshit on John's analogy because it denigrates the value and purpose of proper grammar, diction and syntax. If a Martian came down and took down the grammar of a ghetto guy in Baltimore, he would be quite confused by lack of agreement between nouns and verbs (plural vs. singular), present tense and past tense, double negatives denoting a negative not a positive. There is a reason you don't go to a ghetto guy from Baltimore to draft a contract. For the record, you wouldn't get your contract written by a hillbilly, either.

Many languages — all of the Romance languages IIRC — use a double negative to denote a negative. Also, I am a passionate defender of singular 'they' so I can't give you the singular-plural noun-verb agreement either. (For that matter, I use singular 'you' despite the word's plural-only origins.) And should I bring in the common hypercorrections like "between you and I" that speckle upper-class speech? And for that matter, the predicate nominative pronouns in the objective case are perfectly idiomatic in English while also being at variance with the rules of grammer, so how are you defining "grammer?" Also, if you are drafting a contract, you

I'm glad to hear John and Glenn making sense about the word "Negro." If negro is a racist term, would that mean that "Caucasian" would also be a racist term? Also: I enjoy hearing "black English." It's artful and creative. And often quite (intentionally and successfully) funny. But all people of any race know that we all need to sometimes speak different ways in different situations.

Jim. I am truly awed with your command of grammar jargon, but let me axe you this: how many computer languages are written with such a disregard for grammar and syntax? Whatever their faults, if you go to a lawyer to draft a contract for a house, you know what you're getting. You won't end up owning two homes or buying when you mean to sell. "The dialect's" ambiguity may be more appealing and expressive from an artistic standpoint, but it's not pragmatic at all if you are talking about making actual decisions. Probably explains why liberals love it so much.

Quoting Salt: Whatever their faults, if you go to a lawyer to draft a contract for a house, you know what you're getting.

Yes. A good opportunity to go to court to argue about what the contract "actually" says.

Quoting Salt: how many computer languages are written with such a disregard for grammar and syntax?

Must.... restrain urge... to hate on.... VBA.... Oop. Fail: seriously M$, it is easier to write a compiler for a language with decent syntax! Why did you go out of your way to make my life harder?

Quoting Salt: Whatever their faults, if you go to a lawyer to draft a contract for a house, you know what you're getting. You won't end up owning two homes or buying when you mean to sell.

Normally, yes, but I think that may, in part, be due to the drilling every 1L taking Contracts gets not to screw that up — and the casebook full of times when some lawyer did screw that up.

Quoting BJ:Yes. A good opportunity to go to court to argue about what the contract "actually" says. What court? Never been to court over real estate or any other contract dealings. The contract language was clear and tight. When it's not, I expect that's when you go to court.

Quoting Salt: Quoting BJ:Yes. A good opportunity to go to court to argue about what the contract "actually" says.

What court? Never been to court over real estate or any other contract dealings. The contract language was clear and tight. When it's not, I expect that's when you go to court.

There's a reason we have the word boilerplate, and I strongly suspect your never having been to court stands on those shoulders. My point -- it pains me slightly to have to spell this out -- was less about standard agreements to transfer ownership of a house than it was about contracts and legalese in general.

Don't miss Colbert's episode! Also notice the rest! I'm glad there are a few of us following Comedy Central best shows. In terms of all manners of speech, I agree with others here that we all have different ways of talking depending on the situation. The choice of vocabulary, tone of voice, inflection, and even language may vary according to context. When I'm very angry or tired I tend to speak in Spanish... De ahora en adelante empezaré a insultar a los que me contradigan en todos los idiomas!

Quoting Ocean: [...]

You must delete your second sentence! You're stepping on the punchline! [Update] Thanks, O.

It is a dogma among linguists that "no native speaker can make a mistake," and that "all dialects are equal." This is true in the trivial sense that every native speaker of a language, or of a dialect of some language, speaks according to the grammatical and phonetic norms of his nation, region, social class, or race. But it is not true that an ancient language like English, the fruit of centuries of refinement by grammarians, writers and others, is spoken equally well by all speakers. Education and literary usage shape what is considered good English, and so they should. Isn't that obvious? It is unfortunate that the question of race should cloud this issue. If Reid hadn't used the N word, would anyone care that he attributed Obama's success to his mastery of English? Now if someone had said that G W Bush would never have been elected if he spoke good English, I might pay attention: that would be an interesting thesis!

BJ: My point, and it pains me to have to have to spell this out, is that when you don't have a valid rebuttal, you tend to obfuscate the issue with a throwaway line about lawyers, or whatever.

I think that conservatives like myself are not really upset with Reid's choice of words. It is that he did not look at Obama as a man, separate from his race. In short, he used affirmative action. Most of the whites that I know in the South want those who identify themselves as black to be evaluated on the same standard as everyone else. Instead, we have the Democratic party trying to make the future president as white as possible. That is wrong. In my book Reid did far more wrong than Trent Lott. He thus needs to follow Mr. Lott to retirement.

Quoting david7134: I think that conservatives like myself are not really upset with Reid's choice of words. It is that he did not look at Obama as a man, separate from his race. ... He thus needs to follow Mr. Lott to retirement.

This from a guy who is evaluating the Majority Leader of the Senate on the basis of two sentences and from them, calling for his resignation. This is why we have to type a one among our exclamation points from time to time, if you know what I mean, and I think you do.

P.S. And another thing: Trent Lott did not retire after giving Strom Thurmond a tongue bath. In fact, he stayed in the Senate for another five years, until leaving so he could get in under the wire as a well-paid lobbyist before the new revolving-door rules took effect. You could look it up.

Quoting Salt: how many computer languages are written with such a disregard for grammar and syntax?

Who speaks in computer languages?

Quoting Salt: if you go to a lawyer to draft a contract

No one speaks in contract language, either.

Quoting Salt: "The dialect's" ambiguity may be more appealing and expressive from an artistic standpoint, but it's not pragmatic at all if you are talking about making actual decisions.

Dialects are pragmatic, otherwise they wouldn't be dialects; they wouldn't work as language. You couldn't communicate with them. People make actual decisions in dialect everyday. In fact, nearly all communication takes place in dialect. You have no argument, other than an aesthetic one: you don't like the way black people talk.

Quoting Salt: Never been to court over real estate or any other contract dealings. The contract language was clear and tight. When it's not, I expect that's when you go to court.

As has been pointed out, this has nothing to do with the merits of standard American English, as legal language is its own thing (it's not a good example if what you want to talk about are the merits of a particular spoken dialect). With legal language, such as with drafting a contract, you, in fact, write less elegantly in many cases to prevent (as much as possible) ambiguity.

1. I don't want to see a situation in the US as it is in South Korea where there is general agreement about the value of regional dialects. In South Korea, most people, even those people in the country's "hick" provinces, agree that the Seoul/Gyeonggi dialect of the capital is the official dialect and represents what a cultured person should use. All news and other TV programs use this dialect in a style comfortable for Seoul denizens. It just bleaches what Koreans can do inpublic, and disguises a wonderful diversity. 2. So, I agree generally with Loury, that, if I disagree with a Thurmond or Jackson, I should consider the electorate that supports him. I think he downplays the role that the aura of success and celebrity plays for public figures, and how the media anoints public figures.

Quoting Ray: [...] You have no argument, other than an aesthetic one: you don't like the way black people talk.

Oh snap.

In regards to BJKeefe's statement that Lott didn't retire after making his statement, that is true. However, he did have to give up his leadership position. Also, at the time when he did so, Harry Reid weighed in with the following statement:

"He had no alternative,If you tell ethnic jokes in the backroom, it's that much easier to say ethnic things publicly. I've always practiced how I play."

So, if that is how Reid plays, then perhaps at the very least he should be forced to give up his leadership role if not be forced out of the senate completely? Hmmm?

Quoting jr565: In regards to BJKeefe's statement that Lott didn't retire after making his statement, that is true. However, he did have to give up his leadership position. Also, at the time when he did so, Harry Reid weighed in with the following statement:

So, if that is how Reid plays, then perhaps at the very least he should be forced to give up his leadership role if not be forced out of the senate completely? Hmmm?

What ethnic joke did Reid utter in the backroom?

Can anyone point me to a McWhorter article or book explaining the virtues of using these terms? Generally, I use the "African-American". But, if all three - "negro" included - have spin associated with them, I'd like to hear that argument.

Quoting Baltimoron: What ethnic joke did Reid utter in the backroom?

What ethnic joke did Lott utter in the backroom?

Ray: You have no argument, other than an aesthetic one: you don't like the way black people talk. So what you're saying is that you don't hear "dialect" in operating rooms, or airtraffic control towers or on trading floors because all the surgeons, etc. are racist? By the way, as I pointed out already you don't hear hillbilly slang, cockney-rhyming slang, or pidgin either. I'll also point out that you have attempted to make it impossible for someone to disagree with John's assertion that formal grammar and educated syntax are irrelevant without being branded a racist. This maneuver has lost its effectiveness, because most people see it for what it is: scurrilous, passive-aggressive, ludicrous crap.

In regards to the conversation about the comparison to Lott's statements versus Reids statements a few points:
Reid was simply making the argument that Barack Obama, by not speaking in negroese and by being, to quote Biden "clean and articulate" he was more electable than, say, an Al Sharpton. There have been many arguments and many made in the black community about this very point. Was Barack authentically black enough, or was he a sellout. In fact, I remember a parody song, Barack the magic negro, that appeared on the Rush Limbaugh show, which was marked on as completely racist by the left. In it, the "authentic black leader" modeled after an Sharpton suggests that Barack is getting all the positive press that the authentic black leaders doesn't get because he makes guilty whites feel good about their racism and because he isn't from the hood or who speaks gangsta, or ebonics, or isn't a sellout or whatever(which would denote a more authentic negro) the song was based on an article, written by a David Ehrenstein (a black journalist) in the LA Times similarly titled "Barack the Magic Negro" which made the same point and

I can't pass up the opportunity to link to H. L. Mencken's rendition of the Declaration of Independence in the American language, which he always believed to be superior to the Queen's English. I can imagine him saying "Take that, H. P. Lovecraft", except nobody heard of him back then. On Strom Thurmond: I think Glenn is a bit off in claiming that voters who kept re-electing him must agree with his Dixiecrat views. He was really old, so a lot of those voters would have grown up after the civil rights movement became accepted and Thurmond himself became reconciled to it. I've heard it said (though I haven't seen proof) that Thurmond racked up a higher proportion of the black vote than the Republican party gets nationally. I believe George Wallace was also able to get the support of African-Americans after he renounced his previous support for segregation. Most of us would think it silly to assume that all those people voting for them actually supported segregation in the present.

Dialects are rich and precious and should be cultivated, on the other hand, being able to switch to a standard language raises your marginal productivity, so there's a strong incentive to learn the standard language. My advice would be: learn the standard language if you're poor, and enjoy the dialects if you can afford it. This would be the 'economic' perspective. From a cultural point of view, what I've noticed is that dialects can also be a way to express your anti-status-quo status, especially, when well-off and standard-speaking people adopt a dialect, they might do this to send an anti-establishment signal.

bjkeefe...Finally, I would like to believe Glenn was being totally tongue in cheek about Harold Ford and the absence of a kneejerk embrace of him by libs and Dems... That was my take: he was being entirely tongue and cheek here, though McWhorter didn't know what to make of it. I thought for the most part this was a crackling exchange and I thought for the most part Loury was on fire. But he lost me over Lott. I can (barely) understand an argument for letting Lott off some moral and even political hook because his comments were meant as a sort of joke or a sentimetal gigging up of Thurmond on his 100th birthday though I’d reject that argument. What I can’t understand is what Loury seems to be saying: that Lott gets a pass because there is free speech in America and a lot of people held/hold segregationist views—like those who kept voting Thurmond in—and what is America about but diverse viewpoints that should get argued out in the market place of ideas. The absurdities that that line of reasoning gets one to are

And one can praise a colleague without necessarily espousing the views that they exhibited 40 years prior,when you didn't know them. I imagine similar things will be said about Robert Byrd when he retires.

But Lott specifically praised Thurmond's presidential campaign and said that if he had been elected, the US wouldn't have gotten into so much trouble. Thurmond wasn't just a guy who happened to support segregation like a lot of people from his state did in 1948. The whole reason he ran for president was because of it. Their slogan was "Segregation forever", for god's sake. If Lott had said "I admire Strom Thurmond's service in the senate" or "Strom Thurmond has achieved many admirable things during his long career", some eyebrows might have been raised, but it would have been fairly innocuous. Apparently Lott didn't get that saying what he said was at worst an endorsement of segregation and at best an indication of his warped view of American history, and that this was bad, and I can understand why the Republican party wouldn't want to have a guy like that as their majority leader. When Robert

I am not going to bother trying to illustrate to you why I think you're doing nothing but making an especially obvious false equivalence between Trent Lott's praise for a repugnant point of view and Harry Reid's harsh but probably accurate assessment of one of life's unpleasant realities, due to my sense that (1) you have your mind made up, or (2) you know how ludicrous your argument is and you're only trying to make political hay, or (3) both. So let's just skip all that, and measure things as calculated by the respective politicians' allies.

Quoting jr565: In regards to BJKeefe's statement that Lott didn't retire after making his statement, that is true. However, he did have to give up his leadership position.

Yes. And why was that? Partly because libs/Dems were making noise, but mostly because his own party and ideological fellow travelers on other matters said, in effect, "Sorry, ol' buddy. You fucked up. Here is your sword. Please fall on it now." If nothing else, that aspect ought to persuade you that there was something qualitatively different about the two incidents.

Quoting bjkeefe: ... Trent Lott's praise for a repugnant point of view ...

Just how repugnant was it? Attached is a reminder (h/t: Atrios (who has a better quality image), via TwinSwords), a copy of a mailer sent out in 1948 (confirmation here), urging people to vote for Strom Thurmond for President, among other people and things. Note the part I highlighted in the attached image. I've retyped that text below.

REMEMBER

A vote for Truman electors is a direct order to our Congressmen and Senators from Mississippi to vote for passage of Truman's so-called civil-rights program in the next Congress. This means the vicious FEPC -- anti-poll tax -- anti-lynching and anti-segregation proposals will become the law of the land and our way of life in the South will be gone forever.

Say it again: anti-poll tax, anti-lynching, and anti-segregation proposals were considered "vicious" by these people. Anti-lynching. Vicious. Because it takes away "our way of life." Think about that for a few minutes. .
.
.
.
.
.
.
. (Yes, they called themselves Democrats back then -- you don't really need this link, do you? -- but not for much longer.) From the NYT, 11 Dec 2002 (emph. added):

Lott's Praise for Thurmond Echoed His Words of 1980

Trent Lott, the Republican Senate leader who faces mounting criticism

I recently read John's book "Our Magnificent Bastard Tongue," so I get what he's saying about Black English--all languages have things that don't make sense, and we only think Standard English has "proper grammar, diction and syntax" because it's our native tongue. For example, in English we have the "meaningless do," where "do" in sentences like "they do not eat meat" serves no grammatical purpose (this usage is pretty much unique to English, although it also occurs in Welsh, which leads McWhorter to argue that the traditional understanding of the history of English is incorrect). In Spanish that sentence would be "ellos no comen carne"--there's no "do" in there. Other languages have their own illogical usages, like gendered nouns, absurd verb cases, etc.

Quoting bjkeefe: Say it again: anti-poll tax, anti-lynching, and anti-segregation proposals were considered "vicious" by these people.

And in the next paragraph, they say that without lynching, segregation, and poll-taxes, "our way of life in the South will be gone forever."
Strom Thurmond won four states. 87% of the vote in Mississippi
80% of the vote in Alabama
72% of the vote in South Carolina
49% of the vote in Louisiana (Source)

Here are the results of the 1968 presidential election, when George Wallace ran on a platform not terribly different from Thurmond's. Wallace won five states: Alabama: 66%
Mississippi: 63%
Louisiana: 48%
Georgia: 43%
Arkansas: 39% It's interesting to cross-reference the states that voted for the white supremacists in 1948 and 1968 with those states that had the largest slave populations prior to the Civil War. — 1860 Slave Census And, whatever you do, don't miss the George Wallace for Governor Comic Book! Sample page:

Interesting discussion on dialect. McWhorter states black English is just as coherent as standard English, which he then seems to equate with Baltimore ghetto English. I have never been to the Baltimore ghetto, but here in NYC ghetto English deserves its own classification. Ghetto English is not only spoken with a heavy accent but uses a completely different and ever changing dictionary. Ghetto is barely recognizable as English and not intelligible to many outside of the ghetto. Black English as used by McWhorter and Loury seems to be referring to a more middle class black English, where one can easily identify the speaker as black while fully understanding what is being said. Not all blacks residing in the ghetto speak ghetto and not all blacks (including those with a black dialect) outside the ghetto can understand it. I was surprised that McWhorter seemed to treat these two distinct dialects as one.

Quoting Salt: So what you're saying is that you don't hear "dialect" in operating rooms, or airtraffic control towers or on trading floors because all the surgeons, etc. are racist?

Can't speak for Ray, but of course you do hear dialect in those places, the particular dialect that is generally accepted there. And there's nothing negative about that. What sounds ignorant to me is the assumption that there's something inherently better about that dialect, as opposed to it being better (or more useful) for a particular time and place.

By the way, as I pointed out already you don't hear hillbilly slang, cockney-rhyming slang, or pidgin either.

True, and those also aren't inherently worse (less clear for those who speak them, less complicated, more suited for people of low IQs, etc.) as language. The point is that although one learns a particular dialect in school which is generally considered standard American English, that dialect is not inherently one that is more complicated or "smarter" or better for communication generally. Nor is it one that lacks grammar. The rules are simply different. Recognizing this and accepting that there are good reasons to be proficient in standard American English (or whatever the

I am not sure about this "add the sig" business.
Chamblee54
Does that help?
This was a good dialog. The participants allowed each other to speak, and showed respect for each other. And they made my stop what I was doing and take notes.

Quoting chamblee54: I am not sure about this "add the sig" business.
Chamblee54
Does that help?

You've got the link coded up properly. Now, if you want that added automatically to the bottom of all of your posts (the way, say, "Brendan" appears at the bottom of mine), do the following. 1. Click "User CP" in the horizontal bar running across the top of any forum page. 2. On the new page, click "Edit Signature" in the left-hand column. 3. On the new page, place the same link code you show above in the text box, optionally click the "Preview Signature" button to make sure you're happy, and then click the button labeled "Save Signature." 4. Profit! ;^)

Senator Reid is a Morman, and while their attitude to wards blacks has moderated nowadays when Senator Reid was young and forming his opinions about the various races he was subject to the influences of the Church and we all know how fair and benighted the Mormons were to Blacks.

And [God] had caused the cursing to come upon them, yea, even a sore cursing, because of their iniquity. For behold, they had hardened their hearts against him, that they had become like unto a flint; wherefore, as they were white, and exceedingly fair and delightsome, that they might not be enticing unto my people, the Lord God did cause a skin of blackness to come upon them. And thus saith the Lord God; I will cause that they shall be loathsome unto thy people, save they shall repent of their iniquities." (2 Nephi 5:21)

Judging his comments, in the context of his Mormon beliefs is there really that much difference.

The Racial Blind Taste Test I happen to believe that in many, if not most cases, the race of a speaker can be detected by subtle differences in timbre as well.

Quoting piscivorous: Judging his comments, in the context of his Mormon beliefs is there really that much difference.

yes. they are not at all comparable. 1) reid's thoughts about the electability of a black candidate 2) Lott support and longing for segregation. if you think they are comparable, you should remove your head from the dark smelly place you are putting it.

Quoting piscivorous: Senator Reid is a Morman, and while their attitude to wards blacks has moderated nowadays when Senator Reid was young and forming his opinions about the various races he was subject to the influences of the Church and we all know how fair and benighted the Mormons were to Blacks.

Judging his comments, in the context of his Mormon beliefs is there really that much difference.

Don't ask me. Ask the President ...

Calling the Senate's top Democrat "a good man," President Barack Obama defended Sen. Harry Reid Monday after a new book revealed racial remarks he made about Obama during the 2008 presidential campaign.

[...]

"This is a good man who has always been on the right side of history," Obama said in a television interview Monday.

Obama, who issued a statement on Saturday accepting Reid's apology, called the Nevada lawmaker "a stalwart champion of voting rights."

... and the First Lady ...

"Harry Reid had no need to apologize to me, because I know Harry Reid. And I measure people more so on what they do rather than the things that they say," Mrs. Obama said during a round table session with

Nevermind.

Quoting piscivorous: Senator Reid is a Morman, and while their attitude to wards blacks has moderated nowadays when Senator Reid was young and forming his opinions about the various races he was subject to the influences of the Church and we all know how fair and benighted the Mormons were to Blacks.

Judging his comments, in the context of his Mormon beliefs is there really that much difference.

Senator Lott is a Southerner, and while their attitudes towards blacks have moderated nowadays, when Senator Lott was young and forming his opinions about the various races he was subject to the influences of Southern racial attitudes and we all know how fair and benighted the white South was to Blacks. Judging his comments in the context of his Southern heritage is there really any doubt he's a flaming white supremacist who really believes the civil rights movement was a travesty that destroyed his beloved "Southern way of life?"

Well at lest you have the context of both in mind!

Quoting Stephanie: . . .of course you do hear dialect in those places, the particular dialect that is generally accepted there. And there's nothing negative about that. What sounds ignorant to me is the assumption that there's something inherently better about that dialect, as opposed to it being better (or more useful) for a particular time and place. Now you are just wandering off into semantics and fuzzy relativism. There is a big difference between jargon and dialect. To perform complicated functions a person has to be literate. You cannot pick up vocal inflections, body language, facial expressions, intonation, etc. from text. It requires grammar and syntax, which is something that is LACKING from "dialect". It is not impossible that someone who speaks dialect understands how to use grammar and syntax, but grammar and syntax are absent from dialect. It is not necessary to add that nobody in an operating room wants to be mistaken for an illiterate, if they have a choice. No patient wants to hear their surgeon sounding like an illiterate, if they have a choice. Finally, all you libs out there: better get Martha out to Teddy's Vineyard quick for a cocktail party. Or maybe a

Not a rare occurrence, I'll grant.

Quoting Salt: It requires grammar and syntax, which is something that is LACKING from "dialect". It is not impossible that someone who speaks dialect understands how to use grammar and syntax, but grammar and syntax are absent from dialect.

But it has been a long time since I saw such a factually wrong statement so confidently asserted.

Quoting Salt: ...
Now you are just wandering off into semantics and fuzzy relativism. There is a big difference between jargon and dialect. [...] It requires grammar and syntax, which is something that is LACKING from "dialect". It is not impossible that someone who speaks dialect understands how to use grammar and syntax, but grammar and syntax are absent from dialect. ...

I doubt you'll find much support for these assertions about the lack of grammar and syntax in "dialect" in formal linguistic theory. In fact, I doubt that the usage of "dialect" here is entirely coherent. The Queen's English is as much a dialect as a Scots-Irish drawl from Appalachians. From Wiki:

The term dialect (from the Greek word διάλεκτος, dialektos) is used in two distinct ways, even by scholars of language. One usage refers to a variety of a language that is characteristic of a particular group of the language's speakers.[1] The term is applied most often to regional speech patterns, but a dialect may also be defined by other factors, such as social class.[2] A dialect that is associated with a particular social class can be termed a sociolect; a regional dialect may be termed a regiolect or

Quoting BJ: But it has been a long time since I saw such a factually wrong statement so confidently asserted. Is it ironic that John and Glenn's dialogue is in this and every other instance I have heard on B'head 99% dialect-free? What could account for that? Are they racists? Or just sell-outs? This dialect-happy forum is the one and only instance where I feel it is permissible for me to ask, "What up with that?" Kudos to Keenan from SNL.

Quoting Salt: Quoting BJ: But it has been a long time since I saw such a factually wrong statement so confidently asserted.

Is it ironic that John and Glenn's dialogue is in this and every other instance I have heard on B'head 99% dialect-free?

Two in a row! Say, has anyone ever seen Salt at the same time, in the same place, as Baghdad Bob? It would be irresponsible NOT to speculate™.

Quoting Salt: John's assertion that formal grammar and educated syntax are irrelevant ...

I haven't watched the DV yet, but I have a sneaking suspicious McWhorter never said this. It just smells like a straw man.

Quoting AemJeff: I doubt you'll find much support for these assertions about the lack of grammar and syntax in "dialect" in formal linguistic theory. In fact, I doubt that the usage of "dialect" here is entirely coherent. The Queen's English is as much a dialect as a Scots-Irish drawl from Appalachians.

From Wiki:

Linguists have a saying, "a language is a dialect with an army and a navy." You can see it on Wikipedia's list of mutually intelligible languages.

Quoting Jeff: I doubt you'll find much support for these assertions about the lack of grammar and syntax in "dialect" in formal linguistic theory. In fact, I doubt that the usage of "dialect" here is entirely coherent. The Queen's English is as much a dialect as a Scots-Irish drawl from Appalachians. We are not talking about Al Gore's speech patterns here. I have taken exception with John's claim that if a Martian transcribed the English language from a ghetto guy in Baltimore, that language would have the same utility as formal English. You don't get a heart bypass from someone who constantly salts his sentences with "fuhgettaboutit", or "you know", or "like, wow", or, for that matter, "straight up". The reason is that if they were about to wheel your kid into the OR and the surgeon suddenly starts riffing in some slang, you might stop to marvel at his/her verbal dexterity, but you would be negligent not to wonder if the surgeon was qualified. It's called a red flag. Same reason why you hear lots of language at shareholders' meetings: Japanese, Chinese, English. But you don't hear slang coming from the CEO. It's too easy for people to sell their

Quoting Salt: Quoting Jeff: I doubt you'll find much support for these assertions about the lack of grammar and syntax in "dialect" in formal linguistic theory. In fact, I doubt that the usage of "dialect" here is entirely coherent. The Queen's English is as much a dialect as a Scots-Irish drawl from Appalachians.

We are not talking about Al Gore's speech patterns here. I have taken exception with John's claim that if a Martian transcribed the English language from a ghetto guy in Baltimore, that language would have the same utility as formal English. You don't get a heart bypass from someone who constantly salts his sentences with "fuhgettaboutit", or "you know", or "like, wow", or, for that matter, "straight up". The reason is that if they were about to wheel your kid into the OR and the surgeon suddenly starts riffing in some slang, you might stop to marvel at his/her verbal dexterity, but you would be negligent not to wonder if the surgeon was qualified. It's called a red flag. Same reason why you hear lots of language at shareholders' meetings: Japanese, Chinese, English. But you don't hear slang coming from the CEO. It's too easy for people to sell their

Quoting claymisher: Linguists have a saying, "a language is a dialect with an army and a navy."

!!!

Salt said:

We are not talking about Al Gore's speech patterns here. I have taken exception with John's claim that if a Martian transcribed the English language from a ghetto guy in Baltimore, that language would have the same utility as formal English. You don't get a heart bypass from someone who constantly salts his sentences with "fuhgettaboutit", or "you know", or "like, wow", or, for that matter, "straight up". The reason is that if they were about to wheel your kid into the OR and the surgeon suddenly starts riffing in some slang, you might stop to marvel at his/her verbal dexterity, but you would be negligent not to wonder if the surgeon was qualified. It's called a red flag. Same reason why you hear lots of language at shareholders' meetings: Japanese, Chinese, English. But you don't hear slang coming from the CEO. It's too easy for people to sell their shares.

Your original assertion was that Black English, or the Black dialect of American English, does not exhibit grammar or syntax. That assertion is, I believe, demonstrably false. You may now have a slightly different assertion in mind, that its grammar or syntax are not sufficiently flexible or complex to

On the talk of recognizing the race of the speaker, I wonder if the recognition persisted even on people speaking another language, brought up in an entirely different culture, like say, French culture, with a french accent.
I suspect it would persist. Nothing strange about that if true, there tends to be a clustering of intonation and pitch or whatever else it might be called from different groups. Some of it is just biological, not cultural, and you can generally tell.
Again, personally, I sound like a complete nerd. Was not really cultural, I did not even know about it based on what I hear in my head until I heard my recorded voice. When I did I was like, wow, NERD !!!!!!!!!!! I've come to terms with it now. But after seeing some tape of myself as a small kid, I sounded the same. And you know the eerie thing? younger kids with sort of a similar mix as I have... sound familiar in tone. Not identical, but there is something else there that is a bit distinct. Again, you can tell. EDIT: On a side note, Glenn is dead on here about the Lott issue http://bloggingheads.tv/diavlogs/252...2:50&out=33:47
it would have been far more useful to take him to task along with all the people

I went too far yesterday in attributing views to John McWhorter. I really have no idea what the state of play is as regards the grammatical complexity and flexibility of the black vernacular. I know that there is a grammar. A question that occurred to me after my last post is that of whether there is a future perfect tense in the black vernacular. The next question is how important it would be for scientific or medical discourse to have a future perfect tense. I'm guessing that one could read very thick medical school textbooks without ever encountering the future perfect tense. I, on the other hand, use the future perfect tense fairly frequently, even in speech. It's pretty common in classical Latin, which is why I thought of this in the context of my prior post. I'm thinking that an answer to the question "How long has he been here?" in the black vernacular might be, "He done been here four days." But one might also say, "Tomorrow, he done been here five days" to mean "As of tomorrow, he will have been here for five days." But for all I know, there is a semantic

Quoting ....On a side note, Glenn is dead on here about the Lott issue

[url: http://bloggingheads.tv/diavlogs/25263?in=32:50&out=33:47[/url]

it would have been far more useful to take him to task along with all the people that supported Strom about Why that was wrong and off in the first place.

I'd have been more satisfied if his statement about Strom was clearly taken apart and shown to be flawed, I'd rather have him yield the point, and all those defending him on it. The belief that having Strom, standard bearer for a segregationist platform winning would have made the country Better off, is flat out wrong. The implications needed to be made plain and all the problems with such a view laid bare.

But it never got there.

This is a false opposition. Lott was rightfully condemned for what he said. That condemnation necessarily included the reasons therefor. Saying that people who hold Lott's view, including Lott, have the right to that view misstates the issue in a number of ways. Their right is not in question. Plus, Lott wasn't just "people"; he was in high, high office beyond being a Senator. For him to have aligned himself with egregious racism--leaving aside the issue of him just making nice

bjkeefe said

However, I don't think it is completely wrong for there have been a reaction such as there was to what Lott said. Societies evolve, and hopefully, they progress, and one of the important elements of this movement is the decision by enough people that such and such a word or statement is now defined to be offensive, or that such and such a viewpoint is now defined to be repugnant. Yes, the Lott episode was picayune in and of itself, but it is also symbolic, a watershed moment perhaps, where we as a society draw a firm line. We have to have these concrete moments. They serve as steps -- ratchet clicks -- in the fits and starts journey toward the larger goals we pursue. Ultimately, it is all well and good to say "everyone is entitled to an opinion," but it is a mistake to insist that all opinions have equal merit, forever.

Good analysis.

Reid used a word that is now borderline inappropriate in most contexts, and he spoke an uncomfortable truth.

This reminds me of an incident when I was describing meeting a woman in person who I had previously only met

I am so tired of the backward intellectual spins by the designated speakers in the white chatter class like McWhorter & Loury. Lott & Ried are the same animals both are bigots..I find it amazing how some folks including backward people like McWhorther & Loury are fighting over the degree of thier white supremacy and white privledge... Both Lott & Ried comments were offensive and reflected the usual cultural themes of white folks with regard to Black Americans This issue is not about cadence and nonsense about derivative concerns about dialect..The issue remains the same white folks with continued contempt for Black people in our nation..

Quoting ledocs: But one might also say, "Tomorrow, he done been here five days" to mean "As of tomorrow, he will have been here for five days." But for all I know, there is a semantic distinction between "He been here four days" and "He done been here four days."

I'm not fluent in the dialect, but it seems to me you might as likely hear "Tomorrow, he be here five days" (or maybe "he'll") and especially with the context of the conversation, you'd have no trouble understanding what was meant. [Added: My experience is that the "done" is mostly used for emphasis or comic effect. On the latter, it sometimes even seems that the speaker is using it as a sly way of mocking those who mock black English. However, I can hear regional variations at least between LA and NYC, so it wouldn't surprise me if some areas of the country added the done as a regular matter of course.] Speaking of future perfect and other tenses, I have a friend named Dan with a gift for languages, who teaches them to himself for fun. As one measure of his skills, a couple of months after starting in on Chinese (I forget whether it was Cantonese, Mandarin, or what, so I'll just call it that), he and I, along with about ten other people, were at a Chinese restaurant for someone's birthday dinner, and Dan asked permission from the waiter to write up everyone's order on the waiter's pad. The waiter was happy (amused) to hand over the pad, Dan wrote the order, the waiter brought it

Ledocs, you are passionate, but you do not persuade. Unfortunately, you're sentences, despite excellent grammar and syntax, seem to have tied you up in knots. This would amuse McWhorter immensely, no doubt. It appears that you have repudiated your first argument, but I can't be sure. I don't have the inclination to do a study of all the different dialects and vernaculars in Baltimore ghettos or elsewhere, but it is very likely that they don't contain such features as subjunctive, future perfect and other tenses that are actually quite important if you are trying to organize a project. A wedding, for example, I can't imagine trying to organize something as basic as a wedding without those linguistic niceties. You, McWhorter and all the rest can rail on about equivalencies, etc. But you would not hire a wedding planner who couldn't speak with proper grammar and syntax. A home renovation. There are infinite examples.

Quoting JonIrenicus: EDIT:

On a side note, Glenn is dead on here about the Lott issue

http://bloggingheads.tv/diavlogs/252...2:50&out=33:47

it would have been far more useful to take him to task along with all the people that supported Strom about Why that was wrong and off in the first place.

I'd have been more satisfied if his statement about Strom was clearly taken apart and shown to be flawed, I'd rather have him yield the point, and all those defending him on it. The belief that having Strom, standard bearer for a segregationist platform winning would have made the country Better off, is flat out wrong. The implications needed to be made plain and all the problems with such a view laid bare.

But it never got there.

Yeah. As I tried to indicate when I commented on this bit earlier, there is not nothing to this view. There is a bit of a problem, though, in ignoring reality when wishing for the ideal resolution. People, especially in large groups, do not tend to get a whole lot out of teaching moments, as the current term of art would have it. We make societal progress in small -- one might

Quoting badhatharry: bjkeefe said

Good analysis.

Thx.

This reminds me of an incident ...

I wonder if there will be a day when we are no longer so hypersensitive. If so, that will be a good day.

Agreed. However, just wishing won't make it so. It will take time and work to get there. So in the meantime, it seems to me, a little consideration is not too much to ask. Sure, there are people who dine out on being outraged!!! at the use of various words, innocently uttered. Nothing good to say about them. But cultural-historical memories are powerful, especially as concerns black-white relations in the US, and if part of moving forward involves being extra careful about labels, fine. I know you know all this. This is really just my visceral reaction to your choice of hypersensitive.

Oh, Christ. Here, maybe this'll help, G. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mRDOp6zypbM&NR=1

Quoting JonIrenicus: On the talk of recognizing the race of the speaker, I wonder if the recognition persisted even on people speaking another language, brought up in an entirely different culture, like say, French culture, with a french accent.

Interesting question. I have known several French and British people of African descent. All well-educated and well-spoken. No trace of accent in French. In the case of the two Brits I knew there was a distinct accent---you can't escape that in Britain--but it was unrelated to race. But very south London. The only difference, and I'm not sure it is a difference, is perhaps that African voices are in general of a deeper timbre. But I wouldn't bet money on it.

Quoting look: Oh, Christ. Here, maybe this'll help, G.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mRDOp6zypbM&NR=1

Leave it to June Cleaver to straighten things out!

Quoting Salt: Unfortunately, you're sentences, despite excellent grammar and syntax, seem to have tied you up in knots.

No further questions, Your Honor.

Quoting Francoamerican: Interesting question. I have known several French and British people of African descent. All well-educated and well-spoken. No trace of accent in French. In the case of the two Brits I knew there was a distinct accent---you can't escape that in Britain--but it was unrelated to race. But very south London.

The only difference, and I'm not sure it is a difference, is perhaps that African voices are in general of a deeper timbre. But I wouldn't bet money on it.

It would seem that it depends on where and from whom you learn the language and who is doing the listening. Take, for instance, the accent of East Indians, when they speak English. To my ears it sounds British. However, I am sure that someone from the UK would hear that differently.

Quoting badhatharry: It would seem that it depends on where and from whom you learn the language and who is doing the listening. Take, for instance, the accent of East Indians, when they speak English. To my ears it sounds British. However, I am sure that someone from the UK would hear that differently.

Very true, but I am pretty familiar with British accents. Indian accents exist of course (just ask Preppy), but there are British Indians, East and West (Naipal) whose accents are very posh---because of their Oxbridge educations. I would have great difficulty identifying an educated African speaker of French over the telephone. French accents are all regional, and the school system does everything to eliminate them.

Quoting badhatharry: It would seem that it depends on where and from whom you learn the language and who is doing the listening. Take, for instance, the accent of East Indians, when they speak English. To my ears it sounds British. However, I am sure that someone from the UK would hear that differently.

Also it depends on when you learn a language. I have read that in order to learn a language without any accent (from, say, your native language) you must learn it by the time you are two or three years old, as in the example of my East Indian aquaintance. Also, it would seem to me that people who speak 'jive' do so amongst their peers and wouldn't do so in the larger society. I hear Obama lapsing into black slang when he's speaking to certain audiences who he knows will 'get it'.

Quoting badhatharry: Also it depends on when you learn a language. I have read that in order to learn a language without any accent (from, say, your native language) you must learn it by the time you are two or three years old, as in the example of my East Indian aquaintance.

There are most likely significant individual differences, but my impression is that after adolescence (teens) is more difficult to lose one's original accent.

Quoting badhatharry: Also it depends on when you learn a language. I have read that in order to learn a language without any accent (from, say, your native language) you must learn it by the time you are two or three years old, as in the example of my East Indian aquaintance.

Also, it would seem to me that people who speak 'jive' do so amongst their peers and wouldn't do so in the larger society. I hear Obama lapsing into black slang when he's speaking to certain audiences who he knows will 'get it'.

I wasn't talking about the accents of foreigners, but of native speakers. There is a great variety of regional and class accents in the UK. Far fewer in France. Indians, Pakistanis, Africans born and raised in the UK have distinctly British accents.

Quoting badhatharry: Leave it to June Cleaver to straighten things out!

If she can vacuum in heels, she can do anything.

Quoting BJ:
Quoting Salt: Unfortunately, you're sentences, despite excellent grammar and syntax, seem to have tied you up in knots.
No further questions, Your Honor. BJ, the fact that you took the effort to correct my punctuation proves my point more thoroughly than any arguments or examples I have offered. Bravo!

Quoting Salt: Quoting BJ:
Quoting Salt: Unfortunately, you're sentences, despite excellent grammar and syntax, seem to have tied you up in knots.
No further questions, Your Honor.

BJ, the fact that you took the effort to correct my punctuation proves my point more thoroughly than any arguments or examples I have offered. Bravo!

If you say so. I was just making a joke, though.

Quoting Ocean: There are most likely significant individual differences, but my impression is that after adolescence (teens) is more difficult to lose one's original accent.

Most language learners don't try hard enough, or don't bother or don't notice the most common mistakes. There is no reason that prevents Germans from pronouncing "w" properly for example. They are simply unaware about the issue. About the Negro dialect: I believe the tonal differences are partially biological. The vocal tract is visibly different. Asian Americans also sound distinctly different, and I am not talking about Chinglish, I am talking about umpteenth generation Asian Americans. I always thought that this would be obvious to everybody.
I can't explain it precisely. It is not just about pitch.
Also, I've noticed, that some people, who look alike, sound alike.

I don't have the inclination to do a study of all the different dialects and vernaculars in Baltimore ghettos or elsewhere, but it is very likely that they don't contain such features as subjunctive, future perfect and other tenses that are actually quite important if you are trying to organize a project.

First off, they do. Black vernacular English actually has distinctions in verb aspect that standard English doesn't. For instance, "He working late" means "He is working late right now" while "He be working late" means "He is in the habit of working late". The Wikipedia article has a good overview of the ways this dialect is different, grammatically, from standard English, and here's another article by a linguist that clears up a lot of misconceptions.

I don't know how you measure poverty in a language. But on the bit about grammatical mistakes, people are simply wrong. There is a difference between making grammatical blunders in Standard English and speaking correctly in a different variety of the language, one that has a slightly different grammar. And that's the case here. African-American Vernacular English has a regular, systematic grammar of its own.

People who don't

Salt said:

But you would not hire a wedding planner who couldn't speak with proper grammar and syntax. A home renovation. There are infinite examples.

You're joking, right? Where does one find a wedding planner who speaks with proper grammar and syntax? I'll bet you've never heard a wedding planner use the future perfect (not that this is a requirement of good grammar, obviously). I'll bet you've never heard a medical doctor use it. Let's take a class of people I do know something about -- lawyers. Your idea that lawyers write good standard English is, I am afraid, quite incorrect. Sure, there are some lawyers who have a very good command of English, but I don't have the impression that it's even the majority of lawyers. And the idea that one can count on a contract that avoids grammatical ambiguity by relying on the American professional class is absurd. This statement of yours makes me think that (i) either you have virtually no experience here, or, perhaps more likely (ii) your own standards as to what constitutes command of English grammar are not particularly high. I spent close to twenty years reading real estate contracts. The part of what

Quoting ledocs: Salt said:

Let's take a class of people I do know something about -- lawyers. Your idea that lawyers write good standard English is, I am afraid, quite incorrect. Sure, there are some lawyers who have a very good command of English, but I don't have the impression that it's even the majority of lawyers. And the idea that one can count on a contract that avoids grammatical ambiguity by relying on the American professional class is absurd. This statement of yours makes me think that (i) either you have virtually no experience here, or, perhaps more likely (ii) your own standards as to what constitutes command of English grammar are not particularly high. I spent close to twenty years reading real estate contracts...

I’d think, though I don’t empirically know, that amongst professionals, lawyers have a comparatively good command of English. That command is after all a crucial tool of their trade. I don’t think the idea that we can, and do, count on professionals, namely lawyers, to avoid ambiguity in contracts is absurd. In fact, rather than being absurd, the idea is a truism, and is self evidently true. That’s so for a number of reasons that you don’t sufficiently separate. One reason for that

I fear, basman, that is you who are confused, not I. I said that it was absurd to say that Americans can rely upon lawyers to avoid grammatical ambiguity in contracts. I never said that it was absurd to assert that Americans do rely upon lawyers in this way, nor did I even say that the reliance was absurd as compared to an alternative of not having licensed attorneys. There is clearly a broad range in the general education and grammatical competence of licensed attorneys in the US. One reason for this is that the US probably has far too many lawyers per capita. I am making two points about the pattern of Salt's posts, and they are related. Salt is probably underestimating the sophistication of the grammar implicit in the black vernacular. It was pretty clear from her initial post that she knows nothing about the subject, either theoretically or empirically. Second, she is overestimating the grammatical competence of the American professional class, prominently including lawyers, but also including CEO's.

Quoting ledocs: I fear, basman, that is you who are confused, not I. I said that it was absurd to say that Americans can rely upon lawyers to avoid grammatical ambiguity in contracts. I never said that it was absurd to assert that Americans do rely upon lawyers in this way, nor did I even say that the reliance was absurd as compared to an alternative of not having licensed attorneys. There is clearly a broad range in the general education and grammatical competence of licensed attorneys in the US. One reason for this is that the US probably has far too many lawyers per capita.

I am making two points about the pattern of Salt's posts, and they are related. Salt is probably underestimating the sophistication of the grammar implicit in the black vernacular. It was pretty clear from her initial post that she knows nothing about the subject, either theoretically or empirically. Second, she is overestimating the grammatical competence of the American professional class, prominently including lawyers, but also including CEO's.

Did I misread you? Is the question between you and your interlocutor really whether lawyers can be counted on to avoid “grammatical ambiguity” in contracts? If it

But I continue to think lawyers’ general grammatical competence is comparatively good amongst professionals because competent use of language is uniquely essential to their professional life.

Lawyers probably write more clearly than engineers, but engineers can rely on exhibits and equations to communicate the gist of what they are writing. They probably write more clearly than doctors, for the reason you give. There isn't much point to arguing about the grammatical competence of American lawyers outside of the precise context in which it arose for me here. I don't think that the standards are as high as one might like, and I don't think that they need to be, for most practical purposes. There probably is a literature that pertains to the question. I can imagine various Supreme Court justices complaining in speeches about the writing standards in the American Bar. In fact, I would be surprised if Scalia, of whom I generally do not approve, has not made such a complaint. And there are probably law review articles pertaining to the question of how often a poorly written contract (poorly written in the narrow sense of containing substantively important grammatical ambiguities) leads

Ledocs The “precise context”, I’m guessing and extrapolating without going back over the whole thread, seems to have to do with the denigration of black vernacular English, what using it signifies culturally and socially, particular in comparison with standard English as illustrated in its use by professional and business people. Just a couple of thoughts I was going set out by way of post script even before I read your last post: clear thinking would demand distinguishing between written and spoken English in these comparisons and would demand distinguishing between descriptive accounts and evaluative accounts of language use. I sense neither distinction has been sufficiently drawn. Scalia. among other things, is quite the fuss budget over language use and in these respects is a barometer of nothing much at all except his own idiosyncracies. Itzik Basman

...clear thinking would demand distinguishing between written and spoken English in these comparisons and would demand distinguishing between descriptive accounts and evaluative accounts of language use. I sense neither distinction has been sufficiently drawn.

I don't know whether you care about this, but if you're coming in late and saying that you don't have time or inclination to read the discussion, it's sort of insulting to then be told by you what clear thinking requires. Did I give you the impression that I thought I had written something with scientific merit about the black vernacular? I thought, to the contrary, that I was deferring to McWhorter, or to someone like him. But thanks for your input. Very enlightening.

So basman, I did a google search on "grammar lawyers." The first page of hits revealed these links: http://lawyerist.com/lawyerist/wp-co...Guidelines.pdf http://www.luc.edu/law/activities/pu...o1/farrell.pdf This is just the tip of the iceberg. Without knowing what your precise judgment is about the level of grammatical competence among American lawyers, I'll wager that I am more right than you are about this, with or without testimony from Scalia.

Frank Rich has an op-ed up about the Reid nontroversy has a very interesting, and new to me, thought: the noise was primarily driven by RNC chairman Michael Steele, but not out of actual racial sensitivity concerns. Read "The Great Tea Party Rip-Off." Bonus: funny dig at Al Sharpton.

Ledocs, don’t be insulted and no insult intended. I generally try to stay out of the insult business though, unlike the Pope, I am fallible. It was my impression starting with McWhorter himself, who I like a lot from what I have read of his books, journalistic writing, posting and appearances here, that he was not distinguishing sufficiently between descriptive and evaluative accounts of language use. I then got the impression from my recollection of the entire thread, which I read once a few days ago, that apples weren’t finding apples without considering the difference between written and spoken English. I have seen the kinds of things you linked to all my professional life and they tell me nothing about the comparative grammatical competence of lawyers. I need to see the iceberg. More I need to see an iceberg that isn’t anecdotal or impressionistic but that has some methodology to it which allows for the drawing of reasonable conclusions. I don’t have a precise judgment about the grammatical competence of American lawyers. It’s a subject that until about 4 days ago I gave not a whit of thought to. But from my too many years of dealing with Canadian lawyers—whose

Quoting bjkeefe: Frank Rich has an op-ed up about the Reid nontroversy has a very interesting, and new to me, thought: the noise was primarily driven by RNC chairman Michael Steele, but not out of actual racial sensitivity concerns.

Read "The Great Tea Party Rip-Off."

Bonus: funny dig at Al Sharpton.

Thanks for the link. I liked the op ed. It was lively, grammatical (:-) and appropriately eviscerating. I knew Palin was a shameless self promoter but did not know the same about Steele, who I thought was a clown but not a fox of a clown. Regardless of one's disregard for Palin, which for me has been growing by leaps and bounds lately--http://www.nybooks.com/articles/23532----she is, paraphrasing Rich, a foxy clown. Itzik Basman

Basman said:

So for your bet, let me make you a logically prior bet: that you cannot establish a reasonable basis for determining your bet.

I think I could construct "a reasonable basis" that would not meet the standards of social science. If you're saying that I probably can't get the raw data to do a regression analysis, and that it would be difficult even to specify the dependent variable, that's probably correct. What about my idea of trying to do a statistical analysis of numbers of cases reaching litigation due to poorly drafted contracts, where "poorly drafted" means containing grammatical ambiguities? Maybe the American Bar Association has data on this. How much anecdotal evidence would I have to collect to the effect that the grammatical competence of American lawyers is not very high, on average, in order to convince you? Would any amount of anecdotal evidence convince you, or do I need a statistical study using recognized social scientific procedures? I don't know enough about you to know if you're arguing in good faith about this. I would not assume that the Canadian case is that similar to the American case. A cursory look at perhaps unreliable

Frank Rich brilliantly captured what I thought all along about the rukus over Reid's remark, which is that it was some sort of manufactured distraction, from what I wasn't sure at first. The Great Tea Party Rip Off

It would be easy to dismiss the entire event as a credulous news media’s collaboration with a publisher’s hype for a new tell-all-gossip 2008 campaign book, “Game Change,” which breathlessly broke the Reid “bombshell.” But this is a more interesting tale than that. The true prime mover in this story was not a book publicist but Michael Steele, the chairman of the Republican Party and by far the loudest and most prominent Beltway figure demanding that Reid resign as Senate majority leader as punishment for his “racism.”

Ledocs I can tell you that I’m trying to have a bona fide discussion with you. I wouldn’t want you to go to a lot of trouble unless you wanted to but in any event just conceptually isn’t there a problem with analyzing the number of cases going to court—or to be fair to your argument, leading to disputes even shy of going to court— based on poorly drafted contracts—let alone boiling “poorly drafted” down to grammatical error? Amongst other problems, you would have to identify them and then measure them against contracts drawn in some agreed upon frame of time in some agreed upon place, and there would have to be refinement of which contracts comprised the universe of contracts the disputed ones would be measured against. I can’t imagine how practically you would do all that. And on a different point, without launching you into some quixotic enterprise, how would you go about collecting anecdotal evidence? And in that collection would you not run into the same problems that seem to attend your idea of a statistical analysis? I am impressed by your data indicating

Good post from SEK over at LGM, in response to a big helping of word salad from you-know-who. And yeah. Frank Pembleton rocked.

I wouldn’t want you to go to a lot of trouble unless you wanted to but in any event just conceptually isn’t there a problem with analyzing the number of cases going to court—or to be fair to your argument, leading to disputes even shy of going to court— based on poorly drafted contracts—let alone boiling “poorly drafted” down to grammatical error? Amongst other problems, you would have to identify them and then measure them against contracts drawn in some agreed upon frame of time in some agreed upon place, and there would have to be refinement of which contracts comprised the universe of contracts the disputed ones would be measured against. I can’t imagine how practically you would do all that.

Yes, there is a problem if you're going to be stubborn and obtuse about it, even in theory, otherwise not. I'm saying that maybe someone, the ABA for example, a law professor writing a law review article, a judge who is fed up, has already done the analytical work of saying that a grammatical ambiguity led to a dispute. I'm not going to be making that judgment. We're just

Quoting ledocs: if you're going to be stubborn and obtuse about it... So let's drop it.

If I'm going to be "stubborn and obtuse" about it, you say, and this is your thanks when I was being so gentle with you. Kettles and pots, my man: when I demonstrate the irrefutable absurdity of your position, you get personal. Let's drop it, you say. You took the words right out of my mouth. But I pause to note your exit in the face of your inability to confront what I argued against you except, as noted, by insult. See ya'. Itzik Basman (not to be confused with Itzik Basman)

I think that the particular magic of written, literary Chinese (which exists quite apart from spoken dialects) is its economy. In general, the more formal a setting, the fewer syllables of language succeed. This is the opposite of English, where formal written texts tend to favor MORE words and syllables than colloquial, spoken dialects (whether formal English a la Garner or "Negro dialect"s a la Sharpton).

Also, your friend "Dan" had no way of knowing that many of the orders, when written by Chinese "waitron"s are simplified by a series of puns and homonyms. In English, as servers frequently use idiosyncratic abbreviations and initials, so it goes in Chinese restaurants (and "Thai restaurants," "Vietnamese restaurants," and "Malaysian restaurants" that are run by Chinese diasporic entrepreneurs). As a result, orders are taken down in ridiculous-looking howlers that have little to do with the formal written language. This is linguistic facility. And the compliment, "Your Chinese is so excellent, come to work here any time..." is meant as an opening gambit for the following reply: "No, you are being ridiculous, my Chinese is hopeless..."). Complimenting a Caucasian on her Chinese facility by a native Chinese speaker is an invitation to demonstrate cultural bona fides by denying/rejecting the accolade entirely. It is NOT an actual reflection of skill/facility with written/spoken Chinese.

While we're chiming in about McWhorter's linguistics chops, I just have to mention Brian Garner's Dictionary of Modern American Usage, where he calls out McWhorter for semi-ridiculous statements about how all possible utterances are equal in the eyes of any possible human (or non-human) observer.

Quoting pod2: While we're chiming in about McWhorter's linguistics chops, I just have to mention Brian Garner's Dictionary of Modern American Usage, where he calls out McWhorter for semi-ridiculous statements about how all possible utterances are equal in the eyes of any possible human (or non-human) observer.

It is a semi-ridiculous statement, but among the majority of contemporary linguists, human and non-human, it would count as a truism. Which only goes to show you that linguists have an undeveloped sense of humor. Perhaps they come from another planet?

The estimable basman said:

Kettles and pots, my man: when I demonstrate the irrefutable absurdity of your position, you get personal.

I don't think you've demonstrated very much here, except that I am easily frustrated. I asked if you would accept the testimony of third parties with some presumed expert knowledge of American law who had written about, or studied instances in which grammatical ambiguity in contracts had led to legal disputes. You did not reply, even to say, "It would depend, I might." From this silence I inferred that my task would be Sisyphean. It does not follow from the fact that I am very unlikely to persuade you of the truth of "my position" because I cannot meet a certain burden of proof, yet to be specified, my position being that there is a widespread lack of grammatical competence in the American Bar, that the position is "irrefutably absurd." But maybe this does follow for you, according to some criterion of falsifiability, so that would be good to know. Is there evidence short of "proof" by regression analysis (which might well also fall far short of proof for you, I don't know) that would lend my opinion plausibility for you, and can we

Hey, basman, you posted on your personal blog, in a misleading way, excerpts of things you and I said in this topic. http://basmanroselaw.blogspot.com/20...s-writing.html
(valid as of 14:35, Monday, January 18, 2010, Paris time). First, you make it appear on your blog that things I said to salt were said to you. That’s sort of dishonest. I say “sort of,” because I don’t really care that much, it’s all more or less anonymous and unsourced, you quote me accurately, but still, I wasn’t talking to you when I said what you quote. It does not look good to say to an attorney that the attorney has little or no experience in reading contracts. Perhaps you therefore think that any reader will gather from what I say that I could not have been talking to you. And this is all not unrelated to my prior complaint that you entered the present discussion late and ignored the “precise context” of my remarks. The “precise context” includes a tacit explanation of why I used the word “absurd” in the words of mine that you cite. It’s because I was offended by salt’s posts. That is, your out-of-context citation of me makes me appear even more hyperbolic and hot-headed than I actually am. It also occurs

ledocs: No one reads my blog except my cat. I just keep it to keep a record of different things I write, get, and read and to comment on the odd case I find interesting. But since you complained about something being misleading, I posted our whole exchange leaving you have the last word. I am not a frequent attendee here but once in a while I get the bug and I post a few things. You are much more invested in the subject of the grammatical competence of American lawyers than am I, and at this point with my work day and the rest of my life calling, and with my wife coming back from out of town, I agree with your previous thought, "Let's drop it." Thanks for your concern about my personal profile. I never constructed it, don't know how it works, don't know how whatever is in there got there and could care less about it, be my post about Holder a poorly written rant or reasoned prose worthy of comparison with Areopagitica. As said John Milton, "Over and Out!" Itzik Basman ( not to be confused with Itzik Basman)

John McWhorter was a guest on Chris Matthew's "Obama's America: 2010 And Beyond" tonight on MSNBC. You can watch the program on YouTube, on this channel. Part One is here. You can probably watch the whole thing on the MSNBC web site, too.

Quoting basman: No one reads my blog except my cat.

That's quite a cat you've got.

Quoting basman: ledocs:

No one reads my blog except my cat.

Meow. Your 1/14 post on Robertson and Burston is beautiful.

Complex societies = simple languages

Quoting T.G.G.P: Complex societies = simple languages

No duh.

Quoting bjkeefe: No duh.

Heh.

That's interesting, and I'll have to bring this up next time one of my Czech friends starts going on about how what an easy language English is because it has no case or gender. On the other hand, just because a language isn't very inflectionally complex doesn't mean that it isn't complex in other ways. English phonetics is very complex -- most dialects of American English apparently have 15 vowel sounds and a heap of semivowels. English has a complex system of tenses and Spanish has even more. English phrasal verbs are a disaster (run out, run in, run up, run through, etc).

Quoting kezboard: That's interesting, and I'll have to bring this up next time one of my Czech friends starts going on about how what an easy language English is because it has no case or gender. On the other hand, just because a language isn't very inflectionally complex doesn't mean that it isn't complex in other ways. English phonetics is very complex -- most dialects of American English apparently have 15 vowel sounds and a heap of semivowels. English has a complex system of tenses and Spanish has even more. English phrasal verbs are a disaster (run out, run in, run up, run through, etc).

In the comments there Chris (of "Lousy Linguist") says

A common view amongst typologists is that there is a trade off: less morphology = more syntax & pragmatics (just as complex). Somehow, someway, all language must accomplish the communicative acts necessary for human interaction. How they choose to do this is less relevant than the fact that they all must do it somehow. the simple claim that adult learners have trouble with morphological complexity may stand up, but that's a much less bold of a claim.

I'm a programmer (or at least

Quoting T.G.G.P: I'm a programmer (or at least I was last month and hope to be so again), so I'm reminded of certain language wars. Some languages seem completely incomprehensible at first glance but grant a great amount of power to experienced users (Perl, for instance). Others take great pains to be user friendly and learnable. I don't think the two are zero-sum, it should be possible for a language to have easily learnable basics that will allow novices to get by, but at the same time have many hidden treasures that experts can make use of.

Do you have a favorite/favorites? What about favorite(s) to hate?

Quoting bjkeefe: Do you have a favorite/favorites? What about favorite(s) to hate?

Good questions. I'm curious what other programmers would answer, too.

Quoting TwinSwords: Good questions. I'm curious what other programmers would answer, too.

It's all Greek to me.

Quoting TwinSwords: Good questions. I'm curious what other programmers would answer, too.

You know, perl was designed for beginners and power users. And that's no accident -- it was created by a linguist, Larry Wall:

This brings me to my linguistic beliefs, and you'll probably recognize a lot of these in the design of Perl, and more particularly in the design of Perl Culture.

I happen to be of a school of linguistics called tagmemics. I can't hope to teach you all the buzzwords of tagmemics in a minute, but I can point out a basic principle of tagmemics. Every piece of language you care to talk about has a multi-part meaning, part of which is assigned to it by convention, and part of which comes from the context in which the expression finds itself. ...

Moving right along, I believe that learnability is a laudable goal, but frequently misplaced. The purpose of a language is not to help you learn the language, but to help you learn other things by using the language. We don't water down English to make it easy to learn. We prefer English to remain a rich language, quirky, sloppy, and full of redundancy. Same for Perl.

A corollary to that

Quoting claymisher: You know, perl was designed for beginners and power users. And that's no accident -- it was created by a linguist, Larry Wall:

Fascinating quote. I know literally nothing about programming, and when I try to conceptualize it, it seems very intricate and painstaking. I need to go to wiki for an overview.

Quoting bjkeefe: Do you have a favorite/favorites? What about favorite(s) to hate?

I have the most experience with Java specifically and the C family generally. I like it because I'm used to it. I know Perl by reputation only, so I welcome the correction below. I dislike the functional languages I've tried.

Quoting T.G.G.P: I have the most experience with Java specifically and the C family generally. I like it because I'm used to it. I know Perl by reputation only, so I welcome the correction below. I dislike the functional languages I've tried.

I write almost exclusively in C and C++ these days. C mostly for embedded projects and C++ on the Windows platform. I loved C (compared to PL/I and PASCAL, e.g., which are what I learned in school) when I was first exposed to it. But I think good C++ products are the best general software development tools I've ever encountered. Now, coding in C feels like assembly coding used to - sort of constrained and concrete, in comparison. I've never even read a Perl manual.

Quoting AemJeff: I write almost exclusively in C and C++ these days. C mostly for embedded projects and C++ on the Windows platform. I loved C (compared to PL/I and PASCAL, e.g., which are what I learned in school) when I was first exposed to it. But I think good C++ products are the best general software development tools I've ever encountered. Now, coding in C feels like assembly coding used to - sort of constrained and concrete, in comparison.

I've never even read a Perl manual.

C was designed to be very close to assembly-language. It supports use of assembly within it, though I haven't done so (though I did a bit of embedded C and also assembly in different courses at university). That's why it's sometimes called a "medium-level language". The standard complaint about C++ is that it tried too hard to be compatible with C.

Quoting T.G.G.P: C was designed to be very close to assembly-language. It supports use of assembly within it, though I haven't done so (though I did a bit of embedded C and also assembly in different courses at university). That's why it's sometimes called a "medium-level language". The standard complaint about C++ is that it tried too hard to be compatible with C.

But that's what makes C++ useful to geezers (like me) with a huge investment in their C skills. C is, in fact, pretty compact - the only issues where backward compatibility might be a real burden, IMHO, are type safety, and the legacy standard library. The strategies for avoiding those two classes of problems are pretty clear-cut. Btw, inline assembly is still a feature of C++. The combination of modern pipelined processors, and very good optimizers has reduced the need for resorting to that to nearly (but not quite) nil in most situations - even, to a lesser extent, in the embedded world.

Do you know the books about C++ by Stephen Prata? He's a close relative of mine, by marriage.

Quoting ledocs: Do you know the books about C++ by Stephen Prata? He's a close relative of mine, by marriage.

I didn't until you mentioned them. However, based on the reviews on Amazon, it seems clear that I ought to read "Primer Plus," which I've just ordered. I'll report back when I've had a chance to absorb some of it. Thanks for bringing it up.