Grammar for Everyone - Barbara Dykes 2007

Grammar - background and history
Part I. Teaching grammar

Grammar instruction

The word ’grammar’ often invokes a negative reaction in both teachers and students. Many teachers have come through a period in which grammar was neglected; for others, grammar has been taught in a haphazard way. What has brought about this situation?

During the 1960s and 70s, many believed that traditional elements of scholarship should be updated to suit the practices of contemporary education. There followed a period of uncertainty. No one was sure whether grammar instruction should take place or not. Often, if they believed it should, the new curriculum failed to allow it.

However, many in the profession believed that the absence of grammar instruction was contributing to a lowering of literacy levels. As a return to the grammar instruction courses of the past would be unacceptable, a supposed solution was devised - a system which became known as new or functional grammar. This system involved the generalisation of grammatical terms, and stressed the function that language performs, rather than the parts of speech described in traditional grammar.

But before the age of 12 or 13 - long after the need for basic grammar tuition - children do not normally begin to think in abstract terms. No wonder that both parents and teachers complained that the children disliked ’new’ grammar, while they themselves found it difficult to follow.

David Crystal, author of The Cambridge Encyclopaedia of the English Language, wrote, ’In the popular mind, grammar has become difficult and distant, removed from real life, and practised chiefly by a race of shadowy people (grammarians) whose tech­nical apparatus and terminology require a lengthy novitiate before it can be mastered ... It is a shame because the fundamental point about grammar is so very important and so very simple.’ The final statement is the significant one. We need to show that grammar need not be dry or tedious, but can be both fascinating and relevant.

Some of you may have received no grammar instruction at all; others may have been offered it in a random fashion, eclipsing its true function. Grammar provides a whole cohesive system concerning the formation and transmission of language. The question is, how do we pass on this knowledge? Firstly we need to understand it ourselves and, even better, develop that passion and enthusiasm in our students.

I trip (verb) over the rug (noun) and then you say I’m clumsy (adjective)!

What is grammar?

We all use grammar from the time that we can speak in intelligible sentences, because grammar deals with ’the abstract system of rules in terms of which a person’s mastery of his native language can be explained.’¹ We assume that it all happens naturally and are only confronted with the need to understand and define how English works when we learn another language or attempt to teach English to others.

1 Crystal, D., 1995, The Cambridge encyclopaedia of the English language, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.

So how might we define grammar? The simplest and perhaps the truest definition is ’a language to talk about language’. Just as one cannot explain how a motor engine functions (or is failing to function) without naming words for its parts and their specific actions, so it is impossible to explore the function of words and the part they play in forming meaningful language without a naming procedure.

It is impossible, for example, to offer a meaningful explanation for why we say ’did it well’ rather than ’did it good’ if there is no shared understanding of the language for talking about language - to explain that ’good’ being an adjective qualifies a noun, e.g. ’He did a good job,’ but ’well’, an adverb, is used for adding meaning to a verb, e.g. ’He did it well.’

The history of grammar

Whatever subject we are teaching, it becomes more interesting and meaningful, both to us and to our students, when we know something about its origin and history. This is no less true of grammar.

The word ’gramma’ meaning ’letter’ has come down to us in a path through several languages. In early times, the craft of using letters and constructing messages with the use of symbolic markings was seen to indicate magical powers, causing some early scholars to be seen as dealers in witchcraft and consequently eyed with suspicion. The word ’glamour’, meaning a deceptive charm, derived from the same source. However, in modern usage this word has lost much of its detrimental connotation.

Of course, no one invented grammar - it was there all along, an intrinsic part of the first meaningful speech uttered by human beings and, likewise, of their first meaningful writings. But at some point, interested scholars were inspired to make a study of it and its systems, both for their own better understanding and to enhance the language skills of their students - the same aim that we, as teachers, have today.

The study of grammar is believed to have its origins in both India and Greece. In India it was for the study of recited forms of Sanskrit, and in Greece for the study of written language. It is the latter that provides the source of our own studies.

Grammar and literacy are intrinsically bound. One of the first to formulate a system of grammar was Dionysus Thrax, from Alexandria. His ’The Art of Letters’ required students to first learn their letters in strict order (just as we do with our alphabet), then proceed to letter combinations, forming syllables in increasing length, from simple to complex word forms. Thrax’s grammar, which he defined as ’technical knowledge of the language of poets and writers’, established a model for the teaching of all European languages.

Through the following centuries, various scholars have set their own mark on the development of grammatical thought. Philosophers such as Aristotle and Socrates realised the impor­tance of grammar for all forms of language expression, particularly public speaking (rhetoric) and debate. A Roman, Marcus Varre, produced 25 volumes on the subject, translating the Greek and then applying the grammar to Latin. Interest then spread around the world, with grammarians of other countries comparing the features of their languages with those of Latin.

The best-known early English grammarian was Ben Jonson, who also based his work on Latin. He made a particular study of punctuation for which he had his own rather heavy versions adhering to the theory that one should punctuate as one wishes one’s work to be read or orally delivered, as well as to determine meaning in a logical way.

Then the 1760s ’witnessed a striking outburst of interest in English Grammar’² and among the best-known grammars was that of Robert Lowth, a clergyman and later Bishop of London. Lowth sought to remedy the dearth of simple grammar textbooks, but he earned criticism for judging the language as well as describing it. His pedantic approach led to such oft-quoted prescriptions as the inappropriateness of ending a sentence with a preposition.

Lowth’s work was followed by others, giving rise to the form­ulation of basic grammar principles and agreement on some points of usage. The principle of the supremacy of usage, which is still supported today, was established by Joseph Priestley, who stated: ’It must be allowed that the custom of speaking is the original and only just standard of any language.’³

In 1898, Nesfield and Wood co-authored the Manual of English Grammar and Composition which ran concurrently with Nesfield’s 1900 text An Outline Of English Grammar. Certainly these would appear dull and tedious to most modern students, but they do, nevertheless, provide excellent detailed explanations for those of more linguistic bent.

2 Baugh, Albert C, & Cable, Thomas 1987, A history of the English language, Routledge & Kegan Paul, London.

3 ibid.