Language debate

The preservation of the English language and concern over declining abilities to use it effectively has worried academics for centuries. Jonathan Swift wrote to the Earl of Oxford in 1712 of his fears of the ‘corruption’ of the language. He felt that language need not be constantly changing if the nation is stable and without threat from invading countries. Swift criticised the imitation of the language of the courts in daily life and the introduction of new and ‘conceited’ words and jargon. He targeted poets for their abbreviation of words to fit a metre and men at university seduced by phrases that they hear and take on. The solution proposed by Swift was the appointment of a group of men to set rules for the use of language. Fixing the language he felt was better than allowing it to change.

Swift’s argument for the preservation of the language and the tying up of it in chains is countered in the preface of Johnson’s dictionary (1755). Attempts made to control the development of language Johnson believes to be as futile as efforts to shackle nature. As with Swift, Johnson recognises that invasions have the greatest and fastest impact on language development, however he also recognises the more gradual influence trading with other nations has. Unlike Swift, Johnson views the impact of the arts on language as innovative. While people of wealth have time to develop themselves he believes thought and language will grow. Johnson makes a direct criticism of Swift’s desire to preserve language, arguing that words become obsolete when people stop using them in favour of alternatives and the pen follows speech.

Language and how it is used remains a topic of debate today. Grammarian Jean Aitchison is interested in how language is used and for what purpose. Linguistic trivia she believes to be irrelevant. In an article in the Times (1993) she embraces the use of double negatives and argues that ‘may’ and ‘might’ have developed the same meaning and are now used interchangeably. It is useless to try to prevent such changes, the meanings of words have always changed, and there has always been a concern for the decay of language. What is important, according to Aitchison, is an awareness of how language is manipulated to alter meaning. In Why Do Purists Grumble So Much (1994) Aitchison cites the use of the phrase ‘pinpoint accuracy’ in the ‘surgical’ speech of the Gulf War. The phraseology misled people into believing that buildings were targeted during air strikes and people were relatively unharmed. George Orwell in Politics and the English Language (1946) also argued against the use of phraseology, believing it to be used in politics to prevent people thinking about the reality of what is being described.

The debate between the ‘purists’ and those that believe the pen should follow speech has implications for what we teach and promote in the classroom. The bias towards Standard English has prompted Nick Peim (2000) to call for a re-think of how language is taught; arguing that language is social in nature and the meaning attached to language is therefore a construct, challenging the promotion of Standard English within the subject. The author James Kelman (2009) talks about the effect Standard English, as an approved pattern of speech, has on social groups whose speech patterns do not match Standard English. Arguing that the endorsement of Standard English has damaged the Scot’s national identity, a view that may be applicable to other ethnic groups. Marenbon (1996) defends the teaching of Standard English believing that to deny that one style of English is superior to another is misguided, as not all forms are as complex and riddled with grammatical rules, something he views as an indication of merit. Grammarian, Aitchison (1994) agrees that appropriate use of language is important, however she does not make a value judgement on language form, the stance that we should be adopting as English teachers.