“Good English and Bad”, Bill Bryson

IWA: 2/24/13

Summary: In his article, “Good English and Bad”, Bill Bryson attempts to tell his audience, English teachers, that our language has constantly changed throughout history and many historical figures saw this in different lights, some calling it barbarous. He argues that we shouldn’t worry about it too much because everybody has a different view on the matter (like different dictionaries) and languages constantly change.

Synthesis: This article reminded me of, in a way, the Porter piece. It’s a pretty big stretch but Porter discusses how people combine other’s ideas to form their own. I think Bryson’s piece touches on this in a way because we have begun incorporating other’s ideas in our everyday grammar. These ideas include texting, yolo, google it and more.

QD 1: Bryson is challenging the construct of how we use grammar. He discusses how the English language use of tenses doesn’t really make much since because we sometimes use the exact same word for past and present (like to drive). He often compares its complexity to that of Latin in that many of our verb tenses just do not make sense.

QD 3: Prescriptive means the “laws” of grammar and how we are supposed to use it. Descriptive on the other hand means how we actually use grammar. Throughout school I was always taught to use proper grammar on my papers and for the most part I did. However I’ve also realized that sometimes it just sounds awkward to write the “correct” way and I begin to write a little more informally. Although I know this isn’t always the best thing to do in my writing I think it helps the audience relate to it more and not zone out.

AE 1: Bryson uses examples of how what used to be correct now sounds weird. He says it was acceptable to say “you was” for multiple people but today we say “you all”. Today people are inventing new terms constantly such as “texting” or “yolo”. Before cell phones were around people would’ve never used the term texting but now it’s a common verb. The same goes for yolo. Although it’s an acronym people seem to constantly use it in everyday conversation and the majority of people immediately know what they’re saying. I don’t think Bryson would be too concerned with this since he talks about how language is constantly changing.

AE 3: This goes back to what I was talking about in my last paragraph. Basically as technology and humans advance in life we create more and more acronyms for common things to simplify what we’re writing or saying or to keep up with the world. Today people use terms like “texting” or “google it” which several years ago would not have made any sense. However because our world is constantly changing we have to make word changes. In addition I constantly hear “OMG”, “ROTFL”, and “YOLO”. Although this would be considered awful English people are so used to hearing/texting these acronyms they just accept it and use it in everyday conversation.
MM: Some parts of speech are: nouns, verbs, adverbs, and punctuation. Although I was taught all about them in school I don't always think about them anymore. Some I try to ignore and others have just become second nature that I'm not even aware I'm using them. I think in a way knowing them can help you write better but to me I think writing is more about conveying an important idea. I believe good writing isn't about whether you were grammatically correct, I think it's more about did you have an idea that you were passionate about and did you share it in a good way.

Afterthoughts: I think this piece brought about many new thoughts. It made me realize how ignorant people sound when they go around going “LOL that’s so funny” when they’re laughing out loud already. Granted I’ve always hated the term YOLO but now it gives me a reason to hate it even more because of how ignorant it makes people sound.