Sentence examples for prescriptive grammar from inspiring English sources

Criticizing the previous static views of grammar (descriptive grammar, prescriptive grammar, pedagogical grammar), Larsen-Freeman (2003) emphasized the importance of grammaring, an approach in which teaching grammar is less "knowledge-centered" (p.24).

In 1862, when prescriptive grammar ruled, Thoreau wrote: "When I read some of the rules for speaking and writing the English language correctly … I think – Any fool can make a rule And every fool will mind it".

As education became more broadly disseminated throughout society by the schools, attention shifted from theoretical or technical grammar as an intellectual preoccupation to prescriptive grammar suited to pedagogical purposes, which started with Renaissance vernacular nationalism.

Set at the third-rate Wicomico State Teachers College in Maryland, the novel contains fine scenes of academic nonsense, as when the protagonist and anti-hero Jacob Horner wows the professoriate in a job interview with platitudes about igniting sparks in the minds of students, or in a session with his shrink, wonders whether he should teach "descriptive or prescriptive grammar" in the classroom.

The first, and most traditional way, is what we linguists call "prescriptive grammar," or, more snarkily, the "who died and made you king" approach.

Traditional prescriptive dictionaries and grammar books were mostly written by native speakers, and their more recent and descriptive counterparts have been put together using data exclusively from native speakers.

This, it seems, lies at the heart of this issue: should grammar be prescriptive or descriptive?

And there are meta-level questions about the sources of authority in questions of grammar, the old prescriptive versus descriptive argument.

Depending on the grammarian's approach, a grammar can be prescriptive (i.e., provide rules for correct usage), descriptive (i.e., describe how a language is actually used), or generative (i.e., provide instructions for the production of an infinite number of sentences in a language).

Some English teachers are critical of what they say is a prescriptive focus on spelling lists and grammar that does not relate to children's use of language.

This interest in language was expressed in Varro's work on words and grammar, De Lingua Latina (43?), with its prescriptive tone.