Punctuation (Page 11 of 12)

Who said that? 

Straw-man argument if there ever was one.

At least he admits that's where he stands!!

And three: she, who is just pleased to say she has a pronoun!

Referring to people as "slaves" identifies them with their oppression rather than their humanity. It's far more appropriate today to say "enslaved people."

Centuries of smothering female significance under the catch-all pronoun "he" is a manipulative and political top-down tactic which impacted history by making it perfectly natural to assume females could be subsumed under the male experience.

You think language is important? So do I.

Here's a semi-colon for your evening: ;

I hope we're not arguing with a Markov chain.

You are leaving me too much to surmise your meaning.  Mostly, having had Usenet experience since the '80's, I have ignored such postings as if coming from AI that not surprisingly came from computer geeks who had poor real-people communication and social skills. There is always the "argument" or, at least the premise, which is the telling agent being different than the usual pastiche of garbage put into the mind by profs, celebrities, and crazy uncles.

I am a strong skeptic of the possibility of AI unless AI is always to be confined to the sort of intelligence that can only produce the grammar in: Can anyone think of myself as a third sex. Yes, I am expected to have.

I also think that mathematical randomness is not real randomness. It can be a good simulation, one supposes, but never real.

Glad to hear you say it.  Now, would you please explain why, per my question above, the prescriptivist/descriptivist dichotomy is, as you term it, an un-concept.  I expect I'll disagree with you--respectfully, I hope--but you have whetted my curiousity.

So, for the sake of pushing past my somewhat Aristotelian preconceptions, let me quote my questions:

In other words, are you arguing that there is no distinction between describing and prescribing, or that the people engaged in one are engaged in the other, either intrinsically or by universal accident?

Or does some other factor, intrinsic or functional, obliterate the distinction?

So, help be clear on your position in an attempt to bring this to closure. From what I have gleaned from your statements direct or inferred, let me pose a direct question. Should someone with what I would consider at least above average knowledge of punctuation, say an editor, says that although a certain writer (famous or otherwise) uses punctuation (any punctuation not just the semicolon) which is not standard (which you seem to think are concrete rules), said writing is still appropriate (or one might say creative) as it is their style, would you then say that both the writer and editor are inept? That is what I gather from your past positions so hopefully you can clarify it for me as true or misconstrued and we can wind this subject down. Take care. Vern

Cite an example where Virginia Woolf, who directed by her style did not inject punctuation normally, in publication used a semicolon incorrectly.

If it all worked out according to the ideal? Sure, the patriarchal structure was intended to benefit both men and women. A woman could expect (in an ideal system) to be treated with kindness throughout her childhood, have a man selected for her from the men her father knew, have her wordly things kept for her by her new husband, be cared for by her sons until her death, and die safe and comfortable. (Bearing in mind that most women in England were not taught to write in the 1500s and early 1600s, because a writing woman was a dangerous woman. And for an intelligent woman, such an existence was likely abominably dull. But let's assume the ideal, and hope she was an idiot.)

The historical truth, though? It didn't always work out as planned. Husbands drank and abandoned their wives, fathers died early and step-fathers came in to take on the old property, leaving the unwanted step-daughter to the wolves. Even those who married happily according to the ideal found, all too often, that they were widowed early and left on the mercy of the community. Such women were considered surplus women and were glared at suspiciously by men and women alike who needed to see that the patriarchal structure was fully intact to feel that life was orderly.

Then there was all the rape. What do you think happens in the 1600s when a maid works in the city away from home, and the master coerces her into sex (lest she lose her job, or else be accused of licentious behavior and cast out of every home forever)? She becomes pregnant, she is seen as a drain on the community, and she is publically whipped, sometimes in the middle of labor, in order to force her to name the father. And if the father is an influential man? It's hard to say what's worse: being whipped, or facing what will happen once she names him. Women colluded in this too: midwives tortured single women during labor to get them to name the father. To not be married in the 1600s was considered an enormous social crime for a woman because an unmarried woman had no patriarch. She was out of control: a witch. That was true of those who chose not to marry, and those who married and lost their husbands either to abandonment or death.

You suggest that the supply of a patriarch in such a world was a benefit. I agree, so long as he was kind, because woe to the woman who was without one.

The English language developed out of this society, which was patriarchal. That's not blame? Why would I blame Charles for that? I blame him for everything I've already said above within this thread, but I don't blame him for being born into an ancient structure which is still in the middle of evolving.

I brought up the grammar issue of the generic "he" as a point within a grammatical discussion. Charles had claimed he wasn't suggesting the grammar rules were set in stone, yet he was using a nearly three-decade-old "standard" as if it was current.

Take a look at the rest of this thread, and then ask yourself why you've leapt upon the word "patriarchal" as a problem within this discussion. Memphis can say Linguist-weenie (or whatever he said), Charles can call people hicks rather than sticking to topic, Vern can suggest that Charles is an old man who doesn't get out much, Charles can suggest that Vern has the mentality of a middle schooler, Charles can suggest that all women who are feminists are either female sexists or lesbians (never minding the fact that there are many, many male feminists in the world) -- and no one objects. But let someone refer to the patriarchal structure in society, which you yourself have conceded exists, and this is taking it just a shade too far! If hearing the word "patriarchal" startles you or Charles enough to make you clam up and feel "blamed," that's your issue. I'm certainly not going to apologize for referencing historical fact. If it stings, it's probably because of that evolution I mentioned earlier.

Getting back to my point? Language evolves, has evolved, and is evolving. Charles claims that it is currently standard English to use the generic "he" to refer to everyone. I say that it was standard up until the 1990s. The growing realization that language can be tyrannical is reflected in the very style books (reference books) Charles insisted earlier in this conversation people should refer to when discussing English. Editors are now on the watch for bias-free language. The use of the word "mankind" would likely receive a query from an editor: "Do you mean humanity, or are you referring to men only? Consider revising." The use of a phrase like "Indian giver" would receive a similar query.

Language is changing and those who cling to biased forms of conversing within formal writing (or frankly, casual discussion) will be left behind. It's as organic as you say the patriarchal structure is/was. People who continue to say "he" this and that, when what they mean is "they" will start looking ridiculous, and people won't take them seriously. Because twenty-five years have passed since using  the generic "he" within formal writing was "standard."

I say again: the generic "he" is NOT standard English. Language has evolved. Either Charles concedes that, or he concedes that Vern is correct, and he is claiming that the language rules are set in stone.

Either way, I rest my case.

I don't argue that the situation is 'just' as we now understand the word.  I argue that justice and injustice are not part of the word derivation, and that the implications of the word 'patriarchy' do not apply, because they imply intent, and the structure that resulted was the only one that could have worked.

Here's an ugly fact: what we call the Stockholm Syndrome allows a conquered tribe or clan to assimilate into the conquerers, preserving their lives, their utility in the present, and their genetic endowment.

We are, in the old language, rational animals.  It took a long time for the 'rational' part to happen, and even longer for it to take hold.  Imputing motive, as the word 'patriarchy' does, cannot fit the actual play of cause-and-effect that brought us to this point.

Note that some of the nastiest 'patriarchal' laws came into being in the name of progress and protection during the industrial revolution.

To what anti-concept do you refer in this sentence?