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Rules of Grammatical (Norm)

 

I invite readers to contribute their own Rules of Grammatical in the comment section. Who knows what a wonderful compendium we will create.

01. Considering proper grammar, dangling participles are used to subtly distract the reader from the true horror of split infinitives.

02. There are times when it is acceptable to use a preposition to end a sentence with.

03. The definite article is overused, and distinguishes the bad writing from the good writing.

04. The good writer automatically makes the decision of avoiding the use of the present participle in place of the infinitive.

05. In his classic essay on grammar, Smith explains why you can't use contractions in place of full forms.

06. Tomorrow, wednesday, we will review the work of british grammarian Smith on the correct use of Capitalization.

 

 

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17 responses to “Rules of Grammatical (Norm)”

  1. Elatia Harris

    These are massively awkward constructions, and wrong, too. It takes real ingenuity to come up with sentences that ask the reader to decide whether you, the writer, are conscious of error in the same breath that you interdict erroneous usages. Are you sure Sarah Palin didn’t write this?

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  2. Ruchira

    Okay, okay. That took some effort to construct. Elatia, Sarah Palin wouldn’t know a participle if it dangled before her eyes and that is part of her attraction as was Bushism for some. I hate grammar myself. Had they been not so dangerous, I would find that attribute attractive too!
    The only thing I can add here for Norm is “Desis are notorious for dropping definite (and indefinite) article.”

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  3. Norman Costa

    Elatia,
    I refudiate those accusations, with as much refudiation as I can muster.

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  4. Ruchira

    When you are tired of refudiation, try refutiating it. (She said both, one trying to correct the other)

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  5. Sujatha

    Never misunderestimate the power of the malapropos.

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  6. Norman Costa

    Origin of cells associated with nerve repair discovered. 16 November 2010. This came from a Cambridge University publication. Can anyone find the dangling participle in the third paragraph (quoted here) of the article?
    “Olfactory ensheathing cells (OECs), as the name suggests, ensheath and protect the nerve fibres in the olfactory nerve, which transmit olfactory (smell) information to the brain from receptor cells sitting in the lining of the nose. Excitingly, OECs can promote nerve repair when transplanted into the damaged spinal cord. They can also be grown in dishes from pieces of nasal lining but, unfortunately, in such small quantities that this may not be a viable option for use in treatments.”

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  7. Ruchira

    If my meager knowledge of dangling participle serves me correctly, it would be the possible implication that the OECs and not the nerve fibres transmit the olfactory information to the brain. But what do I know? I read the sentence as it should be understood.

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  8. Pete Chapman

    It is permissible to split the infinitive if and only if you can warp space.

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  9. Sujatha

    Shouldn’t the sentence have been : “Olfactory ensheathing cells (OECs), as the name suggests, ensheath and protect the nerve fibres in the olfactory nerve, which transmits olfactory (smell) information to the brain from receptor cells sitting in the lining of the nose.”
    This would make it amply clear that it is the nerve that serves as channel for the information, not the OECs.

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  10. Norman Costa

    Sujatha,
    You found another poor grammatical construction that I did not catch. Bravo! so did Ruchira. Another Bravo!
    The dangling participle is “Excitingly.” OECs do not get excited, but the author does.

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  11. Dean C. Rowan

    The adverb “excitingly” is a little disruptive. Grammatically it makes sense: OEC’s promote (in some fashion, here in an exciting manner) nerve repair. Semantically, I’m not sure what’s up, and I suspect the author intended to report that it is exciting to know that OECs promote repair. Hence the adverbial participle dangles.
    Also, as Sujatha comments, the verb transmit ain’t properly conjugated.

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  12. Dean C. Rowan

    Ah, well. Stripped again of my due reward. Our comments crossed paths in transit.

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  13. narayan

    Can’t contribute to this article but recommend highly a book I am sampling : When You Catch and Adjective, Kill It!”
    ‘Can’t’ is a blessing in a culture that thinks the long form is always written as ‘can not’ – see Fowler.
    Broad paraphrase of a bit of dialog from a wonderful movie with Alec Baldwin & Andre Braugher whose title I can’t recall :
    Perp – I can’t tell you who I’m running with!
    Cop – Didn’t yo Mama teach you not to end a sentence with a preposition?
    Perp – OK. I can’t tell you who I’m running with, motherf…er!

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  14. narayan

    An anecdote from “When You Catch An Adjective …”
    In an autobiographical piece submitted to the New Yorker, Nabokov had written “… a walnut cracked, the click of the nutcracker passed, …”. Harold Ross circled the second ‘the’ and wrote back with “Were the Nabokovs a one-nutcracker family?” This mystified the author. The passage was printed without change since Nabokov preferred it that way. Sixteen years later, Nabokov decided Ross was right and the article was published in a collection with ‘a nutcracker’.

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  15. Norman Costa

    narayan,
    That is a funny line from the film. I always believed a sentence should not be ended with a preposition. There is a famous (maybe apocryphal) story about Winston Churchill responding to a criticism of his grammar by using the phrase, “…up with which I will not put.”
    The grammar source I checked most recently said that it is OK to use an ending preposition as long as it passes the following test. If the meaning of the sentence is retained when you drop the preposition, then do not use it. An example is, “That is where I am going to.” The meaning is retained if you drop the preposition, “to.” Thus, the sentence should read, “That is where I am going.”
    I still don’t like the ending preposition.
    “Can’t” is a blessing in a culture that thinks the long form is always written as “can not” – see Fowler.
    Thanks. I never found a description as to when it is correct to use ‘cannot’ and ‘can not.’ It has always bothered me. So, the answer to the question is that ‘can not’ is never correct. I’m not going to look up your reference. I’m afraid I might find someone who says otherwise. I prefer to stay with ‘cannot,’ and not think about it anymore.
    With a title like, When You Catch an Adjective, Kill It!, I can not miss the opportunity to check it out. Correction: Forget the final ‘out.’ Another correction: Use the contraction, ‘can’t.’

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  16. narayan

    Norman :
    Re “can’t’” : My apologies – not Fowler. Webster’s Dic of Eng Usage says, with characteristic equivocation, that both long forms are acceptable in America, but that ‘cannot’ must be used in British English unless the ‘not’ is to receive particular emphasis.
    Fowler gives ‘preposition at end’ four (!) columns, ending with this :
    “If it were not presumptuous, after that, to offer advice, the advice would be this : Follow no arbitrary rule, but remember that there are often two or more possible arrangements between which a choice should be consciously made. If the final preposition that has naturally presented itself sounds comfortable, keep it; if it does not sound comfortable, still keep it if it has compensating vigour, or when among awkward possibilities it is the least awkward. If the preposition is in fact the adverbial particle of a phrasal verb, no choice is open to us; it cannot be wrested from its partner. Not even Dryden could have altered ‘which I will not put up with’ to ‘up with which I will not put’.”
    By Fowler’s rule for phrasal verbs, you may not dispense with the ‘out’ in ‘check it out’.
    If this is beyond your pay grade or is TMI, I again recommend Ben Yagoda’s ‘WYCAA,KI – The Parts of Speech for Better and/or Worse’. It is both erudite and entertaining and is pocket sized, unlike Fowler which requires luggage, albeit small. I keep my Fowler in the bathroom; not only is it good for a quick chuckle, I also know where I can find it day or night. Here is a pearl from it : Did you know that Affleck (as in Ben) is the phonetic spelling of the Scots name Auchinleck (as in WWII general)?

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  17. Dean C. Rowan

    I first heard the perp/cop joke long ago, with a Texas yokel in the place of the perp and a snooty Harvard student as the (grammar) cop. The Texan asks, “Can you tell me where the library’s at?” “Here at Harvard, we do not end our sentences with prepositions.” In lieu of motherf—r, a–hole.
    If the Nabokov story is true, Ross was absolutely wrong. An autobiography is not an inventory of the family estate. Only one nutcracker? Yes, to crack this particular walnut, one of several. Had Nabokov used the indefinite article, Ross should have complained about the uncomfortable silence of the other nutcrackers.

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