I have to be completely honest; I don't really understand the assignment but I will do my best to thoroughly complete it. I need to discuss contextual differences between similar statements with different registers. People use different grammar styles according to whom they are talking to. First of all I feel i need to explain what prescriptive grammar entails. Prescriptive is a set of rules in grammar that cannot be changed, so there correct and incorrect grammar. This grammar is used when wanting to be proper and professional. An example of prescriptive grammar can be, "I am older than she". This sentence is considered prescriptive because it uses grammar correctly. "She" is the correct rather than her because "than" is a conjunction. "Than" joins two like forms: "I am older" with "she is older", giving "I am older than she is older". But speakers leave out the last part "is older" to not repeat unnecessary words. According to prescriptive grammar, 'than' functions as a conjunction, so speakers should use "she" in that context. Descriptive on the other hand is more flexible due to many ways and styles of editing "incorrect" grammar. This is what people use when speaking outside of professional/polite environments: like when speaking to a friend or a family member. An example, opposite of the example in prescriptive grammar, is "I am older than her". The reason why is because subject pronouns are paired with a verb, on the other hand object pronouns are not. Since the phrase "than her" doesn't have a verb we can see or hear, some people choose an object pronoun.
This will help my students because learning about these two styles in grammar they will be able to choose which is appropriate in registers they use. Everything I stated above are the tools they need to know in order to know the difference between two commonly used grammar settings: Prescriptive and Descriptive. So to continue with this activity my assignment is to use different registers and choose which type of grammar I want to use to say what I want to say.
Sentence1: I am going to prepare dinner.
Close friend register: Ima cook dinner.
General friend register: I'm gonna cook dinner
Parent register: I'm going to cook dinner. or Voy senar (I am going to eat dinner).
Sentence 1 is prescriptive because it uses the correct vocabulary/ grammar. The other sentences are either using incorrect grammar/vocabulary or less formal.
I really enjoyed your presentation in class on your activity, I thought you all did a great job of describing that none of them are wrong they are just used in different contexts. I thought that was a very descriptive way to go about teaching the lesson. I also enjoyed how you had use determine who we would say the different sentences to, because our answers weren't all the same and it just reinforced the understanding that there was no one right answer. Very good job, also I think I understand how registers and grammar connect, so thank you!
ReplyDeleteVanessa,
ReplyDeleteExcellent job describing why you would "correctly" use "she" rather than "her" in your sample sentence!
By the way, in case I didn't make it clear, feel free to use Spanish in your writing portfolio, as well as English (unfortunately, the commentary should probably be in English, as I don't know the words for punctuation in Spanish).