Irony Becomes Her

The Curse of Babel

I'm reading a book about American dialects. Never having thought much about it outside the soda/pop/coke differential, I find much of the information fascinating. It gets deeply political, however, in its agenda, as it unavoidably deals with the language of "marginalized groups." Indeed, we all speak differently from one another, and most would agree that we at least try to see past a person's "accent" when we are judging the quality of what quem is saying. But it is strongly implied in this book that no language system or use is in any way superior to another; people who "discriminate" based on language use are arrogant and closed-minded.

I agree that the language of the powerful will be the one deemed "correct." That's the way things are. But in order for language to promote any kind of communication, there must be some force of standardization to combat the tendency of humans to quarrel rather than cooperate with one another. My Basic Writing students will never be able to communicate well in written form unless they are compelled by a standard: mine.

Sounds pretty authoritarian. Well, one of my favorite quotes of yesteryear was attributed to Ms. Knouse: "Academia is the last bastion of totalitarianism in America." And it's a good thing.

This is yet another example of the chaos that can result when the very existence of authority is challenged. I'm not trying to get into an argument about who should be in charge, but I do believe there must be a captain or the ship will sink. In a marriage, God says it is the husband. In a country, it is human government. In American language, it is "standard English." None of these is perfect or infallible, but we are in serious trouble when we throw them out.

posted by Lynn @ 6:51 PM