Tension: The changing English language

Nobody likes stability more than I do. Emotionally, I'd love to be on the side of the Grammar Nazis who seem to think that Moses brought the comma rules of English down the mountain along with the Ten Commandments. I cringed when "alright" began showing up in dictionaries as an acceptable spelling. I grit my teeth that "hopefully" has come to mean "I hope it will happen."

Inconveniently, living languages change all the time, sometimes very quickly. English is probably the most living (and changing) language out there. We writers just have to accept that and attempt to keep up with current acceptable usage.

Here's a little item I wrote to a young friend in 2004. He was a high school student, taking a freshman English college course through an Ohio program called PSEO (Post Secondary Education Option). He had written a paper about PSEO students and pluralized the abbreviation as PSEOs. The teacher thought it needed an apostrophe: PSEO's. Because he used this PSEOs construction all through the paper, the teacher marked each one wrong and called the paper a failure. (Never mind the question whether doing the same small grammatical error repeatedly is one error or many—and the question whether a lot of PSEOs make a piece of writing a total failure.) He asked my opinion, and I wrote this response:

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Jon:

In answer to your question about using an apostrophe for pluralizing abbreviations (as, for example in pluralizing PSEO), I've done a bit of research:

• The Blair Handbook (3rd edition, 2000) is adamant: form the plural with apostrophe + s.


• The Little, Brown Handbook (8th edition, 2001) says the apostrophe is often optional when the abbreviations are unpunctuated, i.e. without the periods.


• Rules for Writers (5th edition, 2004) points out that either use is correct, but that you should be consistent.


• Keys for Writers (4th edition, 2005) [sic] says the apostrophe is "commonly used" and that MLA and APA prefer no apostrophe—but that it's acceptable if you are consistent.

I'd say we're in an evolutionary stage with this one. We seem to be moving away from the apostrophe, but either usage is acceptable if you are consistent. This is one of those style book issues. If your course style book is the Blair Handbook, I'd say you should use the apostrophe without fail. Otherwise, it appears to be writer's choice. If you are submitting a paper to a carefully-edited professional journal, however, I'd suggest leaving the apostrophe out.

Curt Allen

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Latest Development

Remember that Rules for Writers said in 2004 that either use was correct? By the 6th edition (2008), the book had changed its tune: "Do not use an apostrophe to pluralize an abbreviation" (page 301). Their example is "We collected only four IOUs out of forty." The Quick Access handbook (2007) doesn't even mention the possibility. Its only comment is that we use the apostrophe to pluralize single letters: "Printing w's is hard for some first graders" (page 483). (I'll bet that rule will vanish in the next decade too.)

What's a writer to do?

The French have something called the French Academy. This body decides what's correct French and what's not. When I was in high school, the Academy had been working for several years to decide the grammatical gender for "grapefruit," so I guess we just couldn't write about them until the decision came down. Things are sloppier but easier for English writers. You have to be aware of the usage of good writers and editors (the New Yorker magazine, for example), and keep a current dictionary at hand. And stay kind of loose in the saddle.

Those Grade Appeals

It's time again for the grade appeals. They always fascinate me because the student often does everything possible to guarantee that I won't be receptive. Here's an example of a last-ditch appeal:

mr. allen i missed class on wensday due to my job i had to fill out these papers and turn them in be wensday or eles i would not have a job yes bad excuse but the truth and then i had to work from 4 till 10 and was unable to email you from work sorry. i had the paper done the final porfolio just wondering if you wanted me to email it to you or to drop it off in your mail box i am trully sorry for the inconvinis and i did not mean for this to happen came up at the last min and i have to have this joe other wise no school next year. i was wondering if too you could send me the topic for the inclass wrighting so i could make that up if i am alowed i really can not afford to miss this i can not get lower then a B in this class for i will lose my exceptince into usf next year im very sorry that i missed class and will do anything to get this B pleas email me back and tell me what to do i will do anything email you paper or drop off right extra papers
thanks

Ethos

In classic argumentation, we discuss whether the writer is believable. That's ethos. Is this the sort of person who should be believed? Or, to look at that sample above, should this student get the "B" he requested? (Keeping in mind that this student had just finished his second semester of college English.) By his own admission, he has fouled up his schedule and not fulfilled the requirements. If this is his best work (keeping in mind that he's asking a superior for a favor, so he should be trying his hardest), I really don't feel that he's nailed down the content of the course.

Logos

This is the part of an argument where the writer gives reasons for the argument. It's the "show, don't just tell" part. This would be the place for a student who has done well in previous work to point out that he's a great student and just needs a final small favor. This student hadn't done very well at all in previous work. In class (when he attended) his behavior was disruptive, and his writing had terrible grammar and an obnoxious in-your-face assertiveness that didn't win it any friends. The student really has no factual argument to fall back on.

Pathos

This is the emotional side of the argument. The student makes a real try to get the reader's emotions on his side, with apologies and an appeal to the student's dire situation. Unfortunately, pathos will not carry an argument such as this one. When you're asking a teacher to change a policy, you need to bring everything good that you have—this should be the best writing you do in the semester.

Tension: Word Count versus Creativity

I'm not too thrilled with arbitrary rules, especially in writing. One reason, of course, is that when I make a rule, I have to enforce it. Another is that poor teachers love rules so much that students become convinced that rules are the only point to English class.

So why have a rule about minimum length of an essay? If I ask for, say, a 1000-word narrative about a turning point in your life, what do you do if you only have 500 words in your head? Can't 500 words be good? Isn't there a danger that the student will write 500 words of quality stuff surrounded by 500 words of trash?

Well, yes. And you'll notice that the really good professional writers seem to get things done very efficiently, concisely, and briefly.

In spite of all this, I've got a couple of reasons for the word count.

Developing an Idea
Five hundred words, for many people, is just about enough to say the obvious material that everyone knew anyhow. It's the sort of essay you can throw together in one draft, taking perhaps an hour. You don't learn to explore an idea deeply in one page. You don't learn to answer the question, "What else?" There's no room for examples, for discussion of the other side, for developing details. There's no room for "Show, don't just tell."

Learning Structure
A really short essay doesn't need much structure. Sure, in high school you wrote five-paragraph essays that were 500 words, but they really didn't need an introduction or a conclusion very much. You often got by with a single-sentence lead and a single-sentence wrap. If the teacher hadn't told you how many paragraphs to write, you would have done the whole thing in a single paragraph. At 1000 words, you can't make the whole thing a single block—the reader gets mired down. You must have a structure.

Learning Correctness
If you really don't know how to form sentences, you might squeak by writing a page and a half. Three pages, though, gives you enough space to demonstrate that you really don't know grammar. Or that you do.

The abuses

I always know who wants to write and who is simply laying down words in hope of getting out of this class. The tricks are so obvious: large type, enormous margins, 2½ line spacing, two inch indents for paragraph beginnings (with an extra line skipped between paragraphs), and a full four-line MLA header on each page instead of just the first one. Is that writing? Why is that good? It only profits the paper company. When I receive a paper like that, I sigh because the student assumed I was too stupid to see the tricks, then I run the whole thing through the scanner.
Last semester I received several really undersized papers. The final assignment was a five to seven page research paper. One student gave me less than three. Was his work a model of brilliant concision? Did it resemble the writing of the best newspaper feature writer? Nope. It was obviously thrown together in less than an hour. It said nothing of any value and the student learned nothing from it.

Help

So what do you do when you realize that you aren't going to fulfill the minimum length requirements? If you aren't too arrogant to accept help, it's available. Every school has some form of writing lab. The textbook is usually full of advice on developing a topic. All writing teachers keep office hours. You just have to get up the humility (or courage) to ask.

It's All About the Grades

Well the grades have been posted for about a week, and (as you might guess) protests are rolling in. It seems worse this year, somehow. Here's a guide to my reactions to grade protests:

I might react favorably:

• Well, I've been a good student and shown up for all the classes. How close is my "A minus" to a full "A"?
• Did you receive this paper that I e-mailed you?
• Why does your gradebook show a different grade from what you wrote on my paper?

I'm less likely:

• Your records are wrong: I really did attend class all those times.
• I'm going to send my mother to talk to your boss.*
• I know I didn't show up much or turn in all my papers. Is there ANYTHING I can do to raise my poor grade?
• Even though I didn't attend class and just sort of guessed when I wrote that last assignment, I think it was pretty good and deserved a better grade.

Face it. Some students suffer from a form of burnout about three-quarters of the way through a term. They stop attending and their papers become shorter and shorter and show less and less real thinking. This is the point where the real students are separated from those who simply take up space: the real students carry through to the end.

*You should know that sending your mother to plead for a grade rarely works, and (assuming you are over 18 years old) it's not even really legal for a teacher to reveal your grade to your parents without a signed release.

Between Terms Advice

Because I write this blog mainly for my students, I feel like I can give you some teacher's advice. Here are three things that would have revolutionized the lives of many of my students (about a third of them).

Show Up! The previous blog entry said something about attendance. I'll say it again. Unless you're in college as a sort of expenses-paid vacation, you need to pass courses and learn information. You can't do that if you're not in class. My students with poor attendance records are always surprised when they turn in papers that I don't approve of. They thought they had guessed right on the assignment! Why not actually show up and make sure? The student with tapering attendance is always fascinating. Pretty good at the start, then less and less. What? Did you learn it all in the first month? Did you discover alcohol? Or are you just so arrogant that you figure nobody can teach you anything?

Read the Assignment! I mean this in two senses:
1. Read the stuff in the book. I don't know about you, but when I spend $90 for something, I want to get some good out of it. And no, the teachers don't get a cut of the profits. And no, we don't hear whether you did buy the book—so we don't grade on spending. We do grade on whether you absorbed the stuff inside the book. And surprisingly enough (this may be different from high school books) there's actually something inside most college textbooks that's worth reading!
2. Read the directions for the thing you're supposed to be writing. When I ask my students for a research paper that's five to seven pages long, I'm not going to give full credit for two pages of unsupported opinion.

Make a Gradebook! You need to know how many absences you have in a class, particularly if you have trouble showing up. You need to know what your grades are, so you know how much it will hurt you when you don't choose to turn in a major assignment. Many of my disappointed students this semester had no idea they were in trouble, even though they might have missed a quarter of our class meetings and not bothered to turn in a major paper. Here's a little hint: few college instructors will seek you out and try to talk you into doing the work. We feel we have better things to do.

Winding down thoughts

I'm sitting here at University of Akron on the last day of finals week. Department policy requires me to give back the final portfolios in a face-to-face conference this week, so this all feels very final and almost a little sad. I feel like we should do a little ceremony here.

We don't do office conferences that much. For one thing, students are generally terrified of their teachers (I think it's hilarious that anyone would be terrified of me), so it's really rare for anyone to come talk with me unless I've announced to them that I'm failing them for plagiarism. For another thing, someone brought a lawsuit at Akron a while back because classes were canceled for conferences. They claimed that a personal 20-minute meeting taught them less than three hours of group lecture. So we can't cancel classes for conferences. (NCSC is its own world. I can't do conferences there because students assume that anyone who has a one-on-one conversation gets an unfair advantage in the course.)

The result is that the last time I see these people is also the first time I talk with them personally. Odd. And sad, too, because these are some very interesting students, and we get to actually talk about their writing for once. But it's the worst time in the semester to do this, because their minds are on summer, and the next formal writing they will do is in September.

Most of these guys really will do well in their future. I look at the grade book and "B" is the most common grade I give out. About 22% of my students, though, won't be passing. For most of them, the issue is simple dishonesty or simple lack of attendance. It seems like every class I teach has at least two students who have "issues" with attending (often I suspect that the "issues" are related to alcohol). I used to assign a paper on "differences between high school and college." I hoped for people to write about maturity or about the new emphasis on thinking for oneself. Usually, though, they write, "The main difference is that you have to attend classes in high school and you don't have to attend in college." Alas. None of the people I'm failing this semester had a good attendance record. Some missed as many as 20 class sessions.

That's a dreary note to end on. A happier one: Several of my students reported that their thinking changed significantly for the better. They figured out important things about their careers. They learned how to think. They learned how to respect the opinions of others. This is the stuff that's supposed to happen to freshmen, and it did here.