RE: describing the minority as literate is a circular argument?

[Mailing List <mlist -at- safenet-inc -dot- com>]

To answer the title question, I think that you first 
have to specify which minority.

WE are a minority, and most of us comprise a bastion 
against slipshod grammar and usage.

I say "most of us" because, if I'd said "all", you 
can bet that SOMEbody would have chimed in to regale 
us with the tale of his ebonics-based manuals and 
Help.

If you want an even more elite group of sophisticated 
english hold-outs, spend a few days on the CE-L 
(CopyEditors-List).  Even some of them state that they 
are not prescriptivists... but they do so in grammatically 
correct fashion. Go figure.

Context is all. Even some of us, who speak and write 
grammatically, and whose general usage is of a high 
standard, would readily (if not eagerly) slip into 
various flavors of simulated/emulated street patois if 
we were to attempt certain types of fiction.

I've encountered university literary magazines, and if 
I had a birdcage to line, or fish to wrap. . . but I 
digress. Those folk appear to be even more of a mutual 
back-patting (or should that be backpatting; stitch to 
the "filesystem" thread) society than we are, here on 
the list whose days are numbered.  But, seriously, 
what are the chances that the 'average' member of a 
university literary magazine staff would call us illiterate? 
They might sniff that many of us lack good/recent grounding 
in "the classics" or "the avant-garde" or whatever their 
pet milieu ("Pfft! Philistines!"), but I'd be surprised 
if we heathens were to be condemned as illiterate.

I'd be gratified, though. 'Cuz then I could tell the 
effete fop to open a dictionary and look up "illiterate".

The minority of users who know and apply the rules 
extends far beyond literary cloisters.

Was there a point here? Well, anybody who defends the 
rules that preserve utility and distinctions of meaning 
**because they know both the rules and the reasons behind 
them** tends to be in the minority. You can assert, all 
you like, that the usage by the unwashed majority is 
what dictates "right and proper" usage, and that the 
defenders of rules and structure are prissy old fudds. 
However, the rules have survived a long time for the 
good reason that they have ongoing utility. Change 
happens, but not every change and fad-of-common-usage 
has staying power. The rules give you something to go 
back to, and they provide a necessary inertia against 
the vagaries and ephemera of popular usage.

Harrumph!  Egad. (*)


Kevin 

 (* Don't admit you know where that comes from -- you'll 
   date yourself horribly.  :-)

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