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Whoa Is the State of English
- University Press of New England
- Chapter
- Additional Information
p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p whoaisthestateofenglish Perhaps it is the influence of e-mail, with its compression of language and penchant for abbreviation. Perhaps it is laziness. Perhaps it is the educational system itself, its ranks becoming increasingly filled with teachers who came of age in an era where appropriate English usage was deemphasized. Maybe it’s a little bit of all of these, or maybe I’m making something out of nothing , like those ufo enthusiasts with their bumper stickers that read, they’re here, and they’re among us. At this point, it has become almost hackneyed to decry the degradation of American English, especially as spoken by college our common tongue 54 p o u r c o m m o n t o n g u e students, who, we believe, should know better. As such, I run the risk of sounding like a fuddy-duddy when I resurrect this lament. The truth is, I don’t talk about it very much at my college, where, as at all colleges and universities, the students’ spoken English has been reduced to a collection of monosyllables punctuated by “like,” “you know,” and “whoa.” As a college teacher, I am awash in a sea of such meaningless language, making any consideration of a counterattack an exercise in futility. Since there is little to no hope of making a dent among my own students, I have taken the last refuge of the frustrated: I have turned my attention to my own family, recognizing that charity—and torture—begin at home. So far as I know, I am the only parent who still corrects his children’s English. When my son Alyosha was ten and I did so, he would examine me with a questioning eye, as if he were viewing an oddity—a father who makes remarks about something that, in our culture, no longer seems to matter. I think the breaking point that launched me upon my Molly Hatchet campaign came when I ran into one of my former students on campus, fresh from two months in Europe. This nineteen -year-old, who had never ventured farther than the borders of her home state, had had the opportunity of a lifetime. Being a traveler myself, and knowing how hard it was for me to shut up when I returned with my head brimming with impressions and experiences, I was full of anticipation when I asked her, “So, how was it?” She nodded three or four times, searched the heavens for the right words, and then informed me, “It was, like, whoa.” And that was it. The glory of Greece and the grandeur of Rome summed up in a non-statement. My student’s whoa was exceeded only by my head-shaking woe. As a biology teacher perhaps I shouldn’t be overly concerned with my students’ English. After all, the traditional means of assessment in the sciences is the hated multiple choice exam, where students are asked to recognize, but not generate, lan- [3.239.59.193] Project MUSE (2024-03-19 12:33 GMT) Whoa Is the State of English p 55 guage. My English-teaching colleagues are, however, duty-bound to extract essays and compositions and position papers from their charges. These products, I am told, are becoming increasingly awful. Some of the problem sources (e-mail, tv, cell phones, etc.) are well known. But there is also something deeper. It is the way in which English, as opposed to other tongues, is viewed by Americans in general. In short, Americans consider French to be a language, as well as German, Italian, Chinese, and Swahili. But English is looked upon as the stuff that dribbles out when you open your mouth. As such, Americans are of two minds about English: on the one hand, they believe that it has a certain right of way, as evidenced by the uncomfortable sight of monoglot Americans traveling abroad, trying to communicate with foreigners . If they are not understood, they simply shout, the assumption being that anyone can understand English; it’s only a question of volume. On the other hand, Americans don’t pay much attention to English because they just don’t believe it matters so long as their meaning is grasped by the listener or reader. The problems with these points of view are legion. I’d like to point out a few of the most...