You're telling a friend an amazing story, and you just get to the best part when suddenly he interrupts, "The alien and I," not "Me and the alien." Most of us would probably be annoyed, but aside from the rude interruption, does your friend have a point? Was your sentence actually grammatically incorrect? And if he still understood it, why does it even matter? From the point of view of linguistics, grammar is a set of patterns for how words are put together to form phrases or clauses, whether spoken or in writing. Different languages have different patterns. In English, the subject normally comes first, followed by the verb, and then the object, while in Japanese and many other languages, the order is subject, object, verb. Some scholars have tried to identify patterns common to all languages, but apart from some basic features, like having nouns or verbs, few of these so-called linguistic universals have been found. And while any language needs consistent patterns to function, the study of these patterns opens up an ongoing debate between two positions known as prescriptivism and descriptivism. Grossly simplified, prescriptivists think a given language should follow consistent rules, while descriptivists see variation and adaptation as a natural and necessary part of language. For much of history, the vast majority of language was spoken. But as people became more interconnected and writing gained importance, written language was standardized to allow broader communication and ensure that people in different parts of a realm could understand each other. In many languages, this standard form came to be considered the only proper one, despite being derived from just one of many spoken varieties, usually that of the people in power. Language purists worked to establish and propagate this standard by detailing a set of rules that reflected the established grammar of their times. And rules for written grammar were applied to spoken language, as well. Speech patterns that deviated from the written rules were considered corruptions, or signs of low social status, and many people who had grown up speaking in these ways were forced to adopt the standardized form. More recently, however, linguists have understood that speech is a separate phenomenon from writing with its own regularities and patterns. Most of us learn to speak at such an early age that we don't even remember it. We form our spoken repertoire through unconscious habits, not memorized rules. And because speech also uses mood and intonation for meaning, its structure is often more flexible, adapting to the needs of speakers and listeners. This could mean avoiding complex clauses that are hard to parse in real time, making changes to avoid awkward pronounciation, or removing sounds to make speech faster. The linguistic approach that tries to understand and map such differences without dictating correct ones is known as descriptivism. Rather than deciding how language should be used, it describes how people actually use it, and tracks the innovations they come up with in the process. But while the debate between prescriptivism and descriptivism continues, the two are not mutually exclusive. At its best, prescriptivism is useful for informing people about the most common established patterns at a given point in time. This is important, not only for formal contexts, but it also makes communication easier between non-native speakers from different backgrounds. Descriptivism, on the other hand, gives us insight into how our minds work and the instinctive ways in which we structure our view of the world. Ultimately, grammar is best thought of as a set of linguistic habits that are constantly being negotiated and reinvented by the entire group of language users. Like language itself, it's a wonderful and complex fabric woven through the contributions of speakers and listeners, writers and readers, prescriptivists and descriptivists, from both near and far.
你告訴朋友一個精彩的故事 而且你正要說到高潮處, 卻突然被他打斷了 「外星人和我 (I) 」, 不是「我 (Me) 和外星人」 大多數人可能會感到煩躁 但摒除掉他無禮打斷你的這件事 你朋友是否言之有理? 你所說的句子是否 真的犯了文法上的錯誤? 但如果他還是能理解你說的話, 為什麼還需要在意文法? 根據語言學家的看法 文法是一種模式, 讓文字得以組成片語或子句 無論是口語或寫作 不同語言有著不同的模式 以英文來說,主詞通常排第一 緊接著是動詞 再來是受詞 但如果是日文或很多其他的語言 順序會變成主詞、受詞、動詞 有些學者嘗試要找出 所有語言共通的模式 但除了一些基本的架構 像是一樣有名詞或動詞 語言學上的共通點很難被找到 雖然所有語言 都需要固定的模式才能運作 可是這些模式的研究 會展開兩方面不斷地辯論 分別是 指示論 (prescriptivism) 和 描述論 (descriptivism) 簡單來說 「指示論」認為既定語言 應該服從固定規則 「描述論」則認為 多元性和適應性是常態 是語言中必要的一環 在歷史中,絕大多數語言是以口語傳遞的 但隨著人們關係越來越緊密, 及文字越來越重要 為了更廣泛的溝通,語言書寫被標準化 以確保不同領域的人們能互相理解 許多語言中,標準格式 常被視為唯一正確的格式 儘管這其實是 眾多口語格式中的一種 且通常是擁有權力者所使用的 語言純正論者嘗試建立 並推廣標準格式 詳細編列一套 表現當時既有文法的規則 書寫的文法也被應用到口語中 與書寫文法相悖的口語模式 被認為是錯誤的 或是社會階級較低的徵象 許多在成長過程中 使用這種說話方式的人 會被迫學習標準格式 然而,近年來 語言學家意識到口語和寫作 是各自獨立的事物 有著自己的規律與模式 雖然我們不記得了, 我們大多很小就開始學習說話 我們不自覺地建立起說話習慣 而非記住規則 由於口語也會運用語氣 和聲調來傳達意思 它的結構常較有彈性 會依講者和聽者的需求調整 這可能意謂:在現實生活中 避免使用難以解析的複雜子句、 進行調整以避免尷尬的發音、 或移除某些發音以加快說話速度 嘗試理解並區分出這類差異, 且不會規定語言對錯的語言學方法 即為「描述論」 與其決定應該如何使用語言 描述論選擇描述人們 實際運用語言的方式 並追溯這過程中出現的新用法 但即使指示論和描述論 之間的論戰仍在進行 這兩者並非完全互斥 指示論頂多可以告訴人們 某個時間點 最為通用的既定模式為何 這件事很重要, 不只在正式場合上需要 也能使不同背景的非母語使用者間 溝通較為容易 另一方面,描述論 讓我們意識到我們的心智如何運作 以及我們如何本能地 建構出對世界的看法 最後,文法被視為一套語言習慣 經過全體語言使用者 不斷的協商與改造而建立 語言本身 是一塊精美而複雜的布織品 經由講者與聽者、 作者與讀者、 指示論者與描述論者 由近而遠,共同編織而成