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Bad Language: Are Some Words Better than Others?
Is today's language at an all-time low? Are pronunciations like cawfee and chawklit bad English? Is slang like my bad or hook up improper? Is it incorrect to mix English and Spanish, as in Yo quiero Taco Bell? Can you write Who do you trust? rather than Whom do you trust? Linguist Edwin Battistella takes a hard look at traditional notions of bad language, arguing that they are often based in sterile conventionality.
Examining grammar and style, cursing, slang, and political correctness, regional and ethnic dialects, and foreign accents and language mixing, Battistella discusses the strong feelings evoked by language variation, from objections to the pronunciation NU-cu-lar to complaints about bilingual education. He explains the natural desire for uniformity in writing and speaking and traces the association of mainstream norms to ideas about refinement, intelligence, education, character, national unity and political values. Battistella argues that none of these qualities is inherently connected to language.
It is tempting but wrong, Battistella argues, to think of slang, dialects and nonstandard grammar as simply breaking the rules of good English. Instead, we should view language as made up of alternative forms of orderliness adopted by speakers depending on their purpose. Thus we can study the structure and context of nonstandard language in order to illuminate and enrich traditional forms of language, and make policy decisions based on an informed engagement.
Re-examining longstanding and heated debates, Bad Language will appeal to a wide spectrum of readers engaged and interested in the debate over what constitutes proper language.
Examining grammar and style, cursing, slang, and political correctness, regional and ethnic dialects, and foreign accents and language mixing, Battistella discusses the strong feelings evoked by language variation, from objections to the pronunciation NU-cu-lar to complaints about bilingual education. He explains the natural desire for uniformity in writing and speaking and traces the association of mainstream norms to ideas about refinement, intelligence, education, character, national unity and political values. Battistella argues that none of these qualities is inherently connected to language.
It is tempting but wrong, Battistella argues, to think of slang, dialects and nonstandard grammar as simply breaking the rules of good English. Instead, we should view language as made up of alternative forms of orderliness adopted by speakers depending on their purpose. Thus we can study the structure and context of nonstandard language in order to illuminate and enrich traditional forms of language, and make policy decisions based on an informed engagement.
Re-examining longstanding and heated debates, Bad Language will appeal to a wide spectrum of readers engaged and interested in the debate over what constitutes proper language.
- GenresLinguisticsNonfiction
240 pages, Kindle Edition
First published January 1, 2005
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About the author
Edwin L. Battistella
10 books32 followersEdwin L. Battistella teaches linguistics and writing at Southern Oregon University in Ashland, Oregon. He is the author of six books and over fifty articles.
Sorry About That: The Language of Public Apology (Oxford University Press, 2014 [in production]) analyzes the public apologies of presidents, politicians, entertainers, and businessmen, situating the apology within American popular culture and showing how language creates sincere or insincere apologies, why we choose to apologize or don’t, and how our efforts to say we are sorry succeed or fail.
A Year of New Words (Literary Ashland Press, 2013) is a short series of essays and a glossary reporting on my 2012 project of making up a word a day.
Bad Language: Are Some Words Better Than Others? (Oxford University Press, 2005) and Do You Make These Mistakes in English? The Story of Sherwin Cody’s Famous Language School (Oxford University Press, 2009) are about language attitudes. Bad Language was a cultural history of language attitudes—why we consider some uses and words better than others. It was named one of the Chicago Tribune’s “10 Best Books on Language” in 2005 and it was an Oregon Book Award finalist in 2006.
Do You Make These Mistakes in English? was a cultural history of the self-education movement focusing on the life of writer Sherwin Cody, an entrepreneur of English whose long-running correspondence course invited the upwardly mobile to spend just fifteen minutes a day improving their English. It made the Library Journal’s 2009 list of Best Sellers in Language.
Markedness: The Evaluative Superstructure of Language (SUNY Press, 1989) and The Logic of Markedness (Oxford University Press, 1996) are about linguistic theory, specifically the structuralist concept of asymmetry between opposites and its later development in generative grammar.
Battistella served as Dean of the School of Arts & Letters at Southern Oregon University from 2000-2006 and as interim Provost from 2007-2008. He is on the board of directors of Oregon Humanities, the state humanities council, and on the editorial board of The Oregon Encyclopedia, and the Executive Committee of the Linguistic Society of America. He has been interviewed on the BBC, NPR’s Jefferson Public Radio, for C-Span2’s Book TV and in the NEH magazine Humanities.
He also moderates the Literary Ashland blog and twitter feed.
Sorry About That: The Language of Public Apology (Oxford University Press, 2014 [in production]) analyzes the public apologies of presidents, politicians, entertainers, and businessmen, situating the apology within American popular culture and showing how language creates sincere or insincere apologies, why we choose to apologize or don’t, and how our efforts to say we are sorry succeed or fail.
A Year of New Words (Literary Ashland Press, 2013) is a short series of essays and a glossary reporting on my 2012 project of making up a word a day.
Bad Language: Are Some Words Better Than Others? (Oxford University Press, 2005) and Do You Make These Mistakes in English? The Story of Sherwin Cody’s Famous Language School (Oxford University Press, 2009) are about language attitudes. Bad Language was a cultural history of language attitudes—why we consider some uses and words better than others. It was named one of the Chicago Tribune’s “10 Best Books on Language” in 2005 and it was an Oregon Book Award finalist in 2006.
Do You Make These Mistakes in English? was a cultural history of the self-education movement focusing on the life of writer Sherwin Cody, an entrepreneur of English whose long-running correspondence course invited the upwardly mobile to spend just fifteen minutes a day improving their English. It made the Library Journal’s 2009 list of Best Sellers in Language.
Markedness: The Evaluative Superstructure of Language (SUNY Press, 1989) and The Logic of Markedness (Oxford University Press, 1996) are about linguistic theory, specifically the structuralist concept of asymmetry between opposites and its later development in generative grammar.
Battistella served as Dean of the School of Arts & Letters at Southern Oregon University from 2000-2006 and as interim Provost from 2007-2008. He is on the board of directors of Oregon Humanities, the state humanities council, and on the editorial board of The Oregon Encyclopedia, and the Executive Committee of the Linguistic Society of America. He has been interviewed on the BBC, NPR’s Jefferson Public Radio, for C-Span2’s Book TV and in the NEH magazine Humanities.
He also moderates the Literary Ashland blog and twitter feed.
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
January 23, 2019
Persuasively argued and written. Has me thinking more about how I teach and grade my students’ writing. Very good book.
June 16, 2007
read for a project for my history & structure of the english language class. pretty general overview. checked out from widener library.
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews