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Subject:RE: Common Errors in English From:"David Locke" <dlocke -at- texas -dot- net> To:"TECHWR-L" <techwr-l -at- lists -dot- raycomm -dot- com> Date:Sat, 21 Feb 2004 19:06:35 -0600
So we should elect a prescriptivist of the week? Idiomatic expression isn't
systematic, nor is it an error. Redundancy is what makes language work.
Peccadillians are fun. Prescriptivists are not. We all be speaking in iambic
pentameter if it were up to the prescriptivists. And, what about all those
declensions we had to learn in Latin class. They were perfectly systematic.
Another point here is the notion that a language should become a least
common denominator facility. No thanks. Isn't English becoming easier all
the time?