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 #2 (permalink) Sun Oct 19, 2008 7:03 am U. S. classroom English is a kind of dead language |
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What, may I ask, is the point of citing an article written....69 years ago???
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U. S. English
Monday, Aug. 07, 1939 |
In your efforts to bash AmE, could you at least cite material relevant to the present? You don't think AmE (or any English, for that matter!) and the teaching of it hasn't changed in 70 years?
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 Skrej
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| #3 (permalink) Sun Oct 19, 2008 16:34 pm U. S. classroom English is a kind of dead language |
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It might be interesting to compare all the changes in BE in the last 70 years to the changes in AmE during that same period of time. 
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Yankee
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| #4 (permalink) Sun Oct 19, 2008 17:19 pm U.S. classroom English is a kind of dead language |
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| M., deftly concealing the fallacy, wrote: |
And does anyone in the US still say and/or teach usage such as "Mother is ill and has retired"?
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| Skrej wrote: |
What, may I ask, is the point of citing an article written....69 years ago???
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Bait, presumably; probably factitious.
MrP |
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MrPedantic
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| #5 (permalink) Mon Oct 20, 2008 10:04 am U.S. classroom English is a kind of dead language |
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| Quote: |
| What, may I ask, is the point of citing an article written....69 years ago??? |
To help answer my question:
Is this true of today's American classrooms?
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| In your efforts to bash AmE, could you at least cite material relevant to the present? |
This, rather paranoic, "hands off AmEng" thing is getting a bit scary. Why is you feel you can question and criticise other varieties of English, but we are not allowed to discuss your variety.
| Quote: |
| You don't think AmE (or any English, for that matter!) and the teaching of it hasn't changed in 70 years? |
You tell me. Has it? Do AmEng school classes now contain examples of the "Mother is on the blink and has hit the hay" type? Are students taught spoken grammar, slang, etc? |
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Molly
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| #6 (permalink) Mon Oct 20, 2008 10:10 am U. S. classroom English is a kind of dead language |
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| Yankee wrote: |
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It might be interesting to compare all the changes in BE in the last 70 years to the changes in AmE during that same period of time.
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It might be. Where shall/will we do it? |
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Molly
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| #7 (permalink) Mon Oct 20, 2008 10:13 am U.S. classroom English is a kind of dead language |
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| MrPedantic wrote: |
Bait, presumably; probably factitious.
MrP |
Interesting. Just the kind of comment you prohibit some others from making in your role as moderator on another forum. You allow yourself such comments there, and here, though. Why is that? |
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Molly
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| #8 (permalink) Mon Oct 20, 2008 10:14 am U.S. classroom English is a kind of dead language |
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Any Americans (and their supporters) who are not caught by the "Hands of my variety!" bug, please feel free to join this thread.
This is my main question, actually:
Is there "a discrepancy between classroom English and the way most people talk" in the USA?
If the topic doesn't interest you, why not give it a miss? |
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Molly
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| #9 (permalink) Mon Oct 20, 2008 14:01 pm U.S. classroom English is a kind of dead language |
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Hi guys
I think first we have to define the classroom, then speak about what structures are present in each field.
What kind of lessons are you talking about, and what do you think is the prevalent US system? Are we talking National Curriculum, lessons run by state guidelines (like in Germany). Or is it dependent on school type.
What is the purpose of the language lessons?
Before we even get onto school versus teacher freedoms and remits.
I have taught AmE, and can only speak about my interaction. The material has few differences to BrE, although the Interchange books had a better layout than lets say Network.
However I am not able to speak about AmE in USA. Leave that to others.
cheers stew.t.
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Stew.t.
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| #10 (permalink) Mon Oct 20, 2008 14:29 pm U.S. classroom English is a kind of dead language |
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If I'm not mistaken, Perrin was not referring to the English spoken in ESL classrooms in the US. 
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Yankee
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| #11 (permalink) Mon Oct 20, 2008 14:32 pm U.S. classroom English is a kind of dead language |
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hi Amy
As the link wouldn´t load I had to predict content ; )
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Stew.t.
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| #12 (permalink) Mon Oct 20, 2008 15:24 pm U.S. classroom English is a kind of dead language |
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Links to 1939 can be awfully obstinate sometimes, can't they. 
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Yankee
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| #13 (permalink) Mon Oct 20, 2008 22:47 pm U.S. classroom English is a kind of dead language |
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| Molly wrote: |
Just the kind of comment you prohibit some others from making
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Wrong from the start –
No, hardly, but...
Capaneus? |
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MrPedantic
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| #14 (permalink) Mon Oct 20, 2008 22:49 pm U.S. classroom English is a kind of dead language |
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| Quote: |
| I think first we have to define the classroom, then speak about what structures are present in each field. |
Whichever modern native-English-student, non-ESL, language classrooms in the USA this might apply to, I guess:
"U. S. classroom English is a kind of dead language, derived chiefly from British literary traditions. Outside the classroom door students have lapsed naturally into their native American, which has a vocabulary as broad as the country, as exact and complex as U. S. technology, from which it draws many terms. To close the breach between classroom English and spoken American..."
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,848067-1,00.html |
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Molly
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| #15 (permalink) Mon Oct 20, 2008 23:53 pm U.S. classroom English is a kind of dead language |
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| MrPedantic wrote: |
Bait, presumably; probably factitious.
MrP |
Well, as your reading seemingly has priority over my intended effect, I guess you must be right.  |
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Molly
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