On linguisitc puritanism and adherence to the standard

There are essentially two ways of looking at grammar. There is the prescriptive approach which tells people which forms of language to use based on the standard and the descriptive approach which explains naturally occurring grammatical phenomena. For this blog I will be looking at the prescriptivist approach to language grammar.
My title for this blog may seem a bit esoteric, but this is a phenomenon that almost everyone is familiar with. Indeed, I'm sure that your grade school teachers did their part to teach you what is standard and what is non-standard English Many people are very sensitive, and many are not so sensitive, to the correct and incorrect ways of speaking English. This is less of a case of right and wrong, and should more accurately be labeled as standard and non-standard distinction. Standard being the form of English which we deem "right" or "correct". These linguistic puritans make sure that speakers of the English language, or at least they themselves, are using English the proper way. It should come as no surprise to us then, that a large number of the population are like this, me included, because of the correction we have received through our lives from teachers, parents, etc.
Linguistic puritanism is an interesting movement. It is good because it means that since we are all at least familiar with standard English we can understand almost all other speakers of English with no difficulty. The problematic part, however, is what it seeks to accomplish. A whole-hearted linguistic puritan would desire strict adherence to the standard wherein there may be no room for linguistic change at all. This is a problem because languages are either changing or dead. This sort of extremism is not encountered much, however, so English dying any time soon is of little concern.
When we begin to think of English forms as standard and non-standard we also encounter another little interesting tidbit. Should we be so concerned with what is "right" English if the changes are just necessary and logical changes in the progression of English? Why do differences in English seem to offend us on a moral level where we can classify "good" forms of English and "bad" form? For instance I know many people who are offended or somewhat annoyed at least by the wide sweeping use of "seen" as the past tense of "saw" as in "I seen it". There should be nothing "wrong" about this use of 'seen' as it is a simple matter of dialectal variation and standard English not some moral code that we must adhere to. There is nothing "more correct" about the standard form of English or the rules laid down in grammar textbooks. (It is also interesting to note that some of those rules were simply made up by the grammarians themselves.)
So if you have made it this far, pause for a minute to look at your own approach to language grammar. Do you take the puritan approach and side with the prescritivist or do you tend to not worry about maintaining "pure" English with the descriptivist?
Are you somewhat morally offended when people use forms of English improperly, and do you have any insights as to why this may occur?

Learn to speak archaically, with flare!

I have noticed that many people have the tendency to use archaic verb and pronoun forms, as well as syntax, especially when referring to the King James Bible or the writings of Shakespeare. Both of these great giants of literature date form the Early Modern English period (1500-1800) and in both they use a form of English called (big surprise) Early Modern English. People like using Early Modern English, but I have also noticed that it tends to be abused slightly, so in this informative blog I want talk about how to speak Early Modern English. (This sounds like one of those phrasebooks people get when they are going to another country on holiday. Something that may be titled, "Early Modern English With Ease!" or "The Quick and Easy Way to Learn Early Modern English, Today!") Okay so, I admit that a phrasebook on Early Modern English might not be the next bestseller, but here are some tidbits just for interest sake.
On pronouns: The pronouns are mostly the same as ours with a few slight differences. The general rule is all the pronouns are the same as you would think to use except the 2nd person pronouns. Today we use the same pronouns to refer to singular and plural in 2nd person, but there was a distinction in Early Modern English.

	SG	PL
Subject	Thou	Ye/ you
Object	Thee	You
Possessive	Thy/ thine	Your (s)

So if you were going to address one person you would use the 'thou' forms and more than one person the 'you' forms. However, beyond this there was also a formal/informal distinction, similar to the one in French and Spanish. If you were referring to one person but wanted to address them formally you would use the 'you' forms, like the king for instance by saying "your majesty", though the king is only one person. The 'thou' forms then only became used as the informal singular way of addressing someone. So the 'thou' forms would be used with a close friend or social inferior. It is also important to note that the formal/informal distinction developed after the singular/plural distinction. I know some of you may be wondering at this point why the King James Translation of the Bible does not use this formal/informal distinction, such as referring to God as 'thou'. This is a bit complicated, but it mostly has to do with the conservative way in which it was translated, and its strong reliance on (by that I mean almost copying) earlier translations.

On verbs
The verb must agree in number and person with the subject.
I will use the verb "walk" as an example:

1SG: I walke	1PL: We walketh
2SG: thou walkest	2PL: Ye walketh
3SG: He/She/it walketh	3PL: They walketh

Here are some examples of usage and just for fun I have thrown in some other archaic vocabulary:
- Whither thou walkest?
- I walke yonder, whilst they walketh thither.
- Doest thou walk by thineself? ('walk' does not need the ending here because it is attached to 'do')
- Verily, as ye walketh together, I walke alone.
Okay, I think you get the idea.
And there you have it! Speaking Early Modern English never seemed so easy! Alright, so it probably doesn't seem any simpler at this point and it may in fact seem more confusing, but I am just trying to do my part to encourage properly spoken archaisms.

What? Is this a new post I "C"?

an you believe it? A new post indeed. Today I would like to address the status of the letter "c". As a linguist-in-training I reserve the right to be completely obsessed with language and its orthographic representations, the alphabet in the case of English, so today I will ramble on about the letter that resides as the third letter in our alphabet but yet is one of the most unstable and unreliable letters in the alphabet. While most of the letters in the alphabet represent one instance of sound in all places, take the reliable "p" for instance, "c" may represent 5 different sounds:
1. It is pronounced as a "k" sound. The hard "c", if you will, like in the word 'cake' and 'cookie' and Cookie Monster eating cake.
2. "c" becomes "s" before the vowels e, i, y. This is the so-called "soft c"
3. "c" may form an alliance with "h" as in the word 'cheese'.
4. "c" also has the tendency to become a "sh" before "e" or "i" such as in 'ocean' or in some borrowings from French such as 'champagne'.
5. "c" may also be silent, such as in 'muscle'.
Many of the problems that arise in the unreliability of "c" come from its unstable origins. In early Latin the letter "c" consistently was pronounced with the "k"-like pronunciation. However, this clarity was short lived. By about 400 B.C, a sound change had diffused through Latin where the hard "c" sound became what we know as the "ch" sound before high front vowels, e, i, and y, a process called affrication. Thus giving us 2 varieties of "c", one like "k" and one like "ch". In some languages, such as French, this process of weakening continued until "c" was pronounced as a soft "c" or "s" sound. English imported all of this variety of "c" usage, giving "c" such a diverse pronunciation.
The problem of "c"'s ambiguity has not escaped linguists throughout the history of English. Many people have sought to resolve the problem that "c" presents in the English language, some giving it the harsh fate of banishment from English. During the Early Modern English period (1500-1800 A.D.) John Hart wanted to reform the spelling of English. The image above is an example of John Hart's proposed spelling reform for English from his book An Orthographie published 1569. Notice how 'k' replaces 'c' in the word "come" spelled by Hart as "kum". Hart wanted "c" to remain only to represent the sound "ch", and for the other symbols "k" and "s" to take over the places where "c" is used to represent these sounds. Not at all a bad idea in my estimation. However, like any spelling reformation the costs of such a project would be almost insurmountable, not to mention that the whole process would be extremely confusing. So, instead of jumping one the spelling reform bandwagon I think I will remain content to leave the status of "c" as is. As long as I get to complain about how stupid it is.