One of my good friends Arvind Narayanan (who regretfully is not very cordial when he comments on my blogs) has seriously questioned the approach of this blog, and my qualifications to write it. Below is my response. I think I am justified in not publishing any more of his challenges, going forward as I don't want to spoil the tone of this blog, it is meant to be a non-controversial light space, and accessible to young people. (That, as far as I can detect right now, there are no young people or otherwise visiting this blog, other than my friends, does not discourage me, since I like doing this!)
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Dude, I think you cannot just have this casual approach to teaching English. I think you are causing more harm than good.
You cannot give a low quality answer like "this sounds more smooth" and hope to get away with it. A child might accept your answer - and thats why you need to be much more responsible before dispensing advise. Your answers have got to be more precise and accurate.
The time lyrics are so out of place in this blog it is beyond irritating.
I would suggest you stop this blog or acquire real expertise in grammar that goes beyond "this sounds right."
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I would count myself as someone very familiar with English. If I needed to justify these I would proffer a few somewhat offbeat items of proof: my english teacher at high school said that I 'would be an asset to any english department in the country', I've always scored well in english exams including a full score on the English GRE. I've read a ton of books, and written a lot through blogs (though I would be the first to admit that I don't proofread very much on the blogs). I would say I have evolved a nice sense of the language and I can critique quite well a piece of writing.
I was just being honest in responding to some of the questions as this 'sounds right' or 'sounds smooth'. The following are relevant:
-- it is quite possible, and I pointed that out, that the person who set the questions was incompetent or intended for more than one construction to be valid. In that case, indeed what I said makes sense. In fact in a phone conversation Arvind was actually not able to refute any of the statements I made, and since he's no mean wordsmith I rest my case.
-- English is highly idiosyncratic language and the rules have infinite exceptions. Besides usage is evolving rapidly, and usage varies from country to country. So indeed there are many areas where there is ambiguity and its the right thing to indicate the ambiguity rather than proffer a false clarity.
Regarding posting the lyrics of the song "Time" ; its a highly individual choice. I do this blog and it will reflect my likes and dislikes. Time is indeed a somewhat adult themed song but I feel that most of the time children don't suffer from being introduced to some serious ideas early. Don't misinterpret that statement - childhood is indeed a delicate time and harsh treatment or cruelty or other such indeed is terrible and can and should be a cognizable offence. But if a blog out on the web which no one is forced to visit (and which at this point no one visits!), which parents can censor; if this blog occasionally gets serious, why should anyone have a problem with that?
Okay - topic closed. Arvind -- your posts here will henceforth be moderated, not responded to.
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3 comments:
Babu,
Although I agree that Arvind was tres harsh in his response, that should not (in my opinion) be reason for you to effectively ban him! After all, if you are completely honest, you must see some truth in what he said. Yes, your English and vocabulary is outstanding because of the book-worm you've always been but sentence structure and grammar are a different story and needs specialized training like MS or PhD in English. We may know that somehow that sentence does not sound right or sounds awkward but the English major knows exactly why this is so. For example, I'm almost certain that "Kapil Dev is one of the greatest cricketers in the world" is more precise and better structured than "One of the greatest cricketers in the world is Kapil Dev" but I don't know why. An English major would.
So, I'm going to ask that you remove this unnecessary moderation of this blog and let Arvind comment away. Me believes that you would not be so upset if you didn't see some truth in what he says.
With that said, I still like the idea of this blog, I like your writing and I can personally vouch that you are a great teacher and can convey ideas with clarity of expression that very few can from all the teaching I had from you in school!
Poor Puneetha, she is going to think we are all a bunch of nit-wits and not come back here again :-)
Sajini
Well.
As Priya and I were also dicussing, I am not at all a grammar person (and I'm not at all sure what value really grammer people add, finally writing good and correct English comes from other stuff), and definitely the flavour of this blog would be about a sense of the language and not about grammar. Nevertheless, I would not discourage grammar questions to this blog, and will answer them in my own unique style :-)
Priya suggested that I need to lay all this out upfront to make clear the point of the blog, which is a good idea.
Re. Arvind -- what's to say. The man's attitude on my blogs is so unconstructive and argumentative which is fine on the general interest stuff, but here I am trying to maintain a nice atmosphere. He's already posted one such unconstructive comment earlier. As you yourself said, kid visitors are already going to be thinking -- what is all this nonsense going on.
So while the idea is not to 'ban'
Arvind, it is certainly to moderate strictly.
=Vijay
Cool beans.
Quote - definitely the flavour of this blog would be about a sense of the language and not about grammar.
Point well taken. The above quote 'splains it all.
Sajini
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