Linguistic prescription
[3] Such prescriptions may be motivated by consistency (making a language simpler or more logical); rhetorical effectiveness; tradition; aesthetics or personal preferences; linguistic purism or nationalism (i.e. removing foreign influences);[4] or to avoid causing offense (etiquette or political correctness).
[20] The chief aim of linguistic prescription is to specify socially preferred language forms (either generally, as in Standard English, or in style and register) in a way that is easily taught and learned.
A good example of this is the demeaning of AAVE in the United States, as the idea that the "lower race" speaks improperly is propagated by people with an opposing ideology.
[25] Books such as Lynne Truss's Eats, Shoots & Leaves (2003), which argues for stricter adherence to prescriptive punctuation rules, also seek to exert an influence.
Style guides vary in form, and may be alphabetical usage dictionaries, comprehensive manuals divided into numerous subsection by the facet of language, or very compact works insistent upon only a few matters of particular importance to the publisher.
Many publishers have established an internal house style specifying preferred spellings and grammatical forms, such as serial commas, how to write acronyms, and various awkward expressions to avoid.
Most of these are internal documentation for the publisher's staff, though various newspapers, universities, and other organizations have made theirs available for public inspection, and sometimes even sell them as books, e.g.
Various style guides are used for academic papers and professional journals and have become de facto standards in particular fields, though the bulk of their material pertains to formatting of source citations (in mutually conflicting ways).
A well-respected style guide, and usually one intended for a general audience, may also have the kind of authority that a dictionary does consult as a reference work to satisfy personal curiosity or settle an argument.
Historically, linguistic prescriptivism originates in a standard language when a society establishes social stratification and a socio-economic hierarchy.
[32] Special ceremonial languages known only to a select few spiritual leaders are found throughout the world; Liturgical Latin has served a similar function for centuries.
Another commonly cited example of prescriptive language usage closely associated with social propriety is the system of Japanese honorific speech.
[38][39] A frequent criticism is that prescription has a tendency to favor the language of one particular area or social class over others, and thus militates against linguistic diversity.
[40] Frequently, a standard dialect is associated with the upper class, for example the United Kingdom's Received Pronunciation (RP).
While some linguists approve the practical role of language standardization in modern nation states,[13][43] certain models of prescriptive codification have been criticized for going far beyond mere norm-setting, i.e. by promoting the sanctioned language variety as the only legitimate means of communication and presenting it as the only valid baseline of correctness, while stigmatizing non-standard usages as "mistakes".
[44][45][13] Such practices have been said to contribute to perpetuating the belief that non-codified forms of language are innately inferior, creating social stigma and discrimination toward their speakers.
[46][47] In contrast, modern linguists would generally hold that all forms of language, including both vernacular dialects and different realizations of a standardized variety, are scientifically equal as instruments of communication, even if deemed socially inappropriate for certain situational contexts.
[50] Propagating such language attitudes is characteristic of the prescriptivists in Eastern Europe, where normativist ideas of correctness can be found even among professional linguists.
Judgments that seek to resolve ambiguity or increase the ability of the language to make subtle distinctions are easier to defend.
[54][55] (Linguists may accept that a construction is ungrammatical or incorrect in relation to a certain lect if it does not conform to its inherent rules, but they would not consider it absolutely wrong simply because it diverges from the norms of a prestige variety.
)[43] A classic example from 18th-century England is Robert Lowth's tentative suggestion that preposition stranding in relative clauses sounds colloquial.
Samuel Johnson commented on the tendency of some prescription to resist language change: When we see men grow old and die at a certain time one after another, from century to century, we laugh at the elixir that promises to prolong life to a thousand years; and with equal justice may the lexicographer be derided, who is able to produce no example of a nation that has preserved their words and phrases from mutability, shall imagine that his dictionary can embalm his language, and secure it from corruption and decay, that it is in his power to change sublunary nature, and clear the world at once from folly, vanity, and affectation.
With this hope, however, academies have been instituted, to guard the avenues of their languages, to retain fugitives, and repulse intruders; but their vigilance and activity have hitherto been vain; sounds remain too volatile and subtle for legal restraints; to enchain syllables, and to lash the wind, are equally the undertakings of pride, unwilling to measure its desires by its strength.
The French language has visibly changed under the inspection of the academy; the stile of Amelot's translation of Father Paul is witnessed, by Pierre François le Courayer to be un peu passé; and no Italian will maintain that the diction of any modern writer is not perceptibly different from that of Boccace, Machiavel, or Caro.
