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by zimpenfish
1921 days ago
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> A lot of writing rules are of the "follow it until you know how and when to break it" variety. Prescriptivists never seem to add that clarifying nuance to their advice though. > That way if you never learn how to break them correctly, your writing is still a lot better than it was. That assumes their advice is good in the first place - when professional linguists call it trash, I'd have to wonder if it is. |
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They often do, in my experience. AFAIK it hasn't been common to attempt any kind of real, strict prescriptivism in English since the middle of last century (yes, I'm sure a few examples exist). These days it's mostly "write like this—until you know better" or "avoid X if your audience is Y, for such-and-such reason".