Focus on form

[Uncle Roger]

Denying incorrect use of language by a native is denying that you have ever made a mistake when talking or writing in your native language
Everybody went through their L1 education unscathed and nobody has ever corrected them in speech. Ever.
Totally believable.
I must be the only one to whom it didn't happen. Shame on me...

And while many mistakes can be ascribed to the element of "performance" of either speaking or writing (i.e. under different circumstances, if you had the time to double check or think more etc, you wouldn't have made that mistake), there are many situations in which the speaker wouldn't be aware of the mistake, which is thus embedded in their language use and ultimately gives it an element of incorrectness.

[rdearman]

Ok. This thread seems to be getting a little heated. So let's make sure we are attacking only peoples positions in the debate not the people themselves. As smallwhite has said if your going to reference studies or other authorities then please provide some links. If it is just an opinion then please say so. Discussion is encouraged here, but it must be civil. This post is directed at all participants in the thread.

[kulaputra]

What if I have actually heard them? Even just once?.

I already told you. If native speakers did produce such utterances then they would by definition be grammatical. The only judge of grammaticality is whether a native speaker finds them to be grammatical or not. If some native speakers find an utterance grammatical, then it is perfectly valid for them. What's fascinating is, if you do field work in linguistics, you will find that such variations are nonetheless rule-governed and fundamentally make sense, that is, they carry meaning for their users. They are not merely chaotic or malicious mistakes on the part of ignoramuses, as prescriptivists tend to think.

What about the Italian ones I have mentioned, of which probably you know nothing about.

I don't speak Italian, so I can't comment on them specifically, but my comment above is generally true for any language. I simply don't understand your indignation or anger.

I'm not interested in theory when the praxis is so glaringly obvious. There is such thing as the incorrect use of the language, even from native speakers.

What exactly does "theory" and "praxis" even mean here? This is a linguistics forum, not a Marxist one. Simply reiterating your point, again and again, doesn't make you more right.

If only kulaputra could post a link or two.

What exactly would you like a link to? Amazon? Literally any introductory linguistics textbook will cover what I'm telling you, and earlier I gave an example of a non-textbook paperback that's fairly accessible to laymen. With all due respect, it's clear neither of you have any academic or professional experience here. Simply barking at people and demanding they give you stuff without putting in an iota of effort in educating yourself is condescending and off putting. For whatever reason people think simply knowing one or ten languages makes them an expert on how language functions in general, as if possessing one or ten organs would make you a doctor. Linguistics is actually science and for those of us who have studied it, the opinions you are espousing are akin to telling a doctor about the wonders of homeopathy.

I don't particularly dislike either of you or hold it against you (as opposed to Roger's barely concealed anger towards me) since this kind of behavior vis-a-vis language is very common.

[Cainntear]

First up, apologies for last night. Posting at that time on a Saturday night/Sunday morning is not a good idea, for reasons that I will leave the reader to infer...

1) why is my language "just bad Latin"? It has its own grammar, its own sounds, its own vocabulary. Long live the dialects, but there is such a thing as the Italian language.

But these grammatical, phonological and lexical points can all be described relative to Latin as errors, if you so wish.

On the flipside, anything you describe as an "error" in any language can be described as a grammatical, phonological or lexical feature of the speaker's dialect/sociolect/idiolect, and thus not an error.

Let's see your intermediate Italian...

How can you deny that saying something like

"Ho visto Maria e gli ho detto che sto per andare in vacanza"

contains an undisputable mistake that, were it a habit, would make you a less correct speaker than somebody that does not make that mistake?

Or

"Se mi piacerebbe quella band, andrei a vederla".

Both sentences contain bona fide mistakes. End of.

No, not "end of". If it is a habit, that makes it a "rule" (if you want to use the term) in the speaker's own personal language. If it is a rule in the personal language of numerous speakers of the language, then it is a rule in the language, and what I would call an accepted variant.

Same as 2+2=5 is a mistake in arithmetics.

That's entirely different. Mathematics is a formal language, not a natural one, and has a strictness and precision you could never expect a spoken language to achieve. Even if you managed to create a conlang that was completely precise, very quickly it would become imprecise in its usage... if it was even possible to actually learn the language in the first place (is anyone truly fluent in Lojban?)

[b]Also, I didn't mean that "you" would be a bad speaker of the language, rather "one", anyone who started to ignore rules and say shit such as "I didn't do nothing", "have you seen mine socks?", "you was wrong" etc.
How can these not be incorrect use of the language?

As previously stated, these have all been part of the legitimate variation of the language at some point in history, and the first and third can certainly still be heard in dialectal forms today -- not sure whether number 2 still exists, though.

The double negative is only considered wrong now because it was considered wrong in the past, and was therefore taught as being wrong, which is a very circular definition of wrong.

As I recall it, the reason it was "wrong" is because it's unGermanic, and there was a trend to try to emphasise the Germanic roots of English because of hostility towards the French and Spanish.

"you was wrong" is a far more interesting case, because if you look at restoration comedies (plays written in England in the period following the so-called English Civil War) you'll see a lot of "we was", "you was" etc. English has all but lost its notion of conjugation for person, and it was entirely logical for English to make that final step-change and lose the last vestiges.
...but some people didn't like it and started insisting on using what they considered the "correct" form. Thus we got to situation where...

Fcuk me, if there is no wrong in native language use, why are they even taught in schools? What's the point in teaching something you can't do wrong? Can you answer this?

Well that is a very circular argument. Consider an analogous situation.

Italian law (as I understand it) insists that Catholicism be taught in all schools. Would you argue for God's existence on these terms -- "If there is no God, why is religion taught in schools?" The teaching of religion only shows that the system believes that God exists, not that he exists. Similarly, teaching "correct language" only shows a belief in "correct language", not the correctness of that belief.

There are other elements of language that are taught in schools.

One is "language awareness" -- you make children aware of how they speak. Noun phrases, verbs, all that stuff, just based on how they do speak rather than how they should speak.

Another is "register awareness" -- pointing out that there are different ways of talking to different people, and that while something might be normal where you are, it would sound weird to other people, so you should adapt your speak.

Then you've got "composition" -- how to write language for clarity and ease of comprehension.

None of these start from the assumption that the kid in class is "wrong" or "worse" and needs to be made "correct" or "better".

Wouldn't you mark those as mistakes if you were correcting an essay of one of your students?

Of course I would, but I'm teaching the language as an L2, and I mostly teach academic English rather than general English, and even when I did teach general English, it was overseas, so teaching a geographically-specific version would be madness. If I was teaching shopkeepers in my area, however, I would be teaching the local vernacular as that's what they would need -- teaching them so-called "correct English" would be doing them a disservice.

Again, I have shown you mistakes in the use of two languages when you claim that "all native language is correct". How am I the flatearther in this?

Both flat-Earthers and globe-Earthers present facts to support their case. Both flat-Earthers and globe-Earthers believe their facts are genuine, true, and definitive. Both sides look at each other and disregard the other's facts as wrong. Both believe that the other only believes what they believe due to ignorance and a conspiracy. A globe-Earther looks exactly the same to a flat-Earther as a flat-Earther does to a globe-Earther.
That was my point -- you called me a flat-Earther, but I didn't call you a flat-Earther.

3) The spectrum of native ability isn't about correct vs incorrect, any more than the spectrum of light is. No-one's going to claim that green is "correct colour" and everything else is "dialect" or any nonsense like that. All native language is correct.

I really, really hope I don't have to specify that what I meant all the time i USE of language, because I can't think of any other explanation for you saying that "all native language is correct". That sounds to me like saying "any multiplication is correct" in a world where one could compute 5x5=30. Saying "green is the correct colour" is like claiming that one timbre of voice is the correct one. It's not a correct analogy of what I am saying.

I was simply pointing out that your original analogy was invalid.

[Xmmm]

All native language is correct.

+1000

[Cainntear]

As smallwhite has said if your going to reference studies or other authorities then please provide some links.

As kulaputra says, this is basic textbook stuff, and unfortunately I got rid of my textbooks over a decade ago.

In general, we can talk about there being two types of errors: mistakes and slips.

A mistake is an error that shows you have a flawed mental model of whatever you're trying to do/learn/achieve.
A slip, also known as a "performance error", is when you know how to do something right, but you just happen to do it wrong on the day.

When I say "all native language is correct", I'm saying (as is the orthodox view in linguistics) that native speaker make no mistakes in their language, because they have a fully formed and fully natively acquired grammar, and they are correctly applying the rules they have learned. It does not matter that the rules they have learned are slightly different from the rules learned by someone born 100 miles away.
However, a native can make slips and that is an error.

Thus, by modern descriptive standards, any structure that is said consistently and habitually by a group of speakers of a language is an acceptable variant form for that language.

Of course, for the L2 learner, mistakes are perfectly possible, as they are still developing their language model.

[Cainntear]

I don't speak Italian, so I can't comment on them specifically, but my comment above is generally true for any language. I simply don't understand your indignation or anger.

"Ho visto Maria e gli ho detto che sto per andare in vacanza"

Literally "I saw Maria and I told her that I'm about to go on holiday."

"Se mi piacerebbe quella band, andrei a vederla".

Literally "If I would like that band, I would go to see it."

In this case, the literal translation works perfectly for our purposes, because the controversy over these forms in Italian is very similar to the situation in English.

[rdearman]

"all native language is correct"

I don't be thinking that be correct, cause wen I's axe my ma she says I talking like a fool. But I's liken dis new thing wheres I is always right evens when I don't talk good, cause now yous has told me I is always right cause I is a native speaker and I ain't gotta fallow no rules. I's a native talker so I ain't gotta talk good no more.

"all native language is correct"

Not all native language is correct, or I could just utter any old bollocks and call it English. Native language is an agreed standard, otherwise nobody could understand each other. The agreement might change over time, but sweeping statements like all native language is correct isn't correct.

[kulaputra]

I don't be thinking that be correct, cause wen I's axe my ma she says I talking like a fool.

It's funny you bring up "axe." This was actually the standard pronunciation of "ask" until the 17th century or so, while "ask" was a minor regionalism from the north of England. It disseminated from there until it replaced the old pronunciation- in many, but not all, dialects. So who's to say you're not wrong when you say "ask" instead of "axe"?

Various other grammatical expressions you're using here are perfectly valid in some English dialects, but they don't mean what you think they mean, because from the perspective of those dialects you're an L2 learner. African-American Vernacular English, for example, uses a habitual be, so for speakers of that dialect, "I be thinking" and "I am thinking" literally don't mean the same thing. The former is closer to standard English, "I have been thinking, I still am thinking, and I'm gonna keep thinking" that is, you habitually think about the subject at hand. You may know from learning other languages with similar mechanisms that this is an example of what's called "grammatical aspect." Some languages/dialects mark aspect, to varying degrees, while some don't mark it at all. None of them are "wrong." Mocking them for this makes about as much sense as mocking Spanish speakers for not declining their nouns like the Romans did.

Also, again, orthography isn't language, it's an artifice on top of language.

But I's liken dis new thing wheres I is always right evens when I don't talk good, cause now yous has told me I is always right cause I is a native speaker and I ain't gotta fallow no rules. I's a native talker so I ain't gotta talk good no more.

The point is you are following rules, but you're not conscious of those rules, and they emerge organically, because language is a biological function. That's not called "I is always right evens when I don't talk good." It's called science.

Not all native language is correct, or I could just utter any old bollocks and call it English. Native language is an agreed standard, otherwise nobody could understand each other. The agreement might change over time, but sweeping statements like all native language is correct isn't correct.

And yet literally no native speakers of English do this organically. You're doing it to win an argument; it has no reflection on the scientific realities of language. You are absolutely correct that native language is a consensus thing, but what that consensus is, is literally never what your primary school grammar textbooks claim it is. Amongst many dialects, ain't IS agreed upon as valid. For such speakers, saying "ain't" isn't wrong.

What you meant to say is "Native language is an agreed standard by various elitist institutions." That is a more accurate reflection of your views, whereas what you actually said only agrees with my argument.

I'm consistently astounded by the sheer obstinacy with which people assert their pseudoscientific opinions about language. Not that I think you're an obstinate person; I think it's just cultural habit, namely being told from a young age about what supposedly is and isn't valid language.

[Cainntear]

"all native language is correct"

I don't be thinking that be correct, cause wen I's axe my ma she says I talking like a fool. But I's liken dis new thing wheres I is always right evens when I don't talk good, cause now yous has told me I is always right cause I is a native speaker and I ain't gotta fallow no rules. I's a native talker so I ain't gotta talk good no more.

First up... "talking like a fool" -- that's the problem here. If talking like the people around you is taken as a sign of low intelligence, that is an implicit negative appraisal of the people around you. I'm all for genuine social justice ("political correctness" as Uncle Roger would have it) and judging vast swathes of people as "fools" because of their local culture is... well, it's just thoroughly objectionable.

It has been used throughout history (and to this day in some places) to justify the suppression of indigenous people in pretty much every colonised country in history.
It has been used historically to justify continued segregation of black people in the US.
It has been used to further marginalise and impoverish rural populations in most so-called "civilised" countries
Hell, it was even used by eugenicists to identify who was "mentally deficient" and therefore a candidate for forced sterilisation.

Consider two kids, Albert and Benny.
Albert's parents are from middle class cosmopolitan backgrounds and speak standard English. Albert is brought up to speak standard English, and spends most of his pre-school years playing with toys with practically no educational value.
Benny's parents are from a rural farming community and speak a very distinct variety of African-American Vernacular English. Albert's pre-school years are spent playing with toys that encourage number awareness, pattern recognition and problem solving.

Albert and Benny start at the same school on the same day. Which one sounds "intelligent" and which one "sounds like a fool"?

How much someone looks, sounds and acts like me is not a valid measure of intelligence, and we have to stop pretending it is.

"all native language is correct"

Not all native language is correct, or I could just utter any old bollocks and call it English.

Sorry, that's a total strawman. Native language is a mechanism in the brain that spontaneously produces utterances with semantic meanings. If you "utter any old bollocks", you're not using the native language circuitry, because it cannot spontaneously produce nonsense (unless you're concussed, suffer a brain injury or are under the influence of a mind-altering substance... which leads to the interesting philosophical question as to whether poetry written while taking an acid trip qualifies as language or not). Instead you are deliberately, consciously producing your bollocks. You may employ the language circuitry as part of that, but there are conscious, directed mechanisms at play also, and these lie outwith* the language centre.

*As we're talking about right and wrong, I couldn't resist using my favourite Scottish word, which I didn't even know was specifically Scottish until my late twenties.

Native language is an agreed standard, otherwise nobody could understand each other. The agreement might change over time, but sweeping statements like all native language is correct isn't correct.

At the risk of sounding all Mr. Spock, that is illogical.

First up, many languages have no agreed standard (I imagine this is actually the majority of languages in existence today, and it's certainly the majority of human languages spoken in history). Don't these languages have native speakers then?

Secondly, native language is the language you are brought up speaking, by definition. If you have to modify later and abandon the rules you acquired natively, then it's hard to argue that what you are speaking is truly your native language.

Besides, even if we disregard that, it's almost certain that for any language with a agreed prescriptive standard, nobody speaks it 100% "correctly". Logically, (if following your definition) would that not imply that no language has any genuine native speakers?