Linguistic Prescription: Familiar Practices and New Perspectives
Author(s)
Finegan, Edward
Abstract
A law student inquires whether a correction of sneaked to snuck suggests misinformation and misguided rigidity. This chapter reports an answer to that question in the context of better information about current legal usage and a perennial tendency to linguistic prescription. It also explores attitudes to current borrowings from English into Japanese and French and distinguishes between language as a vehicle of communication and as a symbol of cultural values. Finally, the chapter indicates the schizophrenic character of linguistic judgments about prescription and description and concludes with a characterization of current guidelines for nonsexist language use as sensible prescription.
