Thank you, Piper. This is exactly what I meant to say, and a very good explanation. I appreciate your time and energy.
On Tue, Jun 30, 2020, 09:23 Piper Thunstrom <pathunst...@gmail.com> wrote: > > The original request for the change had absolutely no hint that the > current text was racist in any way; then we find out that, apparently, > we've been harboring white supremacist ideals by prescribing when to use > apostrophes and commas? That commit message (not the commit itself) took > what should have been a simple change and turned into a platform for > political grandstanding of the worst kind: > > > > - False, as far as I can tell (until given confirming examples from the > S&W text) > > - Only colored people are mentioned (and other /native English speakers/) > > - Zero mention of non-native English speakers > > So, I think I can explain. (Not with references because I've lost most > of them over the years, but bear with me.) > > The actual advice in The Elements of Style are mostly inoffensive when > taken on their own, and out of context. The problem is that the > Elements of Style (And many works like it) are built on a system of > white supremacy. The grammarian movement, in general, was built on > elevating a very specific form of English over others. It specifically > was chosen to avoid "lower class" usages and things like AAVE (though > that term would not exist for decades after the movement reached a > furor). > > The commentary in the commit message is a plain and simple description > of the effects of the grammarian movement to someone who has studied > the topic. > > Strunk & White is just one possible edifice of that history. As > mentioned already in this thread, it is not the name of the authors > that is the problem, but the movement and history of Standard English > that is the edifice of white supremacy. You cannot evaluate the book > strictly outside of the context in which it was written and used and > declare it's not white supremacist. > > In summary: > > The thing being objected to was the idea that we should choose > Standard English as our basis for our language guide. Further, S&W, a > classical work on how to write Standard English well, is a bad guide > when discussing in light of that fact. Each individual who likes > Elements of Style is not wrong for liking the book, you can keep it on > your shelf and no one will be angry. But this argument about Standard > English is propping up a hegemony that affects multiple axes of > oppression, and we should be aware of that. > > Piper Thunstrom > > My public key is available at https://keybase.io/pathunstrom > Public key fingerprint: 8FF9 3F4E C447 55EC 4658 BDCC A57E A7A4 86D2 644F >
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