Whys & Therefores: A Rational Look at the English Language

Whys & Therefores aids the reader in arriving at generalizations for the shape of the English language: words, grammar, meaning, sound and spelling. The format adopted throughout is that of a light-hearted ongoing Socratic dialogue between a mentor and a pupil. The intended effects of such activity are: awareness of what it means to 'know' a language; reliance upon native-language intuition; discovery of what one didn't know that one already 'knows' about the language; use of ungrammaticality as an investigative tool; healthy questioning of received facts about language from so-called experts; and usefulness of language play. Whys & Therefores can be read as a book, dipped into at random, expanded upon, even acted out. The language phenomena treated therein are indexed and tabbed to the dialogues where they are discussed, making Whys & Therefores a valuable source of reference. Whys & Therefores is intended as an entertaining yet serious do-it-yourself book about aspects of English language form and meaning. However, it will also prove useful to schools as classroom material to be further exploited by the instructor in free-range dialogue form, and to institutions offering teacher training in rational-based instructional procedures for English language education in the schools.